Credit Unions

[DarinSchmidt]

As for closing the HSA and spending the tax free money on whatever you want... can I see this written on the plan? I am almost assured this would be illegal... if not I would love to utilize that plan for nothing more than stock piling money into it only to close it out at the end of the year, rinse and repeat.... IRA what? we don't need those we have HSA's that allow you to close them and keep the money

Who said anything about closing them? ----- Correction: I c where you missunderstood what i was saying, forgot that i mentioned about switching over to a traditional insurance plan----And when i said that you could spend it on anything, i was refering to anything mediacal as thats what it is, a medical account.

[micki]

Wow this thread exploded...*wonder why*....

As for credit unions, they are ok unless you leave the area, or need in house banking out of area, or go over seas, or want share options... i can go on and on... as with anything there are pros and cons with both...  but my rates here(pnc) are just fine the way they are, and the employee account makes it too good to want to move anywhere.

Usbank had better rates on both of the homes I purchased over WPCU... and my credit score was good both times, so that is not a factor at all... On a side note I hate usbank, and closed all my other account with them aside from the mortgage.

As for closing the HSA and spending the tax free money on whatever you want... can I see this written on the plan? I am almost assured this would be illegal... if not I would love to utilize that plan for nothing more than stock piling money into it only to close it out at the end of the year, rinse and repeat.... IRA what? we don't need those we have HSA's that allow you to close them and keep the money

MOST HSA suck, they are slow to pay, they audit your claims almost all the time, they sometimes will lock your account, they wont allow you to roll your funds over at the end, you cant transfer funds from them, and though they are tax free you shouldn't count on the interest. they have pros and cons like all...

+1

I think the slow to pay and auditing etc. are a lot of my sons complaints.  And you are correct on the withdraw of HSA monies. 

[DarinSchmidt]

Dental and vision are "approved" to be used for medical.  Tylenol used to be but was taken off I think last year.  The idea of I don't want this anymore so I'll take my money and buy a new TV is not true.  You have to be able to prove you spent the money on "approved" medical supplies, dr. visits etc. per the law. 

That is crazy what your Aunt has to do, what a waste!

I wasnt saying that you could go on a shopping spree with it if you decided it wasnt able to protect your family anymore. But that you could stop paying into it, spend the rest on medial stuff till you run out and then pay for a traditional form of insurance.

My dad has a Debit card that he uses for his HSA. SO there is no wait process

[micki]

HSA's are for "healthier" people. But i do have a kid and IF that becomes such a factor that HSA no longer is making the cut, I can always get out of it and spend all that money saved, with interest, tax free, for whatever.

This didn't come across to me that you were going to spend it all on medical expenses, just sayin... 

[DarinSchmidt]

This didn't come across to me that you were going to spend it all on medical expenses, just sayin... 

Yeah, sorry, i should have said spend it on whatever lol, should have been more specific.

[micki]

But that you could stop paying into it, spend the rest on medial stuff till you run out and then pay for a traditional form of insurance.

My dad has a Debit card that he uses for his HSA. SO there is no wait process

Depends on your company, my son doesn't have a choice it's HSA or nothing.  He too has a credit card but still has issues.  We looked into getting HSA for our company and there were just too many loop holes for us to feel comfortable to provide that for our employees.  I think there may be a day when HSA will be our only choice and we will have to bite the bullet and do that, but I'm not sure we are comfortable taking that leap at this time.  Never know what 2012 will bring when it's time to renew though. 

[DarinSchmidt]

I had an HSA when i worked for Northrup Grumman also. But it was kind of odd. They would give you 2k per year, it would roll over, you could put more into if you want to, and they also gave us a medical card (not a debit card) which then we could use, the doctor office would send in the claim and i paid nothing out of pocket, not even a co-pay, and they would send the doctor the money.

There are many types of HSA's out there. You just have to find the one you are happy with if your employer's insurance sucks.

[DarinSchmidt]

The HSA link from that one Credit Union i posted, it has a Visa Debit card, it wouldnt hurt to look into that and see if he would better benefit from that. Unless the Company is forcing him to sign up for theirs somehow.

[micki]

The HSA link from that one Credit Union i posted, it has a Visa Debit card, it wouldnt hurt to look into that and see if he would better benefit from that. Unless the Company is forcing him to sign up for theirs somehow.

Yes he has to use the one the company uses.  When we looked into switching our employees to an HSA, they would have had to go with the plan/group we chose, not just any of them they chose.

[micki]

worked for Northrup Grumman also.

On a side note... A friend of mine just started working for Northrup Grumman about a month ago.  She was working for General Dynamics I think.  Small world!

[slandis3]

I went through Universal one credit union. Our credit score was 700+ with both the wife and I so no issues there. Chase also offers more no fee ATM's than any credit union plus offer a lot more online interactions. I haven't been inside a bank in a long time, with U1CU I had to go to the bank for everything.

[Todd W.]

Very happy with WPCU.  Have thought about looking at doing more of our banking with USAA but haven't had a lot of time to research it. 

[DarinSchmidt]

I went through Universal one credit union. Our credit score was 700+ with both the wife and I so no issues there. Chase also offers more no fee ATM's than any credit union plus offer a lot more online interactions. I haven't been inside a bank in a long time, with U1CU I had to go to the bank for everything.

I didnt care much for U1CU either. i dont think they hgave the financial backing like WPCU does though. And yet at the U1CU, the manager or whatever drives a Zx0..... I ended up closing an account i had there and went to WPCU. WPCU has a ton of online features and such, just as functional as a fed bank. Fed Banks promote spending, WPCU promotes saving.

[slandis3]

I didnt care much for U1CU either. i dont think they hgave the financial backing like WPCU does though. And yet at the U1CU, the manager or whatever drives a Zx0..... I ended up closing an account i had there and went to WPCU. WPCU has a ton of online features and such, just as functional as a fed bank. Fed Banks promote spending, WPCU promotes saving.

Yea still not worth switching, I have my house loans and car loans there so payments are easy and I can do my payments weekly ( which I do on my cars) which I like.

[DarinSchmidt]

Yea still not worth switching, I have my house loans and car loans there so payments are easy and I can do my payments weekly ( which I do on my cars) which I like.

Going to a credit union wont prevent you from doing any of that....

I'm notby any means saying that anyone should switch. I was just wnting to inform people of the national "Switch to a Credit Union" week.

But some people like what they have and there is nothing wrong with that. Banks of any kind, any branch, any state, any city will provide you diff rates on loans and such that you apply for, credit union or federal.

I havent had anyone beat the CU's rates in the past 2-3 years. My Co-worker just applied for a car loan and got 3.2% , I get 7% interest on the first $500 in my savings account and standard rates on anything over that. I have made more money on my savings account at the CU in the past year than i have in the past 15 or so years at a Fed bank. The past 2-4 years they have offered something like "Profit sharing" Credit unions are non profit, i forget what they called it, but they gave us money since they did so well the past 4 years, about $100 or so each time. How many of the Fed banks hand out free money? I can do anything on WPCU's website that i can on USBank or Chase.com that i am aware of. The Closest WPCU from me is in Troy but i can go to Universal 1 credit union and access my WPCU accounts if needed.

[Boonjob]

A dividend., and nothing is free. even a dividend...

[DarinSchmidt]

It was free to me. I never paid them anything, never had to sign up for anything, etc.

[Boonjob]

You signed up for an account with them, and meet certain criteria... and you paid for it... they dont get their extra income(dividend) from thin air.

[slandis3]

Going to a credit union wont prevent you from doing any of that....

True but switching my home loan to another bank often (not always) means you gotta pay to have an appraisal done, closing cost, etc. Not worth the hassle and the missed work.

[DarinSchmidt]

You can twist it however you want Boon. It was money they gave to their customers that no Federal bank would ever give you. You have to have a bank account for many jobs these days so signing up for an account is a normal part of life. Nothing in life is free, sure, if you want to get down and technical about it, but i had to do nothing extra to get it, and i already had an account before they decided to do it, so it's not like they were dangling a dividend carrot in front of me to entice me to sign up for an account, switch my bank account type into something else, get a loan from them, etc, to get the dividend. I didnt have to pay to get my account, i pay no anual fees, i just got a car loan from them not too long ago, so it was other people's money from loans and bank investments that paid the dividend to me.

Though the dividend that you got was based on how many accounts you have, how much money you have in your accounts, any laons you have with them, etc.

[DarinSchmidt]

rue but switching my home loan to another bank often (not always) means you gotta pay to have an appraisal done, closing cost, etc. Not worth the hassle and the missed work.

Yeah, you have to pay $300 to get an appraisal done, which has prevented me from putting the effort into switching over my home loan currently as well. But i did check and see what i could get my home loan down to and it was 3.25%, but i been curently throwing all of my extra income towards the business and my car.

I was just wanting others to know that by reading this thread that a CU isnt some kind of stone age bank that some kind of make them out to be, and not all credit unions are created equial, but offer better customer perks i think than fed banks. I was just wanting to make people aware of the event this week and it's turned into a debate between CU's vs FB's. Some Fed Banks are good as well by not charging you to hold your money, demanding a min balance, etc, like i have with USBank. They were the first Bank to give me a 5k Credit Card with 8% APR. But thats about the only good thing that has come from them compared to my experiences with other banks.

[DarinSchmidt]

Wow this thread exploded...*wonder why*....

As for credit unions, they are ok unless you leave the area, or need in house banking out of area, or go over seas, or want share options...

You mention Share Options, I'm not totally sure what this is but it may be what you are talking about, I havent looked into it to see what all is available as i'm not really interested in it. http://www.wpcu.coop/Index/LearnMore/ProductsRates/Investments/SelfDirectedInvesting.aspx

But with you having an employee account with PNC (one of those who were banking off of people forclosing homes by frauding paperwork and such along with Chase, Wells Fargo, and i think 1-2 more major ones.), i'm sure there are attached benefits to that account that other banks cant offer.

[Boonjob]

You can twist it however you want Boon. It was money they gave to their customers that no Federal bank would ever give you. You have to have a bank account for many jobs these days so signing up for an account is a normal part of life. Nothing in life is free, sure, if you want to get down and technical about it, but i had to do nothing extra to get it, and i already had an account before they decided to do it, so it's not like they were dangling a dividend carrot in front of me to entice me to sign up for an account, switch my bank account type into something else, get a loan from them, etc, to get the dividend. I didnt have to pay to get my account, i pay no anual fees, i just got a car loan from them not too long ago, so it was other people's money from loans and bank investments that paid the dividend to me.

Though the dividend that you got was based on how many accounts you have, how much money you have in your accounts, any laons you have with them, etc.

WHOA, WHOA, WHOA... slow your role... Nothing is being twisted here....

- CU have always done it, it's part of their non profit status... and actually yes they do use it as a pro to "entice" more business(and you did to.)

- Federal Banks can provide dividends, so saying they wont isn't accurate.... You collect one so easily from WPCU because of their not for profit status... by having an account you are a part shareholder in the company by default... the shareholder status is what earns you your dividend... Own share in your federal bank, and you could still collect one... Most federal banks prefer to keep their "retained earnings" and expand the company, in more ways than literal growth, some of these way can still show returns for their normal banking consumers.... 

- What may seem completely free to you is not the case... You pay interest on your loan(regardless of how great a % you got)... that interest is returned back to the investor(whether the union itself, or private). if returned to the union it is direct income(income you are paying to them)... if it is to a private investor, that investor will take a percentage of that and return it back to the union in the form of income for them servicing the account. NOW even though you state you have only a car loan and getting it for free your not... you are paying x% interest on every payment/transaction you are making... the union turns a profit off of that and is only giving you what is left over back... a 4 year dividend of $100 is not alot... that's $2.09 a month that they are giving back to you out of your % your paying them... federal banks can do the same with retained earnings, but they opt to offer cash back rewards, or points programs, yadda yadda yadda... every purchase nets you x back... they still do all of this too... it just depends on how they are allocating your funds.

- dividends are also comprised of more than just interest you pay, you are correct there... in that it comes from everyone in the union... so those who attract bad check fees,nsf,late charges etc may not feel the same way as you as they may have contributed to a considerable amount  more of your dividend than you did...


Not sure what I twisted.

[Boonjob]

But with you having an employee account with PNC (one of those who were banking off of people forclosing homes by frauding paperwork and such along with Chase, Wells Fargo, and i think 1-2 more major ones.), i'm sure there are attached benefits to that account that other banks cant offer.

Not sure what you are getting at here. its just a job for me...

But if you are referring to the moratorium, you may want to check the results better.

[Wall_Tank]

My dad has a Debit card that he uses for his HSA. SO there is no wait process

This is typically true for an HSA.   Micki, your son is probably refering to and HRA, which is operated by the company.