Investing Online Bank vs Brick N Mortar

[Midpack]

I am sure many/most of you know this, but I have never invested thru a bank (always brokers and the like) - and I was shocked to see how deliberately difficult a traditional BnM bank can be when it comes to even the most basic investing.

My Dad moved a big chunk to Chase this week for FDIC purposes, I was on hand. He asked for all the funds to go into a MM fund. They beat around the bush and said you can invest in almost anything thru Private Client, she even mentioned Ally (turns out that was some long term CD's only), and put him in savings yielding .09% APY - not the MM fund he specifically asked for.

So that afternoon I went online to see what investments Chase offers. If you search you can find Chase CD's and I found a Chase MM at 0.20% - but you can't see anything re: funds or other investments online, even if you're logged in as a Private Client customer, it just says "contact us" at every turn unless I missed something.

So I made an appt at their Flagship Private Client location in Dad's city of 1.5MM, you can't just walk in.

I told the Chase PC Advisor that my Dad did not want anything in equity or bond funds, and no CD's, just MM. Advisor says "you're tying my hands." Huh? My Dad can't choose what asset he wants? He's 95 yo and won the game decades ago, he got out of equities about 10 years ago (right before the financial meltdown) and doesn't want any risk at his age. His choice.

I told the advisor with so many online banks offering well over 1% now, I wanted to see our options to put Dad's money in something with better yield. I asked where I could see the options online, or at a Chase branch. "You can't, we can do that for you. We are working on a self-directed service, but it's not ready yet."

So the advisor brings up investments on his screen and filters on MM funds, though I can't see the screen behind his desk. I said can you print that for me? "No, there are thousands (or hundreds). Is there one in particular you're interested in?"

I said Vanguard's VMMXX has an SEC yield of 1.13% today, is that available? Advisor says "I'll have to get the ticker," and I tell him VMMXX. He looks that up and says not available, he can't even see any info on VMMXX.

We're getting nowhere.

So I said can you sort your thousands/hundreds of MM funds by interest for me? "Yes" Can I have a printout or see that screen? "Sorry, no" OK, what is the highest interest MM fund you can offer us. "Fidelity Tax Free MM" with 0.62% interest, and a 0.18% ER. Anything with a better net interest after expenses. "No"

So we setup a brokerage account and move all Dad's savings to Fidelity Tax Free MM. Less than half the return he'd get with online savings like Ally, but 5X what he was getting. Just setting up the brokerage account and requesting the transfer takes 45 minutes.

After years of seeing anything about any fund/investment I might be interested in thru Vanguard, Fidelity, Schwab and countless others - I was amazed that Chase makes it as difficult as they can to let a client see funds/investments. AMAZING!

I should disclose that we did get three nice Private Client coffee mugs for $250K and a total of 2½ hours in appointments...

 

[GravitySucks]

Three mugs for less than three hours. You made out great!

 

[braumeister]

"Fidelity Tax Free MM" with 0.62% interest, and a 0.18% ER.

Sounds odd. FMOXX is on M* with TTM yield of 0.38% and ER of 0.24%.

 

[Gotadimple]

Chase, yeah. Not the most friendly bank for personal accounts of any kind. As you know bank stock brokers are tied and restricted, and the offerings are expensive. But this is what your dad wants and he's happy with it.

- Rita

 

[UnrealizedPotential]

Yeah since your father is 95 he doesn't need to take any risk. I would make sure your father gets what he needs and really wouldn't worry about anything else. Most people only worry about themselves. Look after your father because it doesn't seem to me he can count on the bank to look after his needs.

 

[calmloki]

Chase Private client hasn't really done anything for us yet - we moved 260k of VCADX from Vanguard to Chase and have avoided any Chase "wealth managemennt fees". OTOH, it is a pain not to see the VCADX holdings when we go to Vanguard and Chase has a pretty opaque way of showing what's going on with those funds. The Private Client bankers and the Financial advisor types have been more on an appointment only basis and all branches don't have those people. Worse yet is that other than some insincere genuflection the PC bankers seem LESS competent than the regular staff. Chase does have a huge brick & mortar presence though, and that has been handy when we need notarizing or check cashing the like. Thought free wires would be of use, but we would lose much more than a wire fee costs just on having funds move from a decent interest account into Chase and sit till deemed good before wiring.

Do appreciate Chase backed credit cards a bunch - as it turns out, I do like getting thousands of dollars in free bonus money. Suspect we will have Vanguard take back control of the VCADX and let PC status expire.