Disregard. I’m a Pen FED member…not a Pen AIR.
Posting here once again to thank scanchain for helping me with PSECU way back. It has been too long since I posted such thanks. Credit where due.
It has been like the Sorcerer’s Apprentice for me at PSECU. Or maybe also akin to the Energizer Bunny. 
I have no clue whatsoever how I have been getting away with this for five months (and of course the prep happened more like seven months ago). But it continues to work, and they already are showing my next ASTs! Dear Lord what a buttertub! 
Today, Saturday, was my first instance of pulling off an AST (automatic share transfer) on a weekend. It worked!! 
I had heard it works on weekends but had no prior experience. Will it work even on Sundays or holidays? I dunno. No experience. Only in last hour can report, based on personal experience, it works on Saturdays.
This AST mechanism has to be the best invention since sliced bread. I actually have two of them going simultaneously, both pumping money into CD accounts paying 3.25% APY. That is a really good rate of interest in the current economic environment . . . which is why I have taken nothing for granted over these months. Each time an AST actually happens I am left counting my blessings.
No other credit union known to me has this AST thing. I had not encountered it prior to PSECU, and it was at first DARN confusing. Took me weeks to wrap my head around it, but with serious help from scanchain (far up thread) I finally understood enough to plow in.
And of course that was all “pre-pandemic”. Had I known a pandemic was coming perhaps I would have worked harder to understand AST more quickly. But I finally got my act together late last year, with my first AST happening early in January, and it has been clear sailing ever since.
How much longer?
Really dunno. Almost surely will finish out July. After that, anything could happen. These PSECU CDs are 36 month deals. That is surely a factor. I have other, much more conventional, add-on opportunities still at the ready. But those are five year deals. Do not want all eggs in the same basket. So we shall see. So far so good.
Can you skip ASTs without losing the ability to add to these CDs?
I can report that I’ve done this twice with no repercussions. The transfer picked right back up the following month. I don’t know how many times you can do it and get away with it. They seem somewhat lenient and the CD department customer service on the phone is excellent. I have also changed my transfer date twice with no issue.
All I can say is PSECU was a godsend when we first heard of them. I didn’t get into your racket. I just put all the funds I could find at that time into the CU. Worked out to all mature either in Sept 2021 or Aug, Sept 2022. Happy folks… 
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Shinobi, it’s amazing that you still have AST running. I opened 3 CDs at that time, and ran the AST 3 or 4 times before stopping. I wish I had the money to continue feeding those CDs!
I have no personal experience with skipping. But zzz is probably our most reliable poster. I think you can take what he says to the bank.
Only exception would be something in the future . . . for example a situation precipitated by the pandemic where PSECU just decides “enough is enough”. I mean, this AST thing is costing the credit union REAL money. At some point they just might cry “uncle” and cut us off. Pursuant to which:
Consider, unlike in conventional add-on situations, the required 30 day notice would not be a lot of help for those pursuing the AST strategy. You might get one or at most two scheduled, dollar limited, AST transfers before the 30 days expires and you run out of time. With conventional add-ons you would have 30 days to dump the “kitchen sink” into your CD. Not with AST. This is one reason I’m so grateful each time an AST actually goes through. It’s like a gift!
If I can get through July with PSECU I will, by then, have moved roughly 25% of my net worth into PSECU. At that point it’ll be time to consider other add-on options. Up until now the PSECU add-on program has acted as a sort of pressure relief valve on my other, five year add-on CD, options, preserving them for future use beyond the PSECU three year CDs.
Of my remaining options, GTE will be used last because of viability concerns. Strategy is to move funds into the strongest, most viable, financial institutions first. This because if one of them goes belly up, and I get the money back from the NCUA, there is no place today I can put the money and earn a decent rate of return. Thus, institutional safety is paramount, and Weiss has lowered their GTE rating to “C”, making it a last choice for me.
All that said I went through this same drill following the 2008 crash with only a single add-on option and came out in good shape. The situation currently is more comfortable than that was. Back in 2008-2009 I ended up with half my net worth in that single financial institution. That was NOT comfortable, even though it ended OK.
I was squeezed very tightly for money back nearer to the beginning. Managed to work my way through it and allow time to get to money from existing CDs which were maturing later.
Other thing I did was to take advantage of the pandemic to close out, without penalty (thanks to the pandemic), a couple of CDs, funds from which I continue to route to PSECU.
If any of my conventional add-on financial institutions give 30 day notice of deal discontinuation, plan is to pay the EWP, extract the money, and get it to add-on safety within that 30 day window. Exception to that, again, might be GTE. If GTE were to give me 30 day notice I dunno at this point exactly what I would do. 
Obviously, you don’t have to reveal anything that’s personal but I wonder how much each individual AST transfer is? For instance, can you transfer over $100,000 one time and successfully skip a AST without repercussions?
You cannot increase your AST but you can decrease it at anytime so if you originally had it set up for 100k, the next month you could decrease to 25k or some other amount and you can continue to decrease on an ongoing basis but you can never increase it again. I don’t know if there’s some type of dollar limit where if you skipped an AST, they would cut you off for good. I was able to do it twice without repercussion. I was, of course, fully ready to be cut off completely.
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Noted in passing, couple of ratings changes at Weiss:
Pentagon FCU, in VA, has been downgraded to “B”
Digital FCU, in MA, has been downgraded to “B-”
On a personal note:
Weiss has downgraded SECU, in MD, to “C”. I doubt many participants here are SECU members. I happen to be a long time member and this new rating really surprises me.
Yes, we are from those long time members of SECU. Remember 6-9%?
To those who ach’d funds into Penair…did you just the “ach number” mentioned in the account or did you have to add -001 to reference the specific account?
Stuck in the middle!!
Question… go for the Keesler 30mo 2.14% CD or just place large chunks of $$'s in various MM & Savings (paying 1.5+%) & wait it out.
I just remembered I have that Unify FCU (add-on) CD 2.25%, matures 7/24/21.
2 Navy CD’s & old United Bank CD has just matured & sitting in Alliant CU waiting for decisions. There was a time when we could leave funds in Alliant when they had decent rates… 
You might be waiting a long time. Tell me who wins the election and I can provide better guidance. A Biden victory will take us back to those eight long years of low rates under Obama. A Trump victory offers better hope of higher interest rates in our lifetimes.
I think the Keesler deal is an interesting compromise. Thirty months. You could do worse. I for certain would not be buying five year CDs at the current rates. But thirty months might not be a disaster.
Ken@deposit accounts is pitching the Nasa FCU 9 month 1.50% with 10K min deal over penair’s no penalty cd at same rate for longer term?
That Keesler CD is a step CD. The initial 1.1% rate is still competitive with current liquid rates. Then it goes up 1% every 10 months - which is faster than market rates tend to rise even in ‘boom’ times.
Given that rates continue to fall, I find it highly unlikely that you’ll miss a better opportunity.
Thanks… Just what I wanted to hear… I’ll go for it tomorrow…
I’m going to offer a opposite view. The S&P 500 has now turned positive for the year and the longer term treasuries yields have also been on the rise in recent days. It seems to me that the tide is turning, and this could mean that the rate falls would be stopping. Of course a lot could also depend on how the vote goes in November.
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Oh, I agree that we’re settling into the bottom. But going back up is another matter - from here, a 1% increase every 10 months is very unlikely, so that Keesler option will remain competitive with “waiting”.
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