Online Savings Accounts The Good The Bad And The Ugly About Them

Online savings accounts have become very popular in today’s times, especially in developed countries like the US. More and more people are moving over from the high street banks to the online banks and applying the savings and checking accounts on them for the myriad conveniences that they can get out of them. But at the same time, you have to realize that there might be disadvantages of these online accounts too. Here we make a list of the pros and cons of the online savings accounts.

The Good Side of the Online Savings Accounts

The best thing is the convenience that you get. You do not have to stand in serpentine queues anymore to find out what’s going on with your account. You are also saved from the travel that you need to make up to your bank, which closes at a particular hour to add to the miseries. Online savings accounts are open 24/7, so you even if you want to make a transaction at 2 in the morning, you can very conveniently do it through your computer, your laptop or even your mobile phone. Also, since these banks are operational through the Internet, you don’t have to worry about not being in the country to make a particular deposit or a withdrawal from the account.

Your deposits and withdrawals reflect in your account in real time, so you don’t need to wait for them to show in your account. This helps you keep a minute check on the account.

Most utility services, credit card payments and other payments can be done by direct money transfer from your online savings account to those services. You also have the option to set up auto-debit facilities for the same. If you think about it, the benefits of online savings accounts seem to go on and on.

The Bad Side of Online Savings Accounts

The biggest con, for some people, is that there is no human face associated with these accounts. There’s no human person you can hold responsible for a discrepancy in the account. Some people still like the old-fashioned way of banking in which they can interact with human cashiers and tellers. For them, the online banking accounts could be quite uneasy to work with.

Though technologically these accounts are quite advanced and secure, there are a lot of people who are still quite apprehensive about their ways of working and would not like to trust them with their money.

The Ugly Side of Online Savings Accounts

Identity theft through the Internet is a very real problem and the online savings accounts are prime targets. However, to the credit of these accounts, most of them have highly sophisticated security tools such as 128 bit SSL encryption which makes them as invincible as fortresses. But, users may make certain mistakes and put their own identities in peril. For example, if a person has a habit of writing his username and password and leaving it in places where others can find it, he is putting his own Internet identity into jeopardy.

We also cannot deny the fact that there are some people with malicious intents on the Internet who are using this route to make a quick buck. They may stoop to the level of building sham websites that look like online banking websites and get people to make their accounts on them and make deposits.

However, the main point is that online savings accounts are here to say. There’s a good and bad side to everything. We need to secure our own interests, be discerning and make use of this very convenient tool.