TFSA Kick Start Account 2015 | Tangerine Bank | Discussion forum

Peter said

I have to say I'm not a fan of this promo: they know that once 2015 rolls around, there will be other financial institutions offering a better TFSA rate (as there are now!), and it will take some work for you to transfer the TFSA elsewhere. (And if you simply withdraw your TFSA amount you have lost that contribution room until next year.)

But, if you're set on Tangerine, this promo still gives you a small bonus.

I agree with Peter about not being a fan of this promotion. I took advantage of it a few years ago and shortly into the new year, after the Kick Start rate ended, they reduced their regular rate on the TFSA account.

Another thing to consider, if you take advantage of the offer, is how easy is it to transfer your funds to another institution by having your new institution do it so you don't have to wait a year before you put it back into a TFSA. I did this with Peoples Trust to transfer from Tangerine last July. Neither institution charges a fee (some do). I had to fill out a paper form and send it to Peoples (didn't check if I could have e-mailed it), it took 7 days from withdrawal from Tangerine to deposit at Peoples. The difference in interest eventually made up for the 7 days loss.

I agree Loonie, there is no need to take advantage of Tangerine's Kick Start offer if you can get more elsewhere as part of a regular offering (e.g. the recent PC Financial (3.1%) or Tangerine (3%) bonus interest offerings on regular accounts) or the extra you get from Tangerine isn't worth the effort.

I already opened a TFSA account at Peoples Trust. They have offered 3% on their TFSA daily interest account for a while now. I transferred my Tangerine TFSA there in July. So once my 3.1% bonus offer at PC Financial is over I can use some of the balance to deposit in my Peoples TFSA account for 2015.

musicalmaestro said

Of course, you guys do realize that on dec 31 you could withdraw all your funds from your kickstart account and move them to chequing and then to your desired tfsa account on jan 1.
Yes, that does mean the kickstart bonus will go into your tangerine tfsa using up some contribution room, but it will save some of the hassle of paper work and having to contact the banks, while you reap the benefits of double interest.
Just my 2¢.

I like the theory but I find the timing required to act is so tight that I can imagine some glitch appearing unexpectedly, or Tangerine figuring out some way to say you can't do this. Dec 31, being year-end, could be a really busy day on their website or phone lines, or a snowstorm or whatever, and could mess things up. To me, it's not worth it.

What I will do, though, is make sure I have the money in Savings at Peoples in advance, earning at least 1.8 I hope, so that it's all ready to go on Jan 1 and don't have to wait for money to transfer in from elsewhere.

Catch is for tfsa kickstart and transaction out of it, that must be done before January 1, or else the funds are automatically moved to your tangerine tfsa, making it much more of a hassle to transfer due to paperwork.

Hi Calan,
That right, no need to roll over.
UNLESS... the fine print has changed... Haven't cheecked to see if thy closed the loophole. Let us hope not.

Thanks musicalmaestro.

If I'm planning to stay with Tangerine, would it not be a good idea to empty my TFSA into my TFSA kickstart account today, get the 2.6% interest rate (essentially), and then have an amount of my choosing roll back into my TFSA for 2015? Can't see any downside to this other than tax on the regular interest, but that would be far outweighed by the double interest.
Edit: just read the fine print. Max contribution to a kickstart account is $5500, so my plan won't quite work.

Maybe I'm missing something, but when you take the money out of the kickstart, can't you then just deduct an amount equivalent to the interest before you deposit into your TFSA?

Got everything set up for this:
Deposited $5500 into the kickstart account.
Post-dated transaction: Dec. 31 transfer $5500 from TFSA to savings.
Willl allow the kickstart to roll into my TFSA on Jan. 1 (to make sure I don't get caught by any fine print about money needing to stay in the account).

Contribution room won't change (except for the additional $5500 room I'll get next year anyway), and I get an extra $16.37 (didn't get in right at the start). Yes I'd be better off moving to a higher interest bank, but I wasn't planning to do that so I'll count this entire $16.37 as "extra" for about 15 minutes of work total. I'm okay with that!