CD Discussion Thread

Scanchain,
This is a great advice. I have setup my cd this week and will call to set up the addon feature so I can add funds that will become available next week. Thank you for pointing this feature out. Very useful!

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I have a large CD that matured today, Sunday 9/29. The funds had already moved to the Savings acct first thing today. This is another situation that shinobi & I discussed earlier. Had I known (for sure) that the funds would be removed & in savings today I could have made the ACH transfer on last Friday. So Now I will make the ACH on Monday, arriving at destination Tuesday. Cost me an extra day!

But now decisions must be made for placement of funds. I still have a couple add-on CD’s at 3%, maturity mid 2020. Navy has the 18 mo CD 3%. Maybe PSECU will have the 36 mo 3.25%. (probably not)

Any other good ideas? :face_with_raised_eyebrow:

Alive for another week.

ā€œThese rates are valid from Monday, September 30, 2019 to Sunday, October 06, 2019. A minimum balance of $500 is required to open a certificate account.ā€

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Wow

With the NFCU 5 year rate now having descended once again, it’s looking like the PSECU 3 year, for yield hawks, has become the only game in town. :frowning_face:

Thank goodness for add-on CDs and, for my liquid dough, for Grow.

It was a tough slough, yield wise, between 2008 and 2017. Sure hope we are not once again headed down that same darn road.

Well it’s PSECU 36mo 3.25% just waiting for me. Luck is still on my side. :kissing_heart:
I’m still going to save some of the latest dough for Grow 2.75%, gotta keep safe for now.

There are multiple reports on Deposit Accounts (aka ā€œKen’s siteā€) that GTE is already limiting, if not completely eliminating, the add-on feature of their CDs.

We always knew they may do it eventually, but weeks after some of the accounts were open? WTF, GTE?

Link to discussion: https://www.depositaccounts.com/banks/gte-cu.html#promo39019

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Looks like shinobi’s earlier post about GTE is spot on.

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Yes, shinobi’s reports are very dependable.
I also have a GTE add-on CD 2.75%. I haven’t used the add-on feature because the rate was not that good. That CD matures 4/20, so I will just take my money at that time & forget GTE. :nauseated_face:

Frankly, I dont put much weight in complaints about ā€œunethical behaviorā€. If they are removing the add-on feature from existing Add-on CDs, ethics arent part of the equation - it’s an outright breech of contract and they should be sued.

Wasnt shinobi’s earlier post about the risk of GTE failing when forced to pay above market rates for the forthcoming wave of add-on money? He never speculated they’d decide to simply ignore the terms they had offered.

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They can’t have it both ways. If they change the terms and conditions after the fact I believe you have the opportunity to pull the funds out although might be difficult to find a better place for them at this point.

Thank you to everyone for posting regarding GTE’s rescission of their add-on promise. Here is what I can add from memory:

GTE can change anything they wish to change about the terms of the CD. However:

They must provide account holders a 30 day notice of the the change(s).

This happened at Valor four or five years ago. Valor sought an instantaneous change of terms of their add-on CD. Everyone screamed. In the end, following involvement by the NCUA, Valor re-opened members’ accounts for 30 days during which the original terms held fast. Valor was shady about it, purposely using holidays and non-business days to fill in as much of the 30 day interval as they could. So members really had a significantly shorter interval of time during which account additions could be made. Then, after all that, of course Valor was taken over by PenFed.

I am struggling to remember details of the earlier instance of this in which I was involved. It was circa 2007-2008 and my recollections have faded a bit. The financial institution was USCU (United Services Credit Union) located in Asheville, NC. They offered an add-on CD which they later had to limit. There was a massive outpouring of complaint. There was a lawsuit I think. My best memory is that USCU also, at some point, was required to re-open everyone’s CDs for an interval of time, during which money once again could be added. I think it was 30 days, but this was so long ago I might be conflating USCU and Valor in my memory. The USCU president was forced to resign over this and USCU no longer exists today as such. It was taken over by another credit union in the Asheville region.

So bottom line, do not assume GTE will be successful in closing down, or limiting, add-ons to our accounts without the 30 day notice required by the NCUA, though of course they might try. But based on my experience they will not be allowed to close off, or limit, our add-on opportunity without the mandated notice.

The above two reported experiences are a key reason I posted earlier about the Rising Bank add on. I continue to think Rising will have better luck supporting their add-on offer than GTE. But I admit I did not think GTE would default so quickly.

ETA

Finally, just as a heads up:

Persons owning Freedom Credit Union add-ons need to be on watch and on guard for this same sort of thing. It will take financial institutions of substantial size to be able to deal with add-on CD inflows given the interest rate environment into which we are entering.

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Just an additional thought pursuant to my writing on GTE, above:

I dunno about you. But so far I have not closed any CDs early in order to take advantage of rapidly disappearing higher CD interest rates. Perhaps this was a mistake. Regardless:

If GTE is forced by the NCUA at some point to provide the mandatory 30 day notice before closing off their add-on CDs forever, that might be the time to close an existing CD early if you have no money available from a different source.

Give the possibility some thought. Forewarned is forearmed.

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Ken posted this morning about a different Rising Bank offering than this. But his post motivated me to go over there and check rate and availability of the Rising add-on CD. Of course, as before, the Rising interest rate is inferior to our hoped-for rate. However, a lower percentage of something might be preferable to a higher percentage of nothing, as we now find at GTE.:wink:

Anyway, Ken gives Rising an A+ rating so the bank might actually be able to stand behind its add-on promise. Here is a link. Best you can achieve is 36 months of protection from possible very low interest rates ahead.

Rising - Click on 36 month

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Another option for add on CD’s that I posted upthread a bit. Many of us are eligible for membership due to being members of the American Consumer Council for other CU’s.

https://www.macu.com/accounts/savings/certificate-accounts

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I still don’t see how they can unilaterally change terms after they’ve already been agreed to. Limit add-ons for CDs opened after 9/29 sure, but retroactively? These aren’t demand deposit accounts, they’re contracts.

I think my CD should be earning 4%, not 3.3%. I mean, if they can change terms to suit their needs, I can change the terms to suit mine as well, right?

I get your thinking. But, sadly, they can change anything they wish to change PROVIDED . .

provided they comply with NCUA rules and offer us formal notice 30 days prior to making the change.

Please do not shoot the messenger. I don’t make the rules. The NCUA does that.

Email received from GTE named ā€œAccount Changes to your GTE Financial Promo Certificatesā€

"Dear X,

GTE Financial has updated the terms of its Add-On Certificates effective 9/29/2019. You can now utilize the add-on feature to deposit up to $6,000 per year, per certificate, for each year of the term. Your rate and term will remain the same.

Thank you for being a GTE Financial member.

If you have any questions regarding your account, reach out to Member Care at 1.813.871.2690 from 7am to 8pm, or you may reach us at gtefinancial.org/livechat
"

So, they accept that they did change the CD terms: Account Changes to your GTE Financial Promo Certificates"

Good post. But they cannot make that change without first offering us 30 days notice. If history is any guide there will be a big dispute, the NCUA will be brought in, and at some point GTE will be forced by the NCUA to open our accounts for unlimited add-on deposits for a period of 30 days. This is how things have unfolded twice before.

Sadly for me, and likely for other of our participants here, I have no significant funds now to add on, and I will not have such funds until next year when some of my CDs mature. This means:

I’m probably, when the 30 day window opens, going to be forced to close a CD early and pay a penalty to obtain add on funds . . . or else just do nothing at all. And it does not help not knowing when that window might open. It could be several months from now, however long it takes to litigate everything.

Finally, the $6k per year is a sick joke. But at least GTE offered no 30 day notice. Had they done that the clock would already be running, forcing our hand.

That’s not true either. The NCUA enforces the rules. And while this deals with banks and the FDIC, the applicable regulations apply equally to credit unions.

https://www.depositaccounts.com/blog/when-a-bank-changes-the-terms-of-an-existing-cd.html

GTE’s response was that the ā€œsubject to changeā€ terms were disclosed when establishing membership. Ignoring for a moment that I’ve yet to receive anything tangible from GTE for my membership or CD, disclosures or anything else, that clause is in a completely different disclosure than the terms establishing the CD.

The chat rep also stated that these are considered ā€œsavings accountsā€. Which is clearly false, they are time deposits, not run of the mill savings accounts.

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Does anyone have screenshots or copies of the original GTE disclosures where it shows they offered unlimited addons? I’m filing a complaint at NCUA Consumer Assistance Center | MyCreditUnion.gov and wish to provide as much documentation as possible.