ING Direct’s New Name: Capital One 360
ING Direct announced to customers last week that they would soon change their name to Capital One 360, effective February 2013. Goodbye big orange ball, you were the first no-frills savings account that paid high interest by piggybacking on regular checking accounts (no branches, no ATM access, no checks) and it worked brilliantly, creating an entire new banking niche. But the financial crisis happened, ING Group got a big Euro-bailout, and as part of the restructuring terms they agreed to sell their ING Direct unit for $9 billion dollars.
It was a fun ride, ING Direct. For a while, you paid me nearly 5% APY interest as I borrowed money for free using 0% APR balance transfers. Your website was unapologetically simple, but everything worked as promised. You created handy sub-accounts for savers to stash their money for specific needs. Good times. Of course, I can’t forget that you also had a nervous brainfart and bullied my webhosting company into shutting down my entire website without any warning. In the end, your interest rates also started to fade a little from the top while staying somewhat competitive, and being a rate-chaser I moved my money elsewhere. No hard feelings?
As is always the case, the new company promises to keep everything you loved about the old company, while also making additional improvements. I still keep about $100 with ING Direct to keep them from closing my account, mostly out of nostalgia I suppose. I’ll continue to wait and see how they integrate the site with the other recently-improved Capital One products like their 1.5% cash back personal cards and 2% cash back business cards. CapOne wants to join the big boys Chase/Citi/AmEx as a broad financial services company.
What are you planning to do with your ING Direct account?
By Jonathan Ping | Banking | 11/15/12, 6:28pm
November 15th, 2012 at 6:32 pm
I’m going to keep my money parked with ING until Capital One starts to implement negative changes.
ING has been good to me. Might as well give Capital One a chance.
November 15th, 2012 at 6:32 pm
I am already getting nervous, especially when they tell all the great things they will do for it. I’m starting move my CDs when they expire.
November 15th, 2012 at 7:08 pm
Ha, I just remembered I also made fun of this takeover a while back:
http://www.mymoneyblog.com/cap.....chase.html
November 15th, 2012 at 7:28 pm
Will it for now. It’s our main household joint account. It’s so dang easy…
November 15th, 2012 at 7:41 pm
Meant:”Will keep it for now…”
November 16th, 2012 at 3:45 am
LIke you, I keep a few hundred there… mostly because they were a good hub and I want to keep options available. I probably made as much money on bonuses from them then I did on interest.
I’m guessing I’ll eventually close things down once something bad happens.
November 16th, 2012 at 4:30 am
Well, I’m keeping mine for now, but I’m open to options.
November 16th, 2012 at 4:51 am
I plan on keeping them unless something would turn negative. I like them so much and have found them so easy to use. I’ve saved & earned quite a bit of money by using them as one of my banks.
November 16th, 2012 at 4:51 am
Gradually getting out of ING already as my CDs mature. Will probably keep an account open with a minimum balance just in case things improve.
November 16th, 2012 at 5:15 am
I am very sad that I have to part away from ING Direct after so many years. I used to have accounts with Capital One. They are just like the big banks. They charge fees whenever they can even when they are the one who screwed things up the first place. I closed all my Capital One accounts because of the bad customer service and their unwillingness to help their customers. I simply refuse to give my business to companies who don’t care about their customers. So sad to see ING goes away.
November 16th, 2012 at 5:34 am
I am moving my primary checking account to USAA. I will leave the savings open with $500 but won’t use them unless rates get better. Don’t really like dealing with Capital One because of their poor reputation.
November 16th, 2012 at 5:38 am
I used to have all my savings accounts (20) there…just last month I pulled the plug and transferred all of them , but 1, to my credit union.
November 16th, 2012 at 5:51 am
I’ll probably stick around as long as their fee scheme stays reasonable. (Very very low overdraft penalties!) I’m guessing that’s going to be the first thing to go, however.
November 16th, 2012 at 6:25 am
I will take them at their word that they will “keep things the same”. I won’t make any move until they prove otherwise. Most of my family members have an account there and it’s great for person-to-person transfers. There is a discussion over on http://www.bogleheads.org about this subject and it’s amazing the number of people there who are sure that the nasty “big bank” will ruin a good thing and are moving before that has a chance to happen.
November 16th, 2012 at 6:29 am
I’ve been migrating my ING savings accounts to Ally since they announced the acquisitions by Capital One (hate them). My last ING CD matured last month so I rolled it over to Ally and closed my ING accounts. I really like the simplicity of INGs web layout, and I did get some good bonuses and interest rates with them, but I don’t have faith in Capital One so I’m getting out now before it becomes a pain to close the account
November 16th, 2012 at 7:31 am
We keep our escrow there – we’ll keep it for now, but I’ll be watching, Cap1…
November 16th, 2012 at 7:31 am
I’m going to keep mine for now as well. Use to have a large balance with ING Direct but then transferred the majority to another account when I got married. I also have a Sharebuilder account and I planned on transferring my remaining ING balance to a Roth with them. I know, they are also Capital One. So, like others with ING, I will keep Sharebuilder until something negative happens.
November 16th, 2012 at 9:11 am
They have my kid’s savings accounts with kid log ins and separate accounts for LT savings (birthday/xmas/portion of the allowance that she basically can’t touch) and ST savings (allowance dumping ground), so I’ll keep the account.
I also tend to sweep my excess cash into my mortgage, so mine has dwindled down. Still handy for occasional project fund parking. I think I have about 5 sub accounts from times gone by. I just leave a few bucks in there and I can always rename them if I need to save for something.
November 16th, 2012 at 10:40 am
I stopped using ING Direct many years ago to rate chase. Never had a good experience with Capital One, so probably won’t be going back to the new 360. However, if people report good experiences with the new managers and the rates are right, I’ll give them a chance.
November 16th, 2012 at 7:33 pm
Ing direct in canada was sold to scotia bank. I use their chequing account so am waiting for that one to be changed as well.
November 17th, 2012 at 12:56 am
Well, I’m starting to move some of my money out of IngDirect,
not so much because they were taken over by Capital One, but
because they just reduced the interest rate they were paying
a bit too much.
November 17th, 2012 at 2:27 pm
I already pulled all my money out. I’m not particularly fond of Cap One. I see them more as loan sharks than a bank. I love ING but unfortunately the rates have been so low for a while now that its not even worth the effort to move money between savings accounts. I would rather put extra savings somewhere else.
November 18th, 2012 at 3:45 pm
I’ve had ING for years and made some decent money oiver the years from bonuses and intetrest rates. Paid a wedding and some other things using that money, so simple and easy. It’s a shame ING is going the way of the dinosaur.
However, I don’t know anyone whose had a good experience with Capitol One. I just don’t trust Capitol One will keep it even close to the same as time goes on.
Does anyone have any recommendations, I’m thinking Ally Bank, but are their any others out there like ING, simple and easy?? I’m also thinking a local credit union but their rates seem to be as bad as the banks.