Update 1/5/2021: for anyone still doing this: reader Sexy_kitten7 notes that you no longer earn interest above $1,000, even on funds which were originally earned as interest (previously, only external loaded funds were subject to the $1,000 limit).
[Originally posted on 6/1/16, reposting on 7/1/16 since change is now going into effect and is also showing on the Netspend site. Time to unload our Netspend accounts now…]
Netspend is lowering the amount that earns a 5% APY rate on all of their prepaid cards from $5,000 to $1,000. The change will take effect on July 1, 2016, and it applies to all Netspend cards, including Netspend, Brinks, Western Union, HEB, Control, Ace Elite, and the Paypal Prepaid too.
You can find this update in your Netspend login by going to Move Money > Savings > Savings Terms and Conditions.
While you can keep the accounts for the $1,000 in interest, it’s probably not worth the effort, especially since there is already a slight hassle with keeping it fee-free from the 90-day inactivity fee.
There are still numerous other options which earn above-average interest rates, including Consumer’s Credit Union which earns 4.59% on up to $20,000, and the Mango and Insight prepaid cards. See “Which High-Interest Savings Account Should I Get?” for a run-down of all the options for high-interest accounts and for the best standard rates as well.
How to Unload
On July 1, most of us will want to empty out the balances from the accounts. Interest is paid quarterly so we’ll get a final interest payment for April – June, and we’ll then empty the accounts.
All the Netspend accounts come with an account/routing numbers and are ACH-enabled. Using the account/routing numbers, you should be able to pull the money out into your linked bank account or you can pay your credit card bill on the card issuer’s website. Be sure to first transfer the money from the savings account into the prepaid before making the ACH transfer.
Even savings accounts are getting killed off. 2016 has been brutal.
Hat tip to tbradnc on Reddit
Update 7/1/16: I’ve been having success pulling out money via ACH transfer to my regular checking account; I’ve so far kept my pulls under $2k each so as not to raise any red flags.
Netspend is changing inactivity period from 90 to 60 days.
Where did you see this change? When does it go into effect?
I noticed they’re also implementing a “Money Transfer Service Fee” – I’m wondering if this will also include ACH pulls from other institutions. Fee description:
Based on “ This fee is charged in addition to the signature purchase transaction fee” maybe this is for debit card based purchases with these services rather than ACH based?
They’re so fn greedy. It’s bad enough that they even charge their customers to actually use their debit card.
And they’re only charging $1.50 for xfers under $20? That’s so generous. That’s only a 7.5% charge. 🙄 It wouldn’t be so bad if their customers weren’t primarily ppl who can’t get a real bank acct.
Thank you. I guess that I will change my $.01 DDs from every 2 months to every month for all of my accounts.
Thanks.
I received alert/notifications on 2 of my 7 accounts, but when I logged in, I didn’t quite see that change in T&C among my messages
I checked my acct earlier and didn’t see it either, but they’re not good at updating their documents. I received outdated info about their referral payment and the savings acct rate.
Ive had these zeroed out for a while but want to keep them open. They wont charge an inactivity fee if there’s no money in the prepaid account – however the account will go to dormant status at 365 days and closed after 3 years (so im told). Ill likely just send $1 in/out every 60 days.
Im going to let the netspend accounts go dormant and no longer do the transfers to stop inactivity for the HEB netspend account. Since theres no inactivity fee if theres nothing in the prepaid account I suspect i can just transfer the quarterly interest from the savings > prepaid (this creates activity) and can then safely pull the funds out without a no activity fee and the account wont go dormant.
Therefore if this works no scheduled transfers to keep the account from getting inactivity is actually required.
I’m working through my accounts to pull my quarterly interest, but can’t get the Brinks Prepaid to send me the verification code. All the other ones have sent the codes and I use the same email for them all. Only the Brinks never arrives. (Yes, I checked the junk folder.)
Anyone else have this issue?
I think I had that issue also at some point. Request a text if the email doesn’t come through.
Unfortunately, I never added a cell number to that one. (Of my seven Netspend-type cards, only on has a phone number. Oops.)
I feel like I had this problem in the past as well. I tried turning off ad-blockers and switching off WiFi. No luck.
I really don’t want to have to call and talk to a human.
I ended up having to call. After insisting they try to send a code to my email to verify my, they let me answer a bunch of identity questions (as I don’t know where that card is!). The person was able to add my cell number so I could get in.
Are you still keeping $1K in the savings accounts? I cleared out most of the funds from all of my Netspend accounts except for HEB as the 5% rate is not currently attractive.
Is there a minimum balance for these accounts/cards? I’m going to zero them out for now without closing them. Will that be an issue in case I need to use them again?
Just leave $1 in the accounts to be safe. Make sure to continue to do a DD or you will be charged a fee.
Can someone confirm this? I am on netspend.com and the fine print
3. The optional Savings Account linked to your Netspend All-Access Account is made available to Accountholders through Pathward, N.A. or Republic Bank & Trust Company; Members FDIC. Interest is calculated on the Average Daily Balance(s) of the Savings Account and is paid quarterly.
If the Average Daily Balance is $2,000.00 or less, the interest rate paid on the entire balance will be 5.87% with an annual percentage yield (APY) of 6.00%.
Is the Netspend all-access account different from the savings account we have been using for years?
When I log in to my existing account, on the Savings Transfers page, it still shows the old info “If the Average Daily Balance is $1,000.00 or less, the interest rate paid on the entire balance will be 4.91% with an Annual Percentage Yield (APY) of 5.00%”. And the “Terms & Conditions” link goes to a pdf with the same info (5% on $1000).
And I haven’t heard anything from Netspend about the account name changing.
This makes me think that All-Access is a different account, and that our existing accounts don’t get the better rate/cap. But it’s not really clear; it’s possible that they haven’t updated all parts of the website yet.
anyone try pulling lately?
What do you mean by “pulling”? I did an ACH pull at an external bank out of my Netspend account on Sep 14 and it worked fine.
i tried linking the card to ally and it says the routing # doesnt work … any other way to get the $$ off of it?
I use Discover. In the comments here I see a few other suggestions like Alliant or Chase.
Fyi, according to a Brinks CS, if they detect you attempting to log in with a VPN at all, they will put a block on your account that can only be removed by calling and talking to their fraud department. And it’s crazy sensitive, just my regular hotel wifi triggered it, the bastards. And then if at any point in the future they detect a VPN, same thing, another block.
This may be annoying enough to get me to close my account.
I only get 0.95 for the previous quarter.
I got the correct amount for 5% interest; a little over $12 for the quarter.
With I Bonds now paying 7+% these accounts are going to get emptied effective January.
you can only do 10k however, unless you do fam gifts, etc
Currently you may potentially get a bonus for up to $30:
1. $10 bonus when you successfully add check funds of $100 or more and redeem the promotion code ADD10 using the Mobile Check Capture feature by 12/31/21. All Netspend cards have this promotion ongoing, but there is a limit of one (1) promotion code per person. The one (1) per person limit applies for any offer you may receive between 04/01/2021 to 12/31/2021 from Netspend or Ingo Money for using a Mobile Check Capture feature. So it looks like you can only get one $10 bonus across all Netspend products. Ingo Money does not accept checks written to yourself.
2. (YMMV, targeted) $5 bonus when you add at least $100 to your account within 45 days of receiving the email. Your receipt of this offer is the date that the offer is emailed to you, as determined by the system-generated time stamp. Excludes direct deposit. A credit of $5 will be credited to your Account within 10 business days.
3. (YMMV, targeted) $15 bonus when you enroll in Direct Deposit and receive at least $200 of qualifying payroll or government benefits within 45 days of this email. I did this one already. ACH transfer counts, and the $15 bonus was issued instantly.
Thanks! Signing up for the extra 1% and deposit bonuses. Plus, there’s no $1+ swipe fee that the NS pay as you go plan has. That also means that you don’t have to set up crazy xfer plans to avoid the inactivity fee.
If you already have a NS acct, you probably won’t get the referral bonus. I tried signing up for another NS referral bonus last year and was told that I didn’t receive the payout bc I had an active acct within the past 6 months or so.
AFAIK, the H-E-B debit account does not have a referral program like other NS accounts. In addition, it does have an inactivity fee that you need to pay attention to. It is $4.95 each month if account is inactive in excess of 90 days. It is in the Agreement document. So you will still need to set up a recurring transfer to avoid it if you do not plan to use the card. But it is almost effortless to do it in your HUB account.
vc
Yes, I saw the inactivity fee. But, with the normal NS pay as you go plan, they charge you $1.5 for swiping/using the card. I was planning on just reloading an amz gc every three months, but withdrawing the interest automatically every 3 months makes sense, too.
Hi,
Evilex, yes, I have 5 Netspend accounts (including H-E-B prepaid) and Porte (which is also managed by Netspend), and I was able to open the H-E-B debit account fine.
Ty so much this is awesome bro, just applied and my card is on the way.
Hi
ShawntheShawn mate sorry to bother you again, were you able to immediately open the savings? I’m trying to open the savings and it won’t allow me, says If the problem persist to call support, is that because I haven’t activated the debit card that has yet to arrive or I need to deposit certain amount of money first.
You need to deposit some money first to open the savings account.
First: activate card. Second: put some money on the card. Third: open savings account. Fourth: transfer money from card to savings account.
I did not find it in the app, either. I thought the promo code field would show up once the mobile deposit is accepted. But I tried several checks, all of which were rejected by Ingo Money (for security reasons they could not reveal when I called them to ask why)…I gave up on this mobile deposit offer, after reading all the bad reviews for Ingo Money.
SDubbs
Used to be on the next screen after you scanned the check. Ive been blocked for a while by Ingo likely for doing too many of these promos so not sure where it is now.
My mobile check deposit was rejected during the processing phase after the images were captured for some unknown reason (code 23 or something?) & I have not used this mobile check bonus before – off to see if I’m targeted on any other Netspend card for this promo to see if it works there. It looks like this feature/bonus is simply broken.
I discovered the issue, at least in my case – with the Netspend app, I got a “D36” error “We’re sorry, your check was not accepted – it appears you wrote this check to yourself. We generally do not accept one party checks” so find a buddy to write a check for you and you might be good here if you haven’t done the mobile check deposit bonus before.
My #2 and #3 are $10 and $20 fyi