How is DCU for banking?

[Anonymous]

Well I have 3 letters from DCU coming according to Informed Delivery so I’ll have my personal care fetch them tomorrow and finish getting set up with DCU. 

I need to find out how long it takes for the relationship benefits to kick in though - since they don’t have Zelle, I’ll need those checks to put money in my FirstBank account if I change my direct deposit. I am on the fence about the direct deposit right now though. I think for now I’ll just write myself checks to put into DCU from FirstBank every month and keep my direct deposit where it is. 

I found out that my FirstBank account only comes with three free checks a month (!?) so I’ll just pay rent out of my deposit and write a check for all but $50 of what remains to put into DCU and see how I like DCU’s service for the next few months and then evaluate bringing my direct deposit over. I move slowly when it comes to my banking. 

[DaveInAZ]

My relationship status with DCU started right away as I did a car loan when I joined and got the 1/2% discount as I promised I would have my payroll direct deposit moved to them, so I ordered checks right away and got them at no charge. As I recall your DD is a Social Security benefit? Unfortunately you can't split that between bank accounts. I took "regular" SS when I turned 62 and have going into my local credit union. But I still work part time for my local county government and have that payroll DD split between DCU and another bank, currently Wells Fargo for a new bank account bonus. If you ask a DCU rep they will tell you that your entire DD has to go to them, but any amount of DD keeps their system happy.

As for checks you can order them online directly from check printing companies for much less than banks charge, google "order checks". Even Walmart.com sells checks for a little more peace of mind if you're (wisely) apprehensive at giving out your banking info.

[Anonymous]

Yeah unfortunately SSDI is my only income which is why I’m leery about doing it. 

I got my info today and got the account set up. Their bill pay is not as good as my bank’s is and I had a few hiccups with getting setup but it seems to be okay now. 

I will have to see if “Synchrony Bank” will work for paying my PayPal and Amazon cards — those two are the only push payments I demand since Sync’s portals go up and down. On FirstBank’s bill pay, they have Amazon Store Card as a bill option and PayPal Extras MC as an option while DCU doesn’t have either, just Synchrony Bank. 

[Anonymous]

Kind of nice that I can pull directly from my 1stBank account! I went ahead and added it and set up a pull for 2/22 which I’m going to use to pay my Discover card. 

They made it very easy to add the account by just logging in to my 1stBank account so I decided to try that first before I write myself a check. Let’s see how this goes.

[Gmood1]

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@Anonymous wrote:

Yeah unfortunately SSDI is my only income which is why I’m leery about doing it. 

I got my info today and got the account set up. Their bill pay is not as good as my bank’s is and I had a few hiccups with getting setup but it seems to be okay now. 

I will have to see if “Synchrony Bank” will work for paying my PayPal and Amazon cards — those two are the only push payments I demand since Sync’s portals go up and down. On FirstBank’s bill pay, they have Amazon Store Card as a bill option and PayPal Extras MC as an option while DCU doesn’t have either, just Synchrony Bank. 

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Synch portals go up and down?

I've never had an issue with the 5 or 6 Synch CC's pulling payments from my bank accounts. It's been painless for as long as I've been a customer.

[AverageJoesCredit]

Me either G, guess its hit or miss, but my Sync experiences has always been smooth.

[Anonymous]

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@Gmood1 wrote:

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@Anonymous wrote:

Yeah unfortunately SSDI is my only income which is why I’m leery about doing it. 

I got my info today and got the account set up. Their bill pay is not as good as my bank’s is and I had a few hiccups with getting setup but it seems to be okay now. 

I will have to see if “Synchrony Bank” will work for paying my PayPal and Amazon cards — those two are the only push payments I demand since Sync’s portals go up and down. On FirstBank’s bill pay, they have Amazon Store Card as a bill option and PayPal Extras MC as an option while DCU doesn’t have either, just Synchrony Bank. 

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Synch portals go up and down?

I've never had an issue with the 5 or 6 Synch CC's pulling payments from my bank accounts. It's been painless for as long as I've been a customer.

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There have been a few complaints of the Sync <-> PayPal portal disappearing from people’s PayPal accounts lately for an example. Not being able to make payments is one of the biggest common complaints about Sync online right after people who didn’t read what deferred interest meant so it’s just better to make sure I have options. 

Got my email this morning that my request for mobile deposit was approved and my $263 ETF is scheduled to post tomorrow. So far it’s looking like smooth sailing with DCU. 

Of course, US Bank may become my bank in July if they approve me for a Gold Checking and Cash+ pairing. 

Man the Medicaid office is going to be like “what the heck is he doing with so many accounts?!” when they ask me for my bank statements in December and I send them 1stBank checking and savings as well as checking with NFCU, DCU, and possibly US Bank. 😂 

I don’t include my share savings accounts since they’re all $0. 

But I am not breaking any rules as long as total balances aren’t over $2000 so 🤷‍♂️ 

[Anonymous]

My transfer from 1stBank to DCU was successfully completed this morning. 

Unfortunately, bill pay on the app keeps erroring saying I have to register on the website but the website gives me full access since I set it up on the 20th, it just doesn’t work well on mobile browsers at all. When I called, they couldn’t see anything wrong with it so they had to bounce me to online banking but I got another very friendly representative in both departments so I don’t really mind the phone call. 

They put a ticket in because they can’t see any reason why it’s giving me an error and said I should expect an email when it is fixed, hopefully by tomorrow but otherwise it should be done on Monday. 

I went ahead and set up a pull payment for Discover since I obviously need to test that anyway and I’ll do push payment tests to my accounts once they get that set up. 

BBVA will be a check in the mail which is just fascinating that so many banks can’t electronically pay BBVA but 1stBank can. NFCU can’t even do it. 

I am kind of glad that these hiccups are happening because things do happen and it’s important to know what kind of service you can expect when you have problems - so far, DCU gets an A+ for the customer service side, let’s see how the backend works with getting this fixed. 

[Anonymous]

Their vendor emailed me this morning and bill pay has been fixed. 

The only lingering complaint about them is no transaction alerts for checking account debits. They will send you one if you overdraft but there is no option for texts for transactions that post. 

1stBank also made me really happy. I called them yesterday and asked to cancel my debit card and it took 5 minutes (literally - I looked at the call timer) for me to get a rep on the phone, cancel my eSave bundle and convert my checking to the regular free anywhere checking account with the debit card canceled so I don’t have to pay $10 a year anymore. I have wanted that stupid savings account gone anyway because it’s one of those automatic rounding of purchases to the nearest dollar deals that messes up my exact dollar amount budgeting. Since 1stBank went ahead and did all of this at 2PM on a Sunday from a call center here in Colorado, I got reminded of why I have them to begin with. 

For the time being, I’m going to keep both accounts but as having my direct deposit at 1stBank doesn’t have any benefits associated with it and DCU’s account does, I am leaning towards moving it to DCU. If DCU had Zelle, it would be a no-brainer but DCU not being a part of EWS also means that my transactions go back to being my business, it just makes it difficult to move money to 1stBank. 

Anyway, lot longer update than I planned, DCU fixed the problem in a satisfactory time period. I will decide what I’m doing over the next few months. 

[crys12065]

I opened a DCU checking and savings account today lol. This thread has been very informative.  I want to park $1K in the savings and then test them out as one of my checking accounts because the checking looks promising with some nice perks and they are co-op with my local CU.  I also just opened an Alliant checking/savings account last week because I want to refinance my car with them and use their savings because Navy doesn’t offer a good savings rate. 

I need less checking accounts, I blame you people on MYFICO for this mess, I was blissfully unaware before coming here 😂😂😂