Banks Delay Money Transfers By Up to Four Days

Money transfers are great, minus the waiting time.

Historically, there is always a delay between when a money transfer is first requested by a consumer to when the dough actually appears in the destination account. It is just a matter of how long is the delay. Too much of a delay and the consumer loses out on interest earnings.

Below details the amount of time some online banks take to transfer funds between accounts, according to the Bank Deals blog:

Fast Transfers ~ 1 to 2 days (0 to 1 day of lost interest)
• E*TRADE
• EmigrantDirect/DollarSavingsDirect
• Providentdirect
• GMAC Bank
• CNBBankDirect
• E-LOAN
• Countrywide
• ING Direct
• OnBank

Slow Transfers ~ 3 to 4 days (often with 2 days of lost interest)
• HSBC Direct
• FNBO Direct
• EverBank
• Capital One
• Nationwide
• OneUnited

The Wall Street Journal took a look at the fund-transfer issue last week, and Bank Deals followed-up with a blog today, detailing some of the slowest and fastest transfers.

We think the matter deserves scrutiny. We hope banks are transferring money as quickly as they can, because if not, taking an extra benefit from, say, the overnight Treasury window is simply not appropriate, in our view.