CITBank

This bank is horrible and their customer service reps are rude. They advertised a 2.30% interest rate for a savings account but give you a lower rate (2.22%) once you sign up. The website is no very user friendly and they do not send you emails about recent transactions. The worse part about this bank is when you do a transfer from an external bank account it will take almost two weeks for your money to be available. It take 2-3 business days for the money to show up in your account and then another 8 business days for it to be available. If the money is not available it will not be counted in your interest. Who want their money to be tied up for that long. I have never experienced a transfer taking that long to clear. This bank sucks and I will definitely be closing my account soon.

First, let me be specific that I am writing about CIT Bank and NOT CITI Bank. They are two separate and individual financial institutions. I purchased two certificates of deposit at CIT Online Bank. They are called "Ramp Up" CD's which allow you a one-time interest rate change should the rates increase and you would want to take advantage. Regarding one CD, I called and told them to ramp up to the current rate which was substantially higher. A week later, I went online to check and the rate was still stated at the original rate. Also, since then, the rate had declined. I called the customer service representative and was told they had no record of my call and therefore could not increase the rate.

On a more recent occasion, a CD was maturing and I had planned to transfer it out of CIT to another financial institution. The representative told me that there's a ten day grace period and that if I waited, my CD would continue to earn the rate at which it originally had been. Six days later, I called to transfer the funds to the regular savings account which is the only account you can perform outside transfers. I told the rep I left the funds in there to collect the high rate it was originally taken at and she told me that during the grace period, the rate was lowered to the current rate. When I explained that another rep had told me I would receive the higher rate during the grace period, she apologized and said that I was misinformed.

I told her to immediately shift the funds to the regular saving account so that I could transfer to funds out of CIT and that I would never do business with them again. Being that this was an internal transfer between accounts, it should have occurred immediately. However, she explained that she had to send the request to another department and that it may take up to 48 hours for the funds to be available to me. I have dealt with other financial institutions and internal transfers between accounts should not take more than a couple of hours. It's been over 24 hours and I still do not have access to my money.

Unfortunately, I have another CD that doesn't mature until late next year and will have to endure the incompetency of this so called Bank and its customer service who seem to have no idea what is going on.

No matter how high of a rate CIT is offering, I would caution you to get a slightly lower rate with a sound financial institution like Discover Bank. I've been with them for over ten years and have never had a problem.

I'm a retired senior with limited tech skills. CIT personnel accomodated my shortcomings when it came to opening an account. I got more interest on less money in 2 months at CIT, than I got in 6 years on more money at PNC. I realize that the higher interest comes at the cost of having less personnel but keeping one's savings at another bank is only 1 step better than burying it in the backyard.