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Savings Account from Citi Accelerate with 4.25% APY

I can easily imagine the pain and the trouble Karen went through. I tried and open accounts, too, but when I asked questions on the phone, the customer service person was not very knowledgeable, kind, or polite. It was very unprofessional attitude. Just as I read many others’ negative reviews about Citi’s poor customer service out there. I am pretty happy with the responses of the current online banks I have business with, so I passed citi.

Zero stars. As of 12/19/19, rate has fallen to 1.85%. Not worth the trouble. I read somewhere that Citi limits daily withdrawals to $2000, which is ridiculous. Worst online banking experience ever. If you do open the account, wait to fund it in case you make the same mistake I did. For background, I’ve opened many online savings and checking accounts over the years without any problems, and this is absolutely the worst experience ever. I tried to open the Accelerate account online and somehow accidentally opened the Access checking account instead. I had funded the account via ACH. I didn’t realize there might be a problem until I finished the process and noticed “Access” instead of “Accelerate.” When I called to try to fix my mistake, I was told it should be easy to fix and the person on the phone started the process to open the Accelerate and have the money moved from the checking to the savings. He couldn’t finish the process because another department had to do that, and they were closed. I called the number he gave me as soon as they opened, and that person told me I had to wait 4 days for the ACH transfer to clear, and then the money from the checking would be moved to the savings, and the checking account would be closed. In the meantime, I can’t even access the money online that’s in the poorly named Access checking account, because I have to wait for them to send me an ATM card with the PIN (this is required to set up online access). This is ridiculous. All the other online checking and savings account I’ve opened allow me access to my money online, as soon as the money has cleared. All my other accounts let me at least SEE and access my account immediately upon setting up the user name and password, even if the money hasn’t cleared. After waiting 4 days for the ACH to clear, I called Citi about moving the money from the checking to the savings. NOW they tell me they can’t move it until I return a signature card via MAIL or FAX (no electronic option), and even then it will take days to verify since it goes through actual people and departments. I asked if I can cancel the whole process and have them send the money back to the original account, and they can’t do that, either. They will have to close the account, and then issue a check, and then mail the check, explaining that the whole process will take probably 2 weeks. This phone call lasted over 45 minutes, because of long hold and wait times. Crazy. And to top it off, I have multiple Citi credit cards so went into my account to try to send them a message about this awful experience so that they can fix their weird system, but there’s no way to send them an email, either securely from my account, or through an external email address. DON’T EVEN BOTHER WITH CITI!!!

We have been Citi credit card users for many years. The money market rate looked appealing so we opened the savings account online. It was easy to open. The account merged with my credit card account in the app without a problem. Deposits and withdrawals are easily done.