There aren’t many “eye candies” on the site, so I can do my transactions quickly. Frequent account menus are easy to locate. Check the interest rates, it’s there. Bank account fees? Same. So, let’s explore CDF and see how user-friendly the bank’s online interface is. This is their (truncated) opening screen:

You enter your customer number and then login, or you can add your number to be memorized so you don’t have to enter your number every time you login. After that is an additional security measure, where you enter your personal access code for the security image and phrase. Please take note to check (for security) that you are indeed logging in to the real site by moving your mouse pointer to the URL icon. The red arrow in the screenshot indicates “Verified by: Thawte Consulting cc.” Take note also that the smiley image is not my security image!

and the smiley:

After successfully logging in, you will then be on this page: Your quick account summary display.

Depositing to a TFSA

There are many ways to deposit to your account. For now, let’s focus on making a deposit to a TFSA. You can deposit by signing their form and mailing it to CDF with a cheque to deposit to your TFSA. Or, you can contribute to it from the money you deposited from your “regular” savings account, which we will do here. Click “Account Services” and then click “Open a new account”.

After that, you should see this screen, in which you’ll have to click “Open Account” next to the range of the amount of your deposit. Each row shows the interest rate depending on the amount range.

Then, it will just show you a small screen about the details of your transaction. After that, this screen will follow, where you enter the exact amount to deposit into the new TFSA:

After clicking “Continue”, you will see a screen summarizing the transaction that is about to occur, and that will remind you about over-contribution rules and future close/transfer fees.

After clicking “Confirm”, the TFSA will be created and you will get a summary screen (not shown).

And finally, the screen shot of our $200 contribution. It’s already reflected in the account summary:

Paying bills

Let’s try another common online banking task: bill payment.

Paying bills online with CDF is easy and secure. Just set up the bill you want to pay, then select the amount, the date you want to pay the bill, and the account you want to draw from. I’m going to pay some of my credit card balances in this example. In my case I have already set up some bills. To pay a bill, click “Payments” in the left menu to get a list of bills to pay:

After a few clicks, you are done:

Withdrawing from a TFSA

Suppose you need some money (via a withdrawal, ugh!) from your TFSA account. You need some more money for your Las Vegas trip or you decided to buy a new computer so… that TFSA will have to be withdrawn. (Keep in mind the TFSA rules whereby withdrawals do not create extra contribution room until the following calendar year.) You can withdraw funds from your KeyReach TFSA in 1 of 3 ways:

a) Complete the TFSA form and mail it in to CDF. You can choose to have the funds mailed to you or deposited into your Savings or Chequing Account.
b) If you have a Savings or Chequing account, you can transfer funds from your TFSA into your Savings or Chequing Account by calling them toll-free at: 1-877-441-2249 (but I haven’t done this before).
c) Make the withdrawal online.

What we are going to do now is to transfer some of our TFSA money to our regular savings account online. First, click “Transfers…” in the left menu, which will bring up a page where you will select the source account, the amount, and the destination type:

After clicking “Continue”, you can then choose the specific account and attach a note:

Then, click “Confirm”:

Since this is an intra-bank transaction, your transfer is complete. You can go now to the nearest ABM (under THE EXCHANGE network of course) and get it.

Electronic Funds Transfer from your account at a different bank

I have already set up my payroll direct deposit with PC Financial. I also completed the EFT transfer agreement form with CDF. Now, let’s do the EFT transfer from my PC Financial account to CDF. Click “Transfers” in the left menu, then click on “Electronic Funds Transfer Authorization (External Bank Transfer)”:

After filling in the details of the EFT request, click “Confirm and Submit”, where you will have a chance to review the transaction:

Here is the summary of the transaction:

If you opted to receive an e-mail about this EFT, CDF will e-mail you with the amount of the transfer and the time at which the transfer will occur.

Wish list

My wish list for the CDF online banking interface is centered around their main account summary. Let’s take another look at this page:

Note that I put some fictitious amount here, as I unfortunately don’t have $1.2M+ sitting in a savings account or a $1M GIC.

Every time I make a new TFSA deposit, the number of the account increments. This started from “KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 00000″ and now I have total of four:

“KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 00000″
“KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 00006″
“KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 00007″
“KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 00008″

I understand that my savings account will stay at “00000″ and if I make another GIC contribution, then I expect to have another “KEYREACH RSP GIC 00002″ and so on, but what about the TFSA? If I make a TFSA deposit at another financial institution, then the amount is just added to the existing account. I don’t know why CDF does it this way. Is this to make sure their interest rate computation will stick to each specific account’s amount? Their software can’t compute them individually? If I keep investing into a TFSA with CDF, I will have “KEYREACH TFSA SAVINGS ACCOUNT 11111″ when I’m 70.

Also, I’d like to see CDF include a payroll direct deposit feature in their system so I don’t have to transfer money so regularly from other banks.

Forum/Topic		Started	Last Post	Posts
	Canadian Direct Financial TFSA as Emergency Account?	November 30, 2011 5:01 am by Fred	December 3, 2011 9:09 pm by msl	10
	Canadian Direct Financial TFSA Account	June 1, 2010 12:01 pm by Tanos	November 26, 2011 11:53 am by msl	4
	Canadian Direct Financial Canadian Direct Financial – HISA 2.1%	July 7, 2011 11:22 am by Dave	August 22, 2011 6:47 pm by MG	5
	Canadian Direct Financial holds?	July 23, 2011 2:21 pm by jacks	July 24, 2011 6:15 am by jacks	5
	Canadian Direct Financial Canadian Direct Financial new account opening process and timeline	November 3, 2010 7:59 pm by Prag	June 10, 2011 10:31 pm by msl	41

The only reason why I keep a chequing account is so that I can deposit the occasional foreign currency cheque with a teller and so that I can write cheques (although some hybrid accounts let you write cheques). However, I try to keep as little money as possible in my chequing account at all times.

Is it possible to experience high interest, no fees, and still have access to your money when you need it? No single account satisfies this, but as with most things in life, you can tweak your habits to improve you situation. Most day-to-day fees and hassles involve debit card and ATM transactions, cheques, bill payments, and transfers. Here are some simple tips that can help you to address these issues to get the most out of your bank accounts.

Use credit cards as much as possible

Stores would probably prefer that you use cash, but to the consumer, using a credit card helps you in three ways. First of all, you can perform unlimited credit card transactions (well, as long as you have the money for it). With many debit cards, your chequing account only allows you a certain number of transactions per month. Second, many credit cards have no annual fee and give you rewards like cash back or points to buy groceries and such. Third, you only have to pay off your credit card once a month. This means that you can continue to earn interest on money that sits in your bank account for up to two months before you have to pay off your credit card bill without penalty.

Of course, you have to be careful with credit cards. If you carry debt on the card, then obviously you are being charged interest. Also, if you have trouble spending money that you don’t have, credit cards exaggerate the problem. But keep track of your purchases and you should have no problem.

Pay your bills online or via telephone

Often, paying your bills online or via telephone is free. You don’t need to write a cheque, you don’t need to mail anything, and you don’t need to drive anything. In addition, online of phone payments are often posted the next day, so you don’t have to wait the week or more with other types of payments.

Use PayPal

With PayPal, once you have linked your bank account to your PayPal account, you can pay people via “pre-authorized payments”. This is different than debit card payments because there are often chequing account limits and fees on debit card transactions but none on pre-authorized payments (although you should check this with your bank).

Although PayPal became big because of eBay, you can use PayPal to pay for items and subscriptions on an increasing number of websites.

If you and your friends have PayPal accounts of the “Personal” type, you can pay each other instantly and without fees via pre-authorized payments. This lessens your need to carry around as much cash (thus lowering the need to go to an ATM) or write cheques.

Try and get your friends to open accounts with the same bank

Often, transfers within the same bank are unlimited and free. I have a friend that I’m constantly lending and owing money to. We pay each other back instantly and without fees through online banking because we both have accounts with the same bank.

Carry some cash around and don’t use other networks’ ATMs!

ATM network fees are a pain. But really, just find an ATM that is part of your bank’s network! For example, if you have an account with HSBC or any of the credit unions, you can use ATMs on any other HSBC or credit union THE EXCHANGE Network (I think it’s officially capitalized) without paying any fees. As another example, if you have an account with PC Financial, you can use any CIBC bank machine without paying network fees.

And if you have at least a couple hundred dollars in your chequing account, whenever you withdraw cash, just try and withdraw larger amounts at a time (like $200 instead of $60). This might sound simple too simplistic, but I used to always withdraw the smallest amount needed; it made a huge difference to withdraw slightly higher amounts in order to decrease the frequency of trips to the ATM.

Don’t be afraid of opening multiple accounts at different banks

Many chequing accounts that have no minimum balance simply limit the number of transactions you can do. So if you have $200, you can just keep $100 in one account and $100 in another account and thus get double the number of allowed transactions. And if you have accounts at different banks, this means that you have probably increased the number of ATMs you can access without incurring network fees.

Pick a high interest savings account over short-term GICs and pair a high interest savings account with a chequing account in the same bank

This goal of this tip is to help you earn a high rate on your money while keeping the money accessible.

High interest savings account rates are comparable to short-term GIC rates, but of course you don’t have to lock your money in. If you keep as much money as possible in a high interest savings account and have a chequing account with the same bank, you can transfer money back and forth as many times as you want between those accounts either instantly or within 1 business day on an as-needed basis. So if you know you need to write a cheque on a certain date, simply transfer your money last-minute from your high interest savings account to your chequing account. This trades off the additional simple step in order to access your money for chequing needs with the ability to earn a higher rate on your money.

First of all, you should have some information on what my financial background is like and what my banking needs are. I am a conservative investor, holding most of my funds in high interest savings accounts and in term deposits (or GICs), registered and non-registered. I am at a stage in my life where I am looking to purchase a place, so I need access to my funds either tomorrow or in months when I actually find a place that I want to buy.

In terms of my banking needs, it is very simple — I don’t want to be limited and I don’t want to pay fees. Sounds simple, but it really isn’t. I am looking for an account where I can perform as many transactions as I need, including bill payments, transfers, deposits, withdrawals and Interac direct payments. I also want to have cheques and easy access to ATM machines if I need one.

Based on this, I did a comparison of accounts at banks and credit unions, large and small. I focused first on finding accounts that did not have any fees and then on the features they provided for daily banking. I did not include accounts that were free but limited, for example only providing 4 free transactions a month — this would just not meet my needs.

Please note that this comparison table is accurate to the best of my knowledge as of August 28, 2007. Please let me know if you see any errors and I will correct them. Also, please check with the specific banks to confirm any information.

*HSBC Direct Savings Account is a high interest savings account with no minimum balance required and no monthly fees.

I also noted that there are some banks that do not offer such an account: RBC, CIBC, and Envision Credit Union.