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You have 100% control over the loan terms. US Bank offerings include conventional (fixed) and ARM. Penfed has better offerings, with 15/15 and 5/5 ARMs. Penfed's 5/5 ARM declares the following:

Rate is variable and can increase by no more than 2 percentage points after the initial five year period and at each subsequent rate adjustment, with a lifetime maximum adjustment of 5%

So a Penfed 5/5 ARM taken in 2015 at 4% can increase to 6% in 2020, 8% in 2025, and only 9% in 2030; that loan would be contractually-prohibited from increasing at a faster rate, and from increasing above 9%. Penfed's 3/1 ARM also allows 2% adjustments, to a maximum of 6%. Their 15/15 can increase by a maximum of 6% points, once, at 15 years (e.g. a 2015 mortgage at 4% can increase to 10% in 2030, but no higher).

The choice is yours.

DD costs companies next to nothing. The Automated Clearing House (which is how they all do it) charges $0.35/transaction.

Wells Fargo for instance charges $10/month + $.50/transactions for non deposits into WF accounts. Not a fortune, but for my previous small-business employer of 8 employees with paychecks every other week, that $.35/transaction really was $1+/transaction.

A couple of other direct deposit providers that I found real quickly:
Quick Books direct deposit is $1.15/check.
US Bank is $28 + .35/transaction

As a valued U.S. Bank customer, we want to make you aware of a situation that has occurred related to your email address.

We have been informed by Epsilon Interactive, a vendor based in Dallas, Texas, that files containing your email address were accessed by unauthorized entry into their computer system. Epsilon helps us send you emails about products and services that may be of interest to you.

We want to assure you that U.S. Bank has never provided Epsilon with financial information about you. For your security, however, we wanted to call this matter to your attention. We ask that you remain alert to any unusual or suspicious emails.

Please remember that U.S. Bank will never request information such as your personal ID, password, social security number, PIN or account number via email. For your safety, never share this or similar information in response to an email request at any time. To learn more about recognizing online fraud issues, visit:
http://www.usbank.com/cgi_w/cfm/about/online_security/online_fraud.cfm

In addition, if you receive any suspicious looking emails, please tell us immediately.
Call U.S. Bank Customer Service at 800-US-BANKS (800-872-2657).

The security of your information is important to us, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. As always, if you have any questions, or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

As a valued U.S. Bank customer, we want to make you aware of a situation that has occurred related to your email address. We have been informed by Epsilon Interactive, a vendor based in Dallas, Texas, that files containing your email address were accessed by unauthorized entry into their computer system. Epsilon helps us send you emails about products and services that may be of interest to you. We want to assure you that U.S. Bank has never provided Epsilon with financial information about you. For your security, however, we wanted to call this matter to your attention. We ask that you remain alert to any unusual or suspicious emails. Please remember that U.S. Bank will never request information such as your personal ID, password, social security number, PIN or account number via email. For your safety, never share this or similar information in response to an email request at any time. To learn more about recognizing online fraud issues, visit: http://www.usbank.com/cgi_w/cfm/about/online_security/online_fraud.cfm In addition, if you receive any suspicious looking emails, please tell us immediately. Call U.S. Bank Customer Service at 800-US-BANKS (800-872-2657). The security of your information is important to us, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. As always, if you have any questions, or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

I think it is only stupid evil companies that were using Epsilon. Litmus test.

I just got an email from US Bank, too:

As a valued U.S. Bank customer, we want to make you aware of a situation that has occurred related to your email address.

We have been informed by Epsilon Interactive, a vendor based in Dallas, Texas, that files containing your email address were accessed by unauthorized entry into their computer system. Epsilon helps us send you emails about products and services that may be of interest to you.

We want to assure you that U.S. Bank has never provided Epsilon with financial information about you. For your security, however, we wanted to call this matter to your attention. We ask that you remain alert to any unusual or suspicious emails.

Please remember that U.S. Bank will never request information such as your personal ID, password, social security number, PIN or account number via email. For your safety, never share this or similar information in response to an email request at any time. To learn more about recognizing online fraud issues, visit:
http://www.usbank.com/cgi_w/cfm/about/online_security/online_fraud.cfm

In addition, if you receive any suspicious looking emails, please tell us immediately.
Call U.S. Bank Customer Service at 800-US-BANKS (800-872-2657).

The security of your information is important to us, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. As always, if you have any questions, or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

Of course I was using a disposable email address, so this won't affect me too much. But, the incompetence still concerns me. I might cancel my bank account and go somewhere else, because US Bank didn't state that they were dropping Epsilon.

I just got an e-mail from US Bank stating the same and that I should be aware of suspicious e-mails, etc. blah blah blah. I wonder how wide spread this is going to eventually end up?

The E-mail:

As a valued U.S. Bank customer, we want to make you aware of a situation that has occurred related to your email address.

We have been informed by Epsilon Interactive, a vendor based in Dallas, Texas, that files containing your email address were accessed by unauthorized entry into their computer system. Epsilon helps us send you emails about products and services that may be of interest to you.

We want to assure you that U.S. Bank has never provided Epsilon with financial information about you. For your security, however, we wanted to call this matter to your attention. We ask that you remain alert to any unusual or suspicious emails.

Please remember that U.S. Bank will never request information such as your personal ID, password, social security number, PIN or account number via email. For your safety, never share this or similar information in response to an email request at any time. To learn more about recognizing online fraud issues, visit:
http://www.usbank.com/cgi_w/cfm/about/online_security/online_fraud.cfm

In addition, if you receive any suspicious looking emails, please tell us immediately.
Call U.S. Bank Customer Service at 800-US-BANKS (800-872-2657).

The security of your information is important to us, and we apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused you. As always, if you have any questions, or need any additional information, please do not hesitate to contact us.

I don't use my bank's internet-based facilities, because they don't support my (more secure) choice of software- bizarre...

Since I rely on online banking considerably, I wouldn't bank with a bank that wouldn't let me use my choice of O/S, be it Windows, OSX, or *nix. (I use Firefox on FC8 and OSX with my bank without any noticed issue)

Switch banks. You know there are tons of 'em. They all want your business. And write a letter to your old bank as to why you are leaving. Will your letter matter? No, or at least, not right away. But it will make a difference if you aren't the only one. And you'll be safer, whatever the legalities of the issue. I mean, who wants to go thru the legal hassle that comes when some farquad steals your identity because they got your password to your bank's website?

According to the terms and conditions:

They add "3.99% to 12.99%" to the prime rate (which, itself, varies).

They don't say how exactly they will decide to "vary" that number... within that very wide range.

All of my past experience suggests... and recent news stories about mortgages ought to reinforce... that anything that called "variable" does, by gosh, vary. If they say they can go up to 12.99% above prime, you can bet your bippy that some fine day they will "vary" it. And of all the numbers in that range to vary it to, why would they vary it to 12.99%? I would, if I were them.

And I'll bet there's fine print that says they can change the rules at any time.

No, I take that back. There's bold print that says "Account and Cardmember Agreement terms are not guaranteed for any period of time, we may change all terms, including APRs and fees, in accordance with the Cardmember Agreement and applicable law."

That probably means they could even renege on that first no-interest teaser year.

This also fits my observations to date, which is that not yet have I seen one of these "affinity" cards that offered even a halfway-decent deal. All the ones I've seen, you pay the credit card company through the nose, and your charity gets a pittance.

The good news is that some banks are making it easy to send money to individuals. You can cut PayPal out of the loop entirely. Example:

US Bank

Check them out. Might be worthwhile to consider for your online game as well.

If you're talking about the login form on the front page of their site, contrary to appearance, it is secure. The page the form appears on does not need to be sent over SSL as long as the data sent back to the server is. This is a bad idea, however, as it tends to cause this kind of distrust.

See my response to another poster's question about this.

I just checked the website of my bank, US Bank, which happens to be based in the same city as Best Buy--Minneapolis.

US Bank has three checking account types listed which have no minimum balance and no minimum monthly maintenance fee: Free Checking with Interest, Silver Elite Checking (55+) and Student Checking.

The interest paid on the accounts varies according to how much money you have and where the account is based.

All of these accounts come with a free US Bank Visa Check Card with a rewards program as well.

Now you may not have US Bank where you live (it's mostly in the central US), but other banks may offer similar free checking accounts.

Check out U.S. Bank's Unsubscribe page. Basically what you do is click no on everything, put a checkmark in the checkbox and click the submit button.

The interesting thing is it asks if you're 13 years old or more. If you choose "No" then it won't let you unsubscribe. So if you're under 13 and truthful then there's no way to stop getting mail from them. And one could argue that no 13 year old has a bank account but then, why would they ask the age?

I just thought that was interesting.

Also the connection secured is part of the real page from the actual place. https://www4.usbank.com/internetBanking/RequestRou ter?requestCmdId=DisplayLoginPage

Correct, but if you use your debit card like a Visa (signature transaction instead of PIN) then the 3% charge still applies.

I'm lucky enough to have a free checking account at USBank that pays me interest on my balance (no minimum balance), as well as 1% cash back on my credit purchases. So, I try to use the Visa check card for everything... Last year I got $180 back in December. Not bad at all...

US Bank's site is Mozilla friendly too. Not a credit card I know, but they're online banking website is very nice. Good times.