Barclays Surpasses $1 Billion In Deposits For Its Online Savings Accounts And CDs

Earlier this month Barclays announced it has surpassed $1 billion in deposits for its online savings accounts and CDs. According to its press release, the online bank reached this milestone in less than 6 months. It was officially launched last May, but the online bank started allowing customers to open accounts last March.

My first review was on March 23rd. Since that time the bank has done a good job at maintaining competitive rates. The savings account yield is still 1.00%. The CD yields have fallen a little since March. Its 5-year CD yield is down by 5 basis points, and it's now 1.70% APY (rates as of 11/15/2012).

For a non-promo rate that's available to new customers, you can get a rate that's a little higher at some other internet banks. Five internet banks currently offer a top yield of 1.05% on money market accounts and savings accounts. However, two of those have minimum balance requirements to avoid monthly service fees. Another one requires a large balance to qualify for this top rate.

Some of noteworthy features of Barclays' online savings account include:

• No minimum balance, no monthly fees
• POD accounts can be set up in the application
• ACH transfer service for for electronic deposits and withdrawals (with no maximum amount)
• Remote Deposit for making deposits with your home PC scanner or iPhone, Android, or BlackBerry smartphone

The most noteworthy feature of the CDs is a small early withdrawal penalty of 90 days of interest on principal withdrawn. This is for all terms including the 5-year CD. One downside of the CDs is that you cannot receive interest disbursements.

I have more details about Barclays savings account and CDs in my Barclays accounts review.

Have you opened an Barclays Bank account? Have you been happy with it? Is the ACH transfers fast? Please describe your experiences in the comments.

Bank Overview

For those prefer to do business with well-established banks, you might appreciate the fact that Barclays Bank is a division of a giant corporation. As described in the press release "Barclays is a major global financial services provider engaged in retail banking, credit cards, corporate and investment banking and wealth management."

Barclays Bank has an overall health score at DepositAccounts.com of 5 stars (out of 5) with a Texas ratio of 5.42% (excellent) based on June 2012 data. Please refer to our financial overview of Barclays Bank for more details. The bank has been a FDIC member since 2001 (FDIC Certificate # 57203).

Finding the Best Savings & Money Market Rates

You can use our rate tables to search for the best rates available nationwide and in your state:

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