For those of you who use USAA or a similar online bank... How do you deposit cash into your checking account?
1. This is a generalization, but it's 2024, and I'm a millennial. Therefore, I rarely use or carry cash. When someone pays me cash for something, like the desk I just sold on FB Marketplace, I need to find a way to get it into my checking account. I could just include my wallet as another account in my YNAB budget and pay for things with cash... Ugh.
2. I used to use money orders and then use the "mobile check deposit" function of the USAA smartphone app. In recent years, places have started printing the words "NOT FOR MOBILE DEPOSIT" on their money orders. So, that's not a reliable option anymore. (I say reliable because sometimes, for some people, with some banks, the mobile deposit will still work.)
3. I could just open a free account with a local bank/credit union, deposit the cash there, and then ACH transfer it to USAA. However, I'm in the military, and the thought of opening and closing bank accounts when I move every 1 to 4 years sounds terrible. Considering their customer base, USAA could find a way to overcome this. Alas, they have not.
4. I could open a checking account with a big bank like Wells Fargo or Chase, which I would use almost exclusively for this scenario. Both of those institutions have branches in most of the areas I'm likely to be assigned. However, their checking accounts either have $10 monthly fees (that's a hard no) or require me to keep $500 in the account (sounds like a $21.25 per month opportunity cost).
How do you do it? Is there a solution I'm not seeing? Is one of these not as bad as I make it out to be?
1. This is a generalization, but it's 2024, and I'm a millennial. Therefore, I rarely use or carry cash. When someone pays me cash for something, like the desk I just sold on FB Marketplace, I need to find a way to get it into my checking account. I could just include my wallet as another account in my YNAB budget and pay for things with cash... Ugh.
2. I used to use money orders and then use the "mobile check deposit" function of the USAA smartphone app. In recent years, places have started printing the words "NOT FOR MOBILE DEPOSIT" on their money orders. So, that's not a reliable option anymore. (I say reliable because sometimes, for some people, with some banks, the mobile deposit will still work.)
3. I could just open a free account with a local bank/credit union, deposit the cash there, and then ACH transfer it to USAA. However, I'm in the military, and the thought of opening and closing bank accounts when I move every 1 to 4 years sounds terrible. Considering their customer base, USAA could find a way to overcome this. Alas, they have not.
4. I could open a checking account with a big bank like Wells Fargo or Chase, which I would use almost exclusively for this scenario. Both of those institutions have branches in most of the areas I'm likely to be assigned. However, their checking accounts either have $10 monthly fees (that's a hard no) or require me to keep $500 in the account (sounds like a $21.25 per month opportunity cost).
How do you do it? Is there a solution I'm not seeing? Is one of these not as bad as I make it out to be?
Statistics: Posted by slippinsurlies — Tue Jun 18, 2024 5:14 pm — Replies 14 — Views 441