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I have some cash that I'm looking to keep in a relatively liquid account, so a CD isn't going to work. I came across Everbank.com which currently has a 3 month promotional rate for their checking account at 4.76% APY. I've seen some mixed reviews online, so I'll keep this thread updated with my experience. I did go ahead and open an account online, but you need to mail in a check to complete the process ($1500 to open). So far it does not look like they did any sort of hard inquiry on my credit report.

After the promotional 3 month rate, it'll go to a 2.26% APY, which is pretty good for a checking account. It looks like I can do deposits at a few different ATM's in my area, as I do occasionally have paper checks to deposit. I doubt I'll keep much cash in the account after the promotional rate, but if it works well, then I may switch my primary checking account to be EverBank. If I don't like them, they offer a $50 bonus if you cancel within 30 days after the 3 month trial. Go figure - they'll pay me to cancel!

The rate certainly beats any 3 month CD's I can find and I can always take my money out sooner. We'll see how it goes.

I've received a few confirmatory emails, but I still can't login or transfer more funds. I called their support number and they said I need to wait for materials to come in the mail so that I can login, although the 3 month trial period has now started. I'll be losing out on a few days of the promotional interest rate on any additional funds - we'll see how long this takes.

Also, I was disappointed and surprised to find that it looks like they did do a credit check hard inquiry which will show up on my credit report. I don't know how big of a deal this is, but for some people it may be a big issue.

I'll keep updating this thread once I am able to access my account online and transfer funds. They said that I can transfer up to $25k per transaction online with a max of $50k per day and $100k per month. This should be fine for my purposes. I suppose if it isn't that good I can always cancel and I'll at least get the $50 bonus they offer if you cancel within 30 days of the end of their promotional rate.

I finally got the account information in the mail. It looks like my check cleared on 8/20/08, so it took about a week for me to get the paperwork to log in online. I don't have my ATM card yet, so I can't deposit or withdraw money at an ATM. I tried to set-up links to other online accounts at other banks, but the quick-verification method didn't work for me at any of the banks (you provide your online login information and if it can login into your account, you have verified the account for transferring funds). I had to resort to the manual method where they will deposit two small transactions into my account and then I need to verify the amounts proving that I have access to the account. I'll see how long it takes for the transactions to show up. It shouldn't be more than 2 days, but I've seen some information online saying that Everbank is very slow with processing things.

Unfortunately, the introductory rate starts from the time I opened the account, even though I can add additional funds at this time.

With one of the accounts, the 2 trial deposits have already shown up, so it looks like transactions entered early enough in the day will be processed the next business day. I set it to transfer funds from my outside account into the Everbank account. They told me there was a limit of $25,000 per transaction, $50,000 per day (so you can do 2 $25,000 transactions) and a limit of $100,000 per month. When entering a transaction amount, it would have been nice if it had told me the limits online - as the interface doesn't deny the order if it is over the limits. I'm sure that ultimately those transactions wouldn't be allowed to go through, but then there would be a delay. I went ahead and ordered for some money to be transferred. Now I'll just wait and see how long it takes. I hope that there isn't any delay between when the funds leave the other account and when they arrive at Everbank to start earning interest. When I spoke to customer support, they had said it would take 4-5 days for funds to transfer. I'm wondering how many of those days will be without interest in either account. That is the one nice thing about Fidelity brokerage accounts - the funds start earning interest the moment you initiate the transfer. I guess they want you to start investing the money and/or trading immediately.

Overall, I don't really have any complaints. I will see how the funds transfer process goes.

I did also receive my ATM card in the mail today, so I'm also thinking I may try to do a trial deposit at an ATM machine to see how well that works. If it works well, then it may be reasonable to switch over my main checking account to Everbank - given that they pay interest, even though I'll probably only keep a small amount in this account.

Okay - so the money transfers have gone through. I entered in two fund transfers from my regular bank. I initiated them through Everbank's online account. I entered in the transactions on 8/27 with the dates scheduled for transfer as 8/28 and 8/29.

The transaction scheduled for 8/28 did get removed from the outgoing bank on 8/29. The funds did not show up in Everbank until 9/2. Obviously the funds were held for the weekend and Labor Day as well. I'm not sure if I'll get interest on the outgoing bank for the 29th, but assuming I don't, but do get the interest at Everbank effective 9/2, then that means I essentially lost 4 days worth of interest.

Interestingly, the transfer scheduled for 8/29 shows as leaving the outgoing bank on 9/2 and appears in Everbank on 9/3. I may have only lost 1 day of interest on that transaction.

So, as it looks like my account was initially activated on 8/20 but I couldn't get any funds transferred in until 9/2, it means I lost about 12-13 days of the promotional interest rate.

Just to see whether it is worthwhile to transfer funds to get an additional 1% of interest for the 2.5 months left of the promotional period, my calculations are (the amounts don't apply to me btw):

$100,000 with lost interest on 5 days coming in and 5 days moving out (most likely will only lost 3-4 days interest on each and possibly less) at 3.75%:
$10.28 / day of lost interest = $103 of lost interest
$100,000 with 1% extra interest for 75 days = $205

So - for all of the hassles and headaches it looks like someone could earn an additional $100. If you cancel your Everbank account within 30 days of the end of the promotional period (assuming you meet the requirements of doing 3 electronic bill pay transactions during the 3 months.

While most people don't have $100k laying around to take maximize the offer (assuming they wanted to stay within the FDIC insured limits), those that do likely won't want to deal with the hassles to make an additional $150. Although, assuming you don't do the fund transfers over a holiday weekend and if you get lucky and the transfers occur with only 1 day of lost interest, you could potentially come out closer to $230 ahead.

Update: The 90 day promotional rate ended and rates have gone down at most banks, including my primary savings account at another bank. The rate at my other bank is still higher so I moved my money back. Interestingly, I transferred some money by initiating the transfer from Everbank and another transfer initiated by my other bank. The transfer from Everbank was immediately debited from Everbank but didn't show up in my other account for 7 days - so a week of lost interest. The transfer initiated at my other bank were credited the same day they were debited from Everbank. If I had known that, I would have initiated all transfers at my other bank and avoided a week of lost interest.

Once all of the transfers are completed, I'll be closing the Everbank account. The rates aren't as good as my other savings account and there is no reason for me to keep the account at this time. I didn't particularly care for their online bill pay service either - It was confusing to tell when the money would be transferred for electronic bill pay. Once the account is closed, I'll request the $50 credit they offer for trying them if you don't stay. I'll see how difficult that will be to claim.

I have to say that overall, I'm not sure it was worth all of the hassles for the relatively small amount of extra income I made from the promotional interest. I had been hoping that I'd like them as a primary checking account, but I've found that having a local branch at Bank of America that I can walk into is worth something that Everbank doesn't offer. It isn't often that I need to go into a local branch, but it has happened in the past year. I also like Bank of America's ATM machines for depositing paper checks.

At least they honored their satisfaction guarantee without too many hassles. I had to mail them a letter closing the account and I mentioned I was not satisfied with their online bill pay set-up and their slow ACH times. I had to make sure the letter was received before 30 days from the end of my 3 month trial. I was just mailed a check with the $50 guarantee as well as my remaining balance.

Overall, it wasn't a terrible experience, but if given the choice again, I'm not sure I'd do it. It was a lot of hassle and not as much of a gain as I had hoped given the amount of time money was not earning any interest during the transfers.