Bank of America is the largest bank holding company in the U.S. with the largest percentage of people using them for their personal banking. The greatest perk of being a Bank of America customer is the convenience of having at least one bank or ATM in every city, even internationally, but this benefit is marginalized by the increasing trends towards mobile and electronic banking. Being part of the biggest bank has its downsides: since Bank of America has basically saturated their potential market share, they are now more interested in earning higher profits than gaining new customers. Here is my personal bias against Bank of America.

What does this mean? This means that instead of trying to gain new or keep existing customers, they are more or less trying to increase profits through various fees or by reducing customer service. On the other hands, we have smaller or newer banks, such as Chase in California, who are trying to build a customer base through exceptional customer service.

Most banks except for Bank of America and Wells Fargo have incentives for new customers. A lot California residents have been getting cash bonuses for signing up for new Chase checking and savings accounts. Bank of the West is currently offering free iPod Touch’s to new checking customers. Bank of the America on the other hand never has any incentives. Neither does Wells Fargo, but that’s because they’re actually a good bank; they weren’t very affected by the recession until they took over Wachovia.

Another way Chase entices customers is through their mobile services. Have you used Bank of America’s iPhone or BlackBerry applications? They both suck. The iPhone version lags so much and the BlackBerry version is just a web browser inside an application. You would think that the biggest bank in the U.S. could spend a little more money developing a decent application. Chase on the other hand has a superb iPhone application. You can easily transfer money to friends from your phone, and my favorite is the ability to deposit up to $1000 from your phone just by taking pictures of checks. In fact, half the time I try to log onto bankofamerica.com, either I get some error which makes it impossible for me to log in, or I can’t access the website at all.

Bank of America doesn’t even cooperate well with other companies on their platform. Have you tried using your Bank of America on Mint? It always says something along the lines, “There are known issues with Bank of America”, which means Bank of America isn’t cooperating with them. Bank of America won’t even cooperate with Chase; I tried to add my Bank of America account as an external account on my Chase account to transfer money, but it got rejected.

Another plus I had with Chase that I didn’t have with Bank of America is pre-approved credit cards. One day when I went to the bank to change some details about my account, the lady said, “Oh, you’re pre-approved for a Chase Freedom Visa Signature credit card. Would you like it?” Pre-approved cards are awesome since it doesn’t affect your credit score since you don’t apply for them, and in fact increase your credit score because you have a lower debt to available credit ratio. I was never offered a credit card from Bank of America, and Chase has one of the best rewards for Visa credit cards.

Perhaps the tipping point which made me close my Bank of America account was when I overdrafted my checking account. I accidentally paid for my credit card twice because I was confused with when my automatic payments would begin. The best part was that I overdrafted by less than $50, yet they charged me $35 for the overdraft fee, and I had over $1,000 in my connected savings account. Why don’t they just transfer money from my savings account to my checking account? Apparently I have to sign up for overdraft protection which my Chase account already had. Why don’t they just make it default?! On the other hand, I withdrew from the wrong Chase account and my checking account went to -$1,200, but instead of charging me anything, Chase sent me a text saying something along the lines of, “Reply with A if you’d like to transfer $1,200 from your savings to your checking.” With a simple text reply, my checking account was no longer in the negative and there were no fees involved. This is just another example of Bank of America finding small ways to get money from their customers.

And I knew that a lot of people were moving away from Bank of America when I went to a branch to close my account and the employee lacked any sort of customer retention. When I said, “I’d like to close my account”, the employee replied with a simple, “Okay”. You would expect at least a futile “Oh no! Please don’t!” or a simply “Why?”, but no, the employee simply went through the process and closed my account in a minute. I’m guessing these employees are used to customers closing their accounts and gave up asking why. It’s funny how the best customer service I’ve experienced at Bank of America was when I closed my account.

This is my list of my favorite websites that I actually use.  I’m not including social networking websites since those are more subjective.

Finance

Mint and PageOnce – These are both services that aggregate your financial information so it’s easier for you to see. Mint is more well written, but Pageonce has a paid app, app for iPads, includes more than just finance. The free version of Pageonce doesn’t let you refresh all your information all at once though. I use Mint more often.

Shopping

Google Shopping – Best place to find the best prices online. Bing Shopping used to be good, but they stopped their cash back program.

Ebates, Mr. Rebates, FatWallet – Sign up, go to online stores through one or all of these websites’ links and receive cash back on your purchases! There’s no risk, I’ve already received $100+ from online shopping.

RetailMeNot – There are a lot of coupon search engines online, but this is by far my favorite due to its user interface.

MapsKrieg – Looking for a place to live? MapsKrieg maps all the craigslist listings in the area.

Other

GeoIPWeather – Gives you weather information based on your location. No more typing in Zip codes!

Imgur – Free image uploads! By far the best for quick sharing. Don’t use it for portfolios and presentations.

Ninite – Automatically install a bunch of free software on  your PC! I use this every time I set up a new PC.

Grooveshark – Stream your favorite songs online for free! It isn’t like Pandora.

DownForEveryoneOrJustMe? – Checks if a website is down on your side or their side.

LetMeGoogleThatForYou – Ever annoyed when someone asks you a question online that can be answered by a quick Google search? Use lmgtfy.com and send them the resulting link that shows them how to do a Google search!

Newsmap.jp – Visual news aggregator. Let’s you quickly see which news is making headlines.

EZTV.it – Tells you what episodes are new today and when torrents on the new episodes are out.

Of course there are plenty more websites, but these are the ones I use regularly. For more websites, I recommend you look at this Reddit post.

This is my list of credit cards that I’ve found to be best for people who have good credit. The purpose is to find credit cards with high rewards and/or low interest rates over a long term duration. Generally, you should avoid hotel and airline credit cards because they don’t give particularly good rewards and it’s generally better to get cash back and use Expedia or something to book plane tickets. All these credit cards have no annual fee unless otherwise noted and do not take into account introductory offers.

American Express Blue Cash

This is my favorite credit card is my default credit card. It offers 5% cash back on groceries and gas and 1.25% cash back on everything else if you spend more than $6500 a year. If you can’t spend $6500 a year, buy things for your friends online and have them pay you in cash. There are also many benefits to this credit card such as extended warranty. The only down side is that it has a high APR; mine’s about 28%. This card however is meant to be used by people who pay their credit card on time and in full.

American Express Plum Card

This credit card is particularly good for business, especially when you purchase a lot of goods. Every month, you can either pay your bill in full and receive a 1.5% discount or you can pay 10% of your bill and defer payment for two months interest free. This is perfect for businesses. The only downside is that there is an annual fee after the first year, but the potential savings in interest, cash back, and financial flexibility is unmatched.

Chase Freedom

This credit card has one of the best rewards for a Visa card. You get 1% cash back on every purchase and 5% on certain categories which change every three months. Also, if you have good credit, you’ll reap the benefit of having Visa Signature on this card. Much of the time the 5% cash back category is useless to you. For example, this month it’s hotels, airlines, and taxi cabs. I don’t travel that much! This will by no means be your default credit card, but it’s nice to have.

Citi Forward

Sure, Citi is one of the only banks still in trouble from the banking crisis, but this is one hell of a credit card. Unlike other credit cards, this one’s rewards focuses on books, movies, music, and restaurants. You get 5 ThankYou points for purchasing in these categories and 1 point in all other categories. Yes, this includes all purchases on Amazon. This works well with American Express Blue Cash since a lot of restaurants don’t accept American Express. This isn’t necessarily 5% cash back though. 16,000 ThankYou points is $100 in cash back, or you can buy gift certificates with less points. This is about a 3.5% cash back rate, which is still much better than other credit cards. Also, ThankYou points are also shared with Expedia, so using Expedia may actually be beneficial.

Credit Card  and Rewards I Do Not Recommend

Airline and Hotel Rewards

These rewards tend to be low and unpredictable. You can’t directly compare these rewards with other credit cards. In my experience, it’s much cheaper to buy hotel rooms and airplane tickets through Expedia than through my mom’s airline credit cards.

Exclusive Shopping Malls

You won’t get the best price by shopping through your credit card’s mall. Don’t do it. In fact, some even jack up prices so that it seems like you’re getting a discount when they offer you 25% cash back. Use Google Shopping and Bing Shopping and shop intelligently.

Discover Card

More people accept Discover Card than American Express, but the rewards aren’t as good. I suggest only using two credit cards, one American Express with rewards and a Visa that you can use every where.

American Express Cards not issued by American Express

For example, don’t use an American Express card issued by Bank of America. You don’t reap the benefits of having an American Express and still have costs of merchants not accepting it. Stick with Blue Cash or the higher tier AMEX cards if you are financially able to.

People don’t think about it early enough, but good credit is necessary whenever you want to get a loan. Yes, you’re going to need a loan eventually when you buy a car or buy a home. I haven’t had a full-time job yet and my credit score is already about 750 which is considered “excellent”. If you have bad credit and win the lottery, the banks still won’t let you get a good loan. Some jobs, especially ones requiring security clearance, pick employees based on credit history since it demonstrates discipline and responsibility.

1. Apply for a credit card. Try to find a good one that either has a low interest rate or has high cash back percentages. Do not apply to too many and do not apply to more than one at once. All you really need to apply for is two. I recommend one American Express and one Visa/Mastercard. Remember, whenever you apply for a credit card or a loan, your credit score goes down.
2. Check your account balances. I recommend using Mint or Pageonce as they help me review all my finances all at once and notify me of any changes. You never want to be in the negative.
3. Use your credit card instead of cash to make purchases. It means more to credit card companies if you actually use their credit cards.
4. Pay each credit card bill in full and pay on time. You don’t want to be branded a late payer, and someone who pays their full credit card bill on time is considered less risky. Some people say that you can build credit by not paying in full, but I don’t think paying the interest on your purchases is worth it. I suggest setting automatic payments that pay your bill in full.
5. Open checking and savings accounts. People with savings accounts tend to be more financially stable.
6. Get different types of credit such as auto loans, personal loans, and mortgages. Responsibility using other means of credit show lenders that you’re less risky.
7. Accept pre-approved credit cards, but you don’t necessarily have to use them. Don’t accept them if they require any annual fee. Pre-approved credit cards do not lower your credit history and one major factor in credit scores is your debt to available credit ratio. If your credit card has high limits but you don’t use much of it, then you will have a higher score. Having more credit cards will almost certainly lower this ratio without any harm to your credit score.
8. Don’t close any credit card accounts. The length you keep accounts is another factor in your credit score. If you consistently seek new credit or are finicky with your credit cards, lenders view you as risky. Also, having more credit cards open will lower your debt to available credit ratio. Make sure that you keep track of these extra credit cards though.
9. Keep track of your credit score. Everyone can view their credit score for free once a year. Make sure all your information is accurate. The first time I saw mine, I saw a phantom account that was opened before I was born and I could not retrieve any information on it from the bank.
10. Open a cell phone account in your name. My AT&T family plan is under my name. If you don’t have good credit, they’ll ask you to make a deposit.
11. Pay all your bills on time. This includes utility, trash, rent, etc. If you don’t pay, they will go through third parties to get their cash and your credit score will be affected.

Basically, the idea is that you should be responsible with your money. Credit scores are banks’ ways to assess your financial responsibility.

Here’s my list of ways to get “free” money, and by free I mean getting money/goods without changing your way of life much and without risk. I’m not in dire need of money, so these are simple ways.

Checking Accounts (you have to report these on your income tax statement. Also, they check your credit every time you apply, which would lower your credit score. I don’t care since I’m still young.):

• Chase has some promotions for their personal (around $50-100) and business ($150-200) checking accounts. The ones I’ve seen are ads when I log into my Chase account, but I’ve gotten them mailed to my apartment and house before.
• Bank of the West – Get an iPod Touch for free!
• CitiBank
• Other promotions

Online shopping:

• Ebates – get cashback for shopping online through Ebates and for referrals. I think you get $10 for free after signing up once and using it within 30 days
• Bing Shopping Cashback – get cashback for shopping online through Bing (can be combined with Ebates)
• Other online cashback websites – these two are the best from what I can tell, especially for Tiger Direct

Do work online (if you have free time):

• Amazon’s Mechanical Turk

If you’re in dire need of cash, you can also do the normal route like doing surveys online, or blogging and setting up advertisements and affiliates! But these typically take a lot of time and you don’t get much money.

If you know any more ways, let me know.