PC, Tangerine, Zag, Zenbanx | Page 2 | Site suggestions | Discussion forum

Thanks to those, including Loonie, who mentioned EQ Bank has, perhaps temporarily, disabled the opening of new accounts without an "invitation" from them to be onboarded. This wasn't even one of the two or three criteria I'd utilized to exclude them but, on that basis alone, they aren't available to the general public and all residents of Canada (excluding Quebec), which is our primary criterion for inclusion.

As for the point about establishing a more formal criteria to define "competitive" in terms of deposit rate, I'm trying to make it more impartial so there can be less accusations of bias and so forth hence the need, I feel, for a more formal criteria.

I agree that saying it must be 0.25-0.5 basis points higher than the "Big 5" as what happens if a "Big 5" bank decided to suddenly offer a "competitive" interest rate? Does that mean we could never include them?

What about this:

the regular, posted interest rate on the high interest savings account must be the greater of: (a) minimum of 25 basis points higher than 1% or, in the event that the highest regular, posted interest on a high interest savings account is currently at or below 1.25%, then (b) a minimum of 50 basis points higher than 0%

Something like either of the two options (either this one or the one I'd previously used) as a "baseline" to establish a minimum criteria for inclusion.

Someone else mentioned that those that end up being removed from the "comparison chart" is now warmed to the idea so long as they're still included in "free chequing" or "services" charts and I completely & wholly agree.

Cheers,
Doug

Peter, see what happens when you go to "the people", they're all over the map! Take the ideas you want, you're the one putting the time into this plus we know you'll incorporate reasonable suggestions as you go along if you have the time. I don't see a major overhaul or new approach (i.e. rigid calculation on whether an institution qualifies for inclusion) is needed, it's been a pretty good resource as you've operated it so far.
There seems to be a bit of confusion re new accounts' status at EQ Bank. Here's what their site says: "Please note that we are temporarily inviting only a select number of new customers each week, but you can easily reserve your spot here. We will notify you immediately when we’re ready to welcome you to EQ Bank." So there's a waiting list, they are opening new accounts every week, it's a temporary situation, and there's no indication anyone will ultimately be turned down. People can speculate about the future. And I agree, what financial institution has ever done this (and it, along with the fact the current 3% rate seems to have been pretty much picked out of the air, may signal these guys don't know what they're doing in retail banking) but, hey, a generation ago people would have thunk long and hard about moving money through thin air with an app after taking a picture of it on a phone. Things are changing, people like to trust in tech and are less risk-averse with how their money moves around, so we're seeing lots of stuff we haven't seen before.

THanks, jg.
I think I largely agree with Bill. Let Peter work it out as he sees fit.

For a new person who wants to get an account at Eq, they are going to wait, and probably a fair while. Perhaps the confusion is that nobody knows how long they'll have to wait.
The likelihood of someone who puts their name on the list today getting 3% is not very high in my opinion. We don't know how many people are already on the wait list, nor do we know how many Eq is accepting per week, but we do know they are trying to make it sound like you would want to put in your name. If 5000 are on the list and they take 5 per week, you'd be waiting basically forever, even more true if the list is growing faster than they are taking new people. So let's wait until we see some results in terms of wait list people opening accounts. If it turns out that they only have to wait a month or so, then I would be OK with putting it on the list, but if they're going to have to wait a year or more, I don't see the point as the rate will have changed for sure by then. The chart should reflect current rates that a person can actually get. I think it's good that they are taking the time to sort themselves out, but I don't think they're quite ready for "prime time".

Doug said
What about this:

the regular, posted interest rate on the high interest savings account must be the greater of: (a) minimum of 25 basis points higher than 1% or, in the event that the highest regular, posted interest on a high interest savings account is currently at or below 1.25%, then (b) a minimum of 50 basis points higher than 0%

What about something like this: As a guideline and at the discretion of the site administrator, the minimum comparison chart rate should be at least 75% of the median rate.

This would look after the situations where interest rates either decline or increase substantially from where they are now. It also tries to put some boundaries on what might be considered a high interest rate as Doug is suggesting.

I wonder how Peter is going to find the time reading all these discussions and make a decision. Poor Peter

In general I agree with Northern Raven, i.e. include everybody - maybe have a top-10 list and then a separate "B section" of the chart with all the others for the sake of completeness.

But if the approach is going to be to pick and choose based on criteria, I've changed my mind re EQ Bank. Clearly EQ doesn't want more customers and is effectively not available to new customers. Also those of us who already have money there are best served by dissuading others from sharing (the probably limited) bounty. So all-in-all I've come to agree, leave EQ off the chart.

Another comment from the peanut gallery:

I would put everything on the list--even EQ with their wait list; and i would include BNS (1.5% momentum account);
those who read the forum can contact the individual institutions and find out if there are wait lists, etc, but they should be able to use this forum to determine which institutions are offering more than the 0.6% from the big 5 banks.
A special section for promo rates would also be great!!!

$0.02

To the moderator(s)(Peter, Loonie?), thank you so much for all the time, effort and information that you provide!!

Also current promotions has no reference to targeted promotions now being offered by Tangerine (I think it might be in the Expired Promotions (?) section).
Maybe it would be helpful now to have two categories of promotions, i.e. targeted and those generally available to everyone. (And then there are promos that pay bonus on only new funds by a certain date vs those that apply to entire balance during the period........!!)