After being GMAC Bank first and then changing it’s name to Ally Bank, everyone’s no doubt seen the new advertisements that emphasizes no fine print. With the bank being connected with General Motors, the first thing I can think of is whether my money will be safe. Of course, I went to research further before my readers could be ripped off with this bank so this review represents my opinion of putting money with its savings account offering.
Sign up for an account by clicking here
Safety of Ally Bank
First things first, Ally Bank saving accounts and CDs are all FDIC insured so our money is safe for up to $250k per account. There are ways to increase the amount covered even further, but you would need to open individual, joint, and accounts under other entities such as a trust to get a higher limit. (Another way is to just open accounts across different banks, which might be easier.)
Products Offered from the Online Bank
Ally Bank offers 2 main products that we are really concerned about – an online savings account and a certificate of deposit with above average rates. The extremely good interest rates for this type of product and the bank being FDIC insured prompt me to open an account with them.
When I opened an account, it was also nice to see that I can actually open multiple savings accounts and certificate deposits all on one screen. No more submitting multiple applications and spending time filling the exact same form more than necessary.
Ally Bank is Another Excellent Option
There’s really many options out there to compete for our money, but it’s nice to see a bank with competitive rates with a simple interface. The name GMAC may spook you in opening an account, but the safety of the FDIC guarantee should provide comfort, especially since you are getting more interest by going with them.
After 2 years of originally reviewing this bank, I am still an Ally Bank customer. But before you decide, make sure that you read through some of the other user reviews below. Though most people only speak up when they have a problem, you can get an idea of the types of issues people have with their accounts.
- Ally Bank – Official Site
Other News You May Want to Know About the Ally Bank
Is GMAC Really GM?
Many people asked me about this already, and I actually had the same question myself. I always thought that GMAC Financial Services was part of General Motors but I was wrong. GMAC is actually a standalone banking operation that provides lending and banking services. The difference with GMAC to a traditional loan company is that instead of offering mortgages and home equities to consumers, GMAC offers loans and lending to GM and Chrysler dealers to finance their operations.
Ally Bank is just one of the online banks we reviewed on MoneyNing.com. Click here for the full list of high yield online savings accounts we have experience with.
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Bryan, please explain your comment “scared”, I don’t understand why anyone would do anything less that the 5 yr CD, lets do a little math, if you have $10,000 and you do the 12m CD at 1.45% you’ll earn $145 in the 12 months, if you do the 5 yr for 2.75% you’ll earn $275 in 12 months, if you cash the CD out after 12m the penalty will be $45 and you’ll still be $85 ahead. Sometimes the word PENALTY just turn people off. Check this out with your local bank, I bet you’ll find a much higher penalty for long term CD’s
I don’t understand what the big deal is with the t.v. commercials, they are doing exactly what they are designed to do GET YOUR ATTENTION, whether good or bad THEY WORK, Ally has good rates, no hidden fees, good customer service (phone & online), like any other bank they have rules to follow, when you tranfer funds its going to take 3/5 business days, you will get into trouble with overdrafts and other fees if you can’t follow the rules.
I have been seeing your ads with the childresn and the fellow who is terrible. These ads are the most terrible and degrading ads I have ever seen. Your company should be ashamed of putting ads of this nautre on TV for people to see. I definitely would not do business with your bank just because of the ads that you are putting on TV. Put something positive on for ads.
Ally Bank is evil and refuses to work with the dire needs of the unemployed Americans. They refused to work anything out with us regarding payments of our 2005 Cadillac even though at this time it is worth basically NOTHING. They are evil and don’t care about the unemployed, underemployed and have no interest in trying to work things out for struggling families. If that is the kind of bank you want to do business with, be my guest but I will continue to spread the word that they don’t give a hoot about anything but their stockholders.
ally bank is not gmac…ally bank handles like saving and checking and cds….. gmac owns like 1 percent in shares or some crap…check the website
Wow a 2005 Cadillac and you aren’t finshed paying it off already, let me guess you got a 7 year auto loan didn’t you. Rule of thumb when buying a car, never get a loan longer then 5 years. And if you buy used never get a loan longer then its expected blue book value. So if you buy a 2 year old car the loan should be no longer then 3 years. Also now maybe you’ll learn to live within your means, it is the consumers responsibility to know if they can afford somenthing if they get laid-off, sick or hurt etc not the lending companies. oh and BTW Ally Bank is not GMAC Auto and they do not have loans through the bank.
I was just about to do the 5 year CD approach (can liquidate with only 2-month interest penalty), but these comments scare me a little bit. But my bottom line, I’m thinking, is: if it is FDIC insured, what do I have to lose?
I would also like to mention that Ally Bank is NOT BBB accrediated. That’s one ything that is holding me on the fence and with the help of these comments about even putting my money into this bank…my money is my money may it be small; still doesn’t mean I want to lose it.
check bankrate for ally and you will find a 4 star rating{5 max}, plus fdic insured. also has excellent phone support and very easy website.
John, I’m curious how Ally got a 4 star ratingfrom Bankrate. Bauer Financial gives them 3 stars. In 2009, their ROA was a -4.44%. In 2008, it was a -0.36%. However, their ROA as of 6 months ended in June is back up to a +1.22%. You also have to remember that this bank had the benefit of bail out money.
my suggestion for people who are considering Ally
pros:
1. they have simple rules and no hidden fees
2. rates are higher than national average
3. 24 hour online chat (some online representatives are not that knowledgeable, make sure to call in if you have a serious question)
4. free ACH transfer (generally takes within 5 business days)
5. debit and checks for online checking and MMA (no atm fees)
6. FDIC insured (up to 250k to 2013, 100k afterwards)
7. no minimum balance requirements
8. overdraft protection
9. 0.25% rate increase for CD renewals (LIMITED TIME)
what I did was I have a 3 month CD at 0.74%, then I plan to renew it by changing the terms to 5 years (2.70% interest, 2.95% final), you get 10 day period to decide if you want to renew it and put in more money.
10. ten day best rate guarantee: you get the best rate out of the 10 days since you open the CD account, I find this valuable.
cons
1. there are cases where ACH transfers take longer than usual, I’ve been with the bank for 2 years, ACH transfers take within 5 business days, but I’ve had transfers that take up to 10 business days, it doesn’t happen often, but it can piss people off
2. “56% of it is owned by the Federal Treasury (US)”, from previous post, this is a disadvantage, but just keep in mind there is FDIC, don’t go over the limit (250k before 2013, 100k after), then you’ll be fine
3. bad commercial, I personally don’t have kids, but teaching the kids how to look at commercials is very crucial, there are many bad commercials out there, and Ally isn’t really one of them. Well, you don’t have to agree with me, but I’m here to earn interest rates and have my money secure, not looking for banks with good commercials. I’d rather go banks with higher interest with bad commercials then banks with good commercials that rip you off.
4. high rates may lead to failure? There are other banks with higher interest rates: Everbank, Discover, Salliemae… I don’t have an opinion about this, lets wait and see
5. security login feature, the login process does get a little annoying since it takes an extra security question if you login from a different computer. My account has never been hacked, so I guess it’s fine with me.
6. some bad customer service, there are cases that some customer representatives (online chat ones) are not knowledgeable
7. soft credit pull for all new accounts
I assume when you look at this thread, you are deciding on a high interest rate bank. Everbank, Discover, Salliemae, ING, HSBC and maybe AMEX are all what you consider, I was skeptical about Ally (GMAC then) when I tried them. I would suggest you to just start with $100 and do a bunch of ACH transfer to test their quality. In general online banks are harder to trust, but you don’t always have to start out with investing all your money, start with a small amount and see if you like the service. That’s what I did and they gained my trust. One advantage with Ally is there is no minimum balance, so you can just even throw in $5 and do $1 ACH transfer to test it’s service. Other Banks all have minimum balances, so you need to put a certain amount of balance in for testing.
I think Ally bank is a great bank, there are flaws, but they have improved dramatically. I encourage people who are considering, just open an account with them and test them out, if you don’t like it, just close the accounts (only takes minutes)
As the economy continues to slide, regional banks are failing at an alarming rate. So far, in 2010, 109 banks have failed. This brings the total number of bank failures since 2007 to 277.
I for one would like to see more use of children. Specifically, if Ally would fire its current staff and replace them all with 12 to 17 year-old kids who would work for minimum wage (or less than minimum since they’re under age anyway) then all that savings could be passed onto its customers in the form of even higher CD interest rates. In fact, if Ally would institute a “must retire on your 18th birthday” policy, then the turn-over for younger replacements would continue to generate greater ROI for those of us who have trusted the established banking community to renegotiate our upside-down mortgages or use bail-out monies to generate new mortgages.
Now, I know that may sound a little cynical to some you but consider the upside (besides a higher rate of return for Ally’s customers): By creating a jaded, disenfranchised underclass you have the next generation of Tea Bagger Republicans weaned on groping for an unreachable American dream because they’ve come to believe that voting to lower taxes and deregulate big business is mysteriously in their best interest. (Don’t question how that works. Glen Beck will explain it to you if you have any doubts.)
But, of course, we seriously do not want a cadre of laid-off young people going on the public dole upon reaching voting age. I think Ally really does have an obligation to help these kids transition with getting a decent college education. That’s the right thing to do in these tough times. That’s why I think it would be incredible if Ally developed a college-loan division (also entirely online, of course), where even greater profits can be had and underwritten by federal funds. This is truly a win-win situation with newly laid-off employees taking their hard-won work experience into the college classroom, funded with subsidized (and, guaranteed) loans to the for-profit university system.
In fact, why not take this winning formula one step further? Create Ally University. A work-study college where students can study for their Business Admin degree and defray costs their loans don’t cover by working for Ally Bank as independent contractors who already know the system. (And you thought deregulation was bad. Shame on you.)
I know where I’m putting my money. How about you?
Hope this helped…
Monty
Thank you Monty. They are not willing to help anyone with car loans that they obtained from GMAC even when people are laid off and have tried their very, very best to work with them. My car would have been paid off in February of 2011 and we had to file Chapter 7 BK because of endless repairs/rental car fees but they refused to work with us at all on any back payments they seemed to think we owed (I disupted the amount) and told them my husband lost his job in January so we had fallen a little behind. Their 12 year old “customer service BK” representative refused to even return my phone calls in regard to working out a payment arrangement then sent an “investigator” to our house as though we were criminals or something. Before they took over for GMAC, I was able to talk to reasonable people and make reasonable arrangements. I even offered to pay them a $4,000 dollar lump sum on the car and it needed a new radiator and transmission and they refused. They came and got it today and it is worth about $2,000 at the most. I wonder what they will do with it? Scrap it most likely when I was willing to pay it off even with the repairs needed because now I have no car to get back and forth to work in and will have to incur rental car expenses yet again.
I will continue to spread the word about Ally Bank and the fact that they only care about their shareholders, the majority GOP I am sure.
you picked the car not them…the way you bought it or the way you drove it is not their fault…why should you not have to pay your part of the agreement?
Your commercial is so very sad – I would never consider banking with your company – using children that way is so sad – we try to teach children to be nice, to share and your commercial is disheartening. Someone needs to change that and make it better- shame on you..
we teach children to be nice, but our government murders criminals?i find THAT to be disheartening.i dont know what fantasy world exists where these commercials are worth all the uproar, but im glad to be planted firmly on Earth
Positives
(1) No ATM fees, even when travelling in Europe. I saved about $10 per withdrawal when compared with my old Wachovia account.
(2) Interest on checking account and easy, free ‘oops’ protection allowing money to be automatically transferred over from savings if I miscalculate and overdraw the checking account
One major negatives
Their billpay system is bug-ridden and borderline incompetent.
(1) I can pay a bill on one screen, and still have it show up on another screen days later as unpaid.
(2) They seem to be totally unable to set up e-bills for Time Warner, which is a situation I’ve been trying to resolve for several months now.
(3) They managed to screw up a payment to one vendor, sending me an e-mail that the payment had failed. I then logged in to the system and retried the payment. This resulted me in double-paying that service, which was something that Ally were unable to correct.
In summary, Ally has lots of good points, but their billpay system is a complete disaster area.
Comon guys…enough. If you don’t like the bank, for whatever reason, don’t bank with Ally …it’s just that simple. If you like Ally, don’t take on a crusade…just bank with them. FDIC insures in case they fail and incidentally, they woulnd’t be the first. Favourable rates promote competition which is what banks don’t want. Isn’t this the American way? And Mody, please…..I hope to hold you to your promise that your previous post was your last. There’s no place on these postings for personal attacks. Have a great day everyone and maybe each of you can do a “little random act of kindness” to make this world a little better.
to my knowledge, FDIC has never had to step in to help a bank, so im wondering how it would work in this case, if Ally collapsed.i have several thousand in CDs, i havent had any problems thus far
FYI: yeah it did, when WAMU failed, everyone who had an account under 100k was FDIC insured, your money is safe as long as you don’t go over the limit, it’s 250k now..from my understanding the FDIC insures your money, two possible condition happens
1. you withdraw your money
2. another bank takes over
for the WAMU case, Chase took over
you are right, if Ally collapse, as long as you are under the FDIC insured limit, you’re safe
Right. I’m a former Washington Mutual customer that got transferred over to Chase. WAMU was OK in some ways, bad in others. Overall, we’re less satisfied with Chase, and we’re thinking of switching. I’m researching Ally and others.
Julie
ASSUME means making an ASS out of U and ME. You just made on out of U. Only because I don’t tell my own experience in detail doesn’t mean I hadn’t any, or does it – to U?
Anyway, I said it previously and – welcome to the 99% club, Stay happy. That’s my last post here.
Thank heavens.
Mody,
It is clear that you have no actual experience with Ally Bank and rather than get into uneducated rants, I suggest you either try them and comment based on actual experience or let the folks that do have real experience help educate others, since that is the purpose of the site.
I for one have been very happy with the Ally Bank experience. You do have to invest 10-15 minutes to apply online like any other bank to open an account and I also had to return a signature card the first time. It all went smoothly though and I have been really pleased with the speed of the transfers and every time I have dealt with their customer service, they have been really helpful and a pleasure to deal with. I started with a simple savings account and have gone on to open CDs and a checking account with them.
I would recommend them based on my experience.
Jenne
Sure there will be a few individuals Ally tries to make happy and if you’re one of them, be happy as long as you can.
Someone once told me – “In business I’m like a whore and if I have to step over dead bodies to get what I want, so I will step over your body, too”. Just do a little research on these crooks and the dark clouds may fall upon your way of thinking about ALLY, too.
Smart, they are, indeed, and the best psychiatrist they must have employed. Too good they know on how to blind the mass, and once again, pull them into the sling. And if that’s not enough, then they just buy themselves into a market, which, on contrary and by being as hypocritical as hypocrisy can allow, otherwise they will deny that market decency and adequate value and just discriminate. Boy do they smell bad.
Nevertheless, as being cited a few times, there must be some very happy customers of Ally and the emphasis is on “must be”.
I count the days to the headlines “Ally is dead” The dream of a “sprinter” of being a multiple marathon runners has come to a fatal end, collapsing after 444 meters and died on a heart attach. Just wait a little longer and make sure you get your money out before they close their doors. … Boy its so obvious that will happen soon.
Question is only, will you be amongst the 99% percent crying or the 1% telling “I knew it, smart me I didn’t fall for them”.
All the best
why is it obvious that they will fold?there are a lot of rants and raves here, but very little substance.on the chance it does fold, doesnt FDIC protect our money?maybe im naive, but ive been investing under that assumption
Mody you sound like a disgruntled former employee or you work for a competing bank. Which is it????????????????????? So far as a customer I have had no prblems using their site, I pay bills, transfer funds to and from, order checks called customer service at 3am EST and got everything I expected and then sum. I have read their financial reports and have searched the web trying to find any substance to back your ranting. So just like in writng a book list your sources, state your document cases or shut up. And yes they are insured by the FDIC so I will NOT lose my money.
Mody,
You seem to have had a nightmare with Ally. What happened? Will you share a little bit? Because till today, everything has been really perfect with me. No problems at all. I do not know why you are suggesting me to buy some shares. I need a saving and a checking account with a bank. Till now, Ally has been good for me.
RJ
you are the best example – you should try getting a job at Ally. With your talent of twisting words you would be offered a stool at the Ally Board, I am (almost) sure.
So now everyone knows my real name – after a BANKER successfully turned the name Mody into MOODY. Well done MR JR, keep going like that and more and more people will easy be able to see the real picture. It’s losers with a big mouth like you who help us deselect the scrap.
i was going to open a checking account with ally. i have two other checking accounts that i deal with personally,not online as i really don’t trust it and prefer to do business face to face. this account is for one purpose only and that is to pay a specific monthly bill separate from my other accounts. i was not going to transfer funds from my accounts to ally electronically but by mail the old fashioned way. but after reading the reviews i’m backing away. i think i’ll find another bank to do business with that way if anything does go wrong at least i’ll be able to speak with someone personally. thanks to all for your warning.
BOB
Knowing the CROOK APPROACH of Ally … boy, a 138 year old, blind could smell it, Bob, do you seriously believe Ally doesn’t post here themselves … they may as well pay some losers to post here and what do you and – HELLO RJ – so many many many millions millions millions Americans Americans Americans thinks they would write?
Maybe something that is not in favor and does not tell how ANGEL DEED led Ally is? Get real, Americans, Germans, English, French … all the way to Chinese …
Talking about China. These hypocritical Ally folk will sure have a very difficult task to convince the Chinese after we expose how they think, speak and discriminate Chinese and other Nationalities, too.
Ally … Good luck and … find yourself a nice place where you can lay yourself to rest. … You finished yourself.
For those of you interested in Ally, NOT Mody, otherwise known as MOODY, I speak for myself and my comments are just that, my own comments gained from my experience which includes working at a brick and morter Bank for over five years and now as a customer of Ally. If your interested in Ally, try them out which is easy to do with a minimal investment. You will see as I and many others have seen that Ally is different and offers a quality and safe investment option.
Jenne
I suggest you go and buy some shares. These crooks may even give you a bravery medal, who knows, or you may go down the drain with them.
Ally Sucks And They Are Crooks Over Crooks … can’t be worse than Ally.
Mody,
You seem to have had a nightmare with Ally. What happened? Will you share a little bit? Because till today, everything has been really perfect with me. No problems at all. I do not know why you are suggesting me to buy some shares. I need a saving and a checking account with a bank. Till now, Ally has been good for me.
I have never been happier with a bank than with Ally. No brick and motar. I was suspicious at first. I wrote down as many questions as posssible before I chatted online with an Ally agent. Matter of fact, I chatted twice before opening my account. Then, I tested everthing: the fund transfers, the bill pays. I have not tried the debit card yet. But I called and asked about the AMT cash withdrawal. The agent said the bank would credit whatever the AMT charges are and you can withdrwal from any AMT machine.
The interest rates for both saving and checking are so so much better than my original banks. They do not have minimum balance requirments. How cool is this.
I am totally satisfied with Ally, at least till today. Plus, they have the best user-friendly website.
I also give Ally a big plus for asking clients’ experience with Ally, and asking for any comments on how to improve their service.
Ally is the best, at least for me. You have to try it to believe this.
The ads still sucks with the man and kids. Perhaps they should have used a woman to play the games with the kids. It turns me off from considering the bank. I think the bank is probably ok, but the commercials turns me off even though I know the message they want us to get. Change the stupid commericals.
Sandi and to all of the other Risk Takers,
You will be the first one in a very long line of people asking questions after questions about how was this possible that this bank could rip me off I believed in them.
Banking history repeats itself over and over again…..stick it to the ones he believe that they can get something for free without any RISK and since this is a start-up bank your RISK is even greater and banks are notorious for making false claims then run to that very long document that you failed or did not read closely that says IN THE EVENT THAT “BLAH BLAH” your screwed and were not.
It was the banks that first gave out those cheap over-seas .003 cent calculator if you opened a $20,000 checking account, what fool would keep $20k in a .000001% a year baring checking account or $20k in a checking account. Bad decision and even worst with the advent of the internet scammer’s and bots will clean your closet a.k.a bank account.
Head in the sand keeps your bottom exposed for a good kicking
Happy loses
Well Bob K
I guess you are the banking expert on all matters of banking. If you think that your bank is so good then you are the one with your head in the looser sand. Why don’t you move your money over to B of A and see what you get there. You do know know that they are under the eyes of the feds.
After opening an account I was assured the money from my account to alley would be transfered. Feeling good about the transfer I started auto pay. After several weeks 3 -4 weeks I get overdraft charges for not having money in the account. It went downhill from there. If you think asking for supervisor will help think again. The original agent was a blessing who told me it was my fault. Put your money in your mattress, credit union, local bank trunk etc. Do not use these people under any circumstances. You have no control at all. A different person every time you call adds to the confusion. Which is your fault. Again {DO NOT USE}
Steve, transferrs from banks take about 3 business days to close. Everyone knows that you don’t pay bills until the money is in the account so starting Bill Pay that fast just doesn’t make sense. Didn’t you see a zero balance on your account. You can’t pay bills with nothing. Transferrs do work very smoothly with Ally. I’ve done it with multiple external accounts. It’s easy, quick and efficient. But if you give the wrong information it’s not going to work. It does sound like it’s your fault. I’ve been with Ally for 2 months now and love them. It’s the future of banking as I see it.
It appears that Diane, RJ and Michele all work for these clowns my my my what canned responses to real issues concerning this front of a bank.
Try changing some of the wording in your copy and paste reply’s folks it would give you at least a little more credibility and not make you look like an hourly employee.
I’m watching
You are dead wrong.
I don’t work for a bank and never will.
My words are my thoughts that ring true for me and it is my guess for millions of other Americans.
I started writing a longer letter but I’ll never convince you Bob. Your mind is already made up as is mine.
I know Ally is not perfect. I don’t believe that any person or company is perfect, but our goal should be to better ourselves and allow our experiences to improve who and what we are. I like the change Ally is making and thier modern approach to banking. Of course I like that thier overall approach includes my financial well being. I’m onboard as many many many others are.
Well stated RJ….and positive approach.
The betterment of all is what we all want, at least it is what I want.
I look at the success and changes a company represents and not go right for their flaws as so many on this blog post have done.
Stop pointing fingers and start finding solutions whatever that might mean in your life.
Good Day.
Love it.
i like how when you people screw up, it’s always somehow Allys fault.ive now realized you cant really go by these types of reviews because you people wont take responsibility for making poor decisions.bottom line
First off, to the Company Trolls -(Diane, July 1) we seeeeeeee you. ;-0 You’re about as authentic as a fart in a space suit. Any half wit can tell a plant from a real customer, Ally . Get with the program.
I’m not sure what your beef is Manhattan. I love the fact that you can bank from the comfort of your home just like Diane does. I don’t really know if you can fax requests to brick and mortar banks for CD’s as she indicates. My esperience with local banks is that you need to show up in person. I think Ally has great security although sometimes it can get in the way, but I accept that and would expect that since it my money. Your right though Manhattan, I don’t know who you are and you don’t know me. So take what you read here with a grain of salt. Experience Ally for yourself as I have and you’ll find that you will like it. I started small with $100 to test the waters in opening a savings and checking accounts. I’m happy with setting up accounts, security, bill pay and the money card. I’m taking my account to the next level now. Go Ally. Keep up the great work..
@ Bob K
another classic, Bob. By the time Ally is finished we will have so much material we can open a GMACALLY museum for our next generation to be reminded what a truly “desperate” attempt of banks raising money looked and felt like… 😉
This is another bank rip-off by getting the easy CD money all the while claiming to offer and have great services and it’s easy to open an account with US. Well setting up an accounts with them is an F- including the bogus on-line customer service rep that is suppose to assist you WELL I HAD TROUBLE SETTING UP THE ACCOUNT only to have these fools send me a generic letter to say oh your credit score is to low to open an account. HUH? people I kept this letter to show any and everyone that this bank plays cat and mouse just like GMAC did with auto/home loans. Do yourself a favor go local or go to a credit union ….. another info gatherer on the wide wide wide web of deceit. I Hope it saves you time and money
i had zero trouble opening an account.take responsibility
I’ve been advising some clients to follow my lead in these times of low interest rates -> open a 5 year cd at Ally Bank, with interest income posted monthly and if you need to break it at some point (increase in interests rates could be a reason) before maturity the penalty is equal to 2 months interest. I ran the numbers and in most cases a person is ahead of the curve in a very short period of time. This posting is for information purposes only, not for advise to those who are not my clients – Make you own decsions.
Thanks for this comment – perfect timing as I was looking to reinvest one of my son’s CDs. I did make my own decision based on your comment and went with an Ally 5 yr CD (after considering a 2 yr at first). After 6 months, the 5 yr (even after paying 2 months of interest penalty if closed) is higher than that gained from their 2 yr CD. I hadn’t considered doing this – and I consider myself finanically astute – and my two sons educationally are a little more now also. THANKS.
the feedback i get from my clients is theb same as you expressed.
@Andrew…
😉 that’s one of the easiest things to find out
… Help Center | Ally
As of December 31, 2009, the ownership of Ally common equity was as follows: GM 6.7%; GM Independent Trust 9.9%; US Treasury 56.3%; Cerberus 14.9%; …
http://www.ally.com/help/ – Cached
just do a search on “Ownership of ally bank”
Congratulations. you are one of the save ones 😉
Oh that is unfortunate, as they had every service I needed. I do not want to open an account with Chase, but I can’t use just my credit union as I’m moving back and forth between Northern Idaho and Southern California. (Post Falls and Malibu to be exact, for college). What bank would you recommend?
Thanks.
What persuaded me not to put my money into Ally is the fact that it became a bank holding company in 2008 and 56% of it is owned by the Federal Treasury (US) which means it was bailed out by TARP because it was not well managed.
Now it is trying to raise funds by having the highest interest rates. There is something very smelly here.
JR, do you have a legitimate source to cite that percentage? If so you’ve persuaded me not to open an account with them. Thank you.
Hi JR –
I don’t believe some of your comments are quite accurate.
As I am sure that you are well aware, most other major commercial banks in the US were “bailed out” with TARP money. Granted, GMAC bank was given a large amount of money and since has paid it back (Maybe check that stat.)
Having the “highest interest rates” is definitely not true. Their interest rates are competitive and that’s about it. You can find other banks / online banks with higher interest rates.
Get your facts straight before you mouth off. GMAC has not paid their tarp money back and probably will not paid it back.
Is Ally Bank associated with Acorn?
paul smith … GB should de-caf for a while …? Maybe he is one of the few one who read the ALLY-Bunch as what they are and considering from where they came, went and now try to change color … seriously, I’d suggest you’d think your investment endeavor with that ally-bunch – once more – over, Unless, however, you have enough money to burn.
After reading this post, http://ally-sucks.wemseo.com/ I’d learned yet another side of that ally bunch and now I stop hanging ? above ally but place … instead. Who are they? Which circus sacked these clowns?
GB and Schwartz…as many previous posters have indicated, these are TV commercials illustrating how ALLY does NOT want to conduct business. Based on more favorable comments than negative, I’m seriously considering placing a chunk of my funds with ALLY to ‘test drive’ them. After all, their rates are higher, and funds in accts are protected up to limits.
GB…I suggest de-caf for a while………………..
First you thieving scumbags fleeced the American people, and were able to double dip by having the same taxpayers bail your asses out a second time. As for your ads exploiting innocent children, you and your company, should be put on the MSNBC program…Predator..
what is wrong w with you people?seems to me like you are all under some sort of follow the crowd hysteria.these reviews should be for their financial services, not commercials.which most normal and rational people have no problem with
Gentlemen..
Your TV advertisements are SICK< SICK SICK….
You enable one child to get or appear to get somewthing than the other child.
I realize the purpoted thinking in this to your stated way of operating BUT
There definitely are better ways to do it…
"one child getting ice cream. the other nothing"
" one child getting a pony…the other not"
There are just a whole lot of way to get your message across that are better..
Exactly who is harmed by this advertisement? The kid actors? You do know that they are ACTING, right? The children who *MIGHT* notice this commercial? Nearly every kid show I have ever seen has a villian who steals or treats people wrong… ever heard of Wile E. Coyote? Stinky Pete? Cruella Deville? The Green Goblin? Dr. Doofenshmirtz?
After allowing 20,000 to languish in a pathetic no fee checking account I was motivated to explore my options, particularly after learning the best rate at my rip off bank was .15 .. POINT ONE FIVE … I thought she had to be quoting me the wrong number. I am now considering ALLY and did not associate them with the “kid commercials”, since I pay very little attention to any commericals. Banks in general have earned the negative stigma which taint so many. Once employed by the 15th largest bank in the nation, subsequent to my association with the IRS, it was only a matter of a few weeks before I was blowing the whistle on their massive scheme to defraud customers who had dealer paper (vehicle loans) acquired by these white collar criminals. Kinda ironic those professional thieves used a pre-hire polygraph.
More recently I have had to kick shins to get those BOGUS $35 over draft charges removed for the authorization of payments from a debit card. Now I am receiving pitches to retain that rip-off “service” in the aftermath of the so-called banking reforms. NO THANKS. If my debit card can’t handle the charge I expect payment to be refused.
So far I like what I hear about ALLY and regret allowing the local vultures free use of my funds for so long. Can anyone explain WHY anyone should be motivated to save money with rates in the gutter for so long.
My mother had a CD that matured last month. She decided to take half out in a form of a check that she received several days later. Well, the $20,000 check bounced. I hope this is resolved quickly or I will be forced to close all of my accounts with Ally. Sincerely, Paul Stanek.
How can banker’s check bounced…? I don’t understand. I thought bank’s check just like cash, it means guaranteed.
I’m trying to learn more about Ally, before I open up account with them…
did it bounce or did the bank say you couldnt cash it? some small banks are afraid to cash internet bank checks/ or you cant cash them bc your balance is low….alllsooooo isnt ally governemt insured so it cant bounce?
After setting up an acct with ally, I then initiated a fund transfer to ally (using ally’s online system). I called ally beforehand to make sure it would be ok since the 30 day time frame to deposit was approaching. I was ASSURED that as long as I initiated the transfer before 30 days, it was fine. I waited patiently for several days but received nothing from ally.. no e-mail, no phone call. I signed onto my ally acct. and now my balance showed a NEGATIVE dollar amount instead of zero. When I called them, they said my acct had been closed because I didn’t deposit money in time. BUT.. they had taken my money from my other bank. Incredulously though, they said at the same time that since the acct. was closed that they DIDN’T really have my money. My “old” bank confirmed the monies had been sent to ally. MORE calls to ally.. they have NO idea where my money is or how to get it back. I go into my “old” bank and they actually spend a LOT of time helping me figure it out although they had NOTHING to do with the problem. With the information (ACH tracking numbers that ally wouldn’t bother looking for) from my “old” bank, I call ally AGAIN ( I don’t even know how many times I called ally). This time (after mentioning perhaps banking authorities might be notified) they miraculously are able to find the money. I am STILL waiting for the money to be returned to my “old” bank. Funny.. their claim to fame.. being an ultra modern, high-speed, web-based bank.. sure seems like BS when you consider it has been over TWO WEEKS and I STILL don’t have my money back and they weren’t able to find, track, or identify ANYTHING. I had to go into an old-school, brick and mortar bank and have a REAL PERSON help me. So, an online bank may give you a little interest and allow you to use ATMs nationwide, but JUST WAIT until something goes wrong. THEN you will wish you had a REAL PERSON to help you. The winner here is oddly enough.. BANK OF AMERICA (my “old” bank). haha. Caveat Emptor.
Clay, we are Ally Customer Care and are sorry to hear you did not have a good experience with us. We’d like to look into your situation further to see what can be done to address your concerns. Please send us an email at allycommunity@ally.com and provide your contact information so that we can contact you directly. We look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.
Ally Customer Care
Thank you for sharing your experiences. It definitely makes me think twice about opening an account with Ally…
I have been using Ally Bank now for a while and love thier website. It’s easy to use, and easy to move montey between accounts, even external accounts. Security is well thought out. Ally is the bank of the future. I look forward to a great future with Ally. I know banking well. I worked for a bank for many years. They are just as they are as dipicted in the Ally commercials, devious and will do anything to confuse the public. Thanks Ally, keep up the good work.
GMAC, Ally Bank … whatever.
You really care for the name or the integrity of that business?
It’s neither the name nor their advertisements that make a decent company. (well, agree, for a short time it may as well account for some none-lasting success) In fact, it’s a firm’s intention and action that will decide on their sustainability.
That being said, I cannot think of any company that blackmails other companies to favor themselves, that will ever last. We have (written) evidence and will take this proof to court – agains ALLY BANK – for blackmailing legitimate established businesses as “SCAM”. Are they that desperate? Wasn’t aware of it but – it’s good to know.
Whoever considers ALLY BANK as their – … whatever, may we only wish you the best.
Pete,
One word for you: “huh?”
Doug
GMAC= General Mortors And Chrysler they created GMAC to finance their loans operations and car loans. So yes GMAC BANK was created by GM and Chrylser. Thy like to keep the money in the family.
gmac is not ally bank…they are affiliated but ally is no longer gmac….and gm and gmac are not the same….
Love your TV ad, so true and to the point. I don’t see why people have an issue with it.
I am opening an account today because you don’t charge for automatically sweeping money from savings to checking (overdraft protection) to cover purchases. In the past my wife has paid $37 for a cup of coffee when she used her debit card because of overdraft charges.
We always knew it was a ploy for the banks to commit usuary, just like the “egg management fee”. Love it. Thank you.
Joe Hinkley.
I do not appreciate your advertisements which use small children and it seems to me that you are teaching them that that cannot trust adults. I wonder if you have had your ads scrutinized by child psychologists. Children see enough of fraud and deceit. What do you use it to advertise your bank.
Thank you for reading this complaint.
Nancy J. Hoke
Good God… Nancy with all due respect, you should lighten up. What you “should” be teaching your kids is that television is NOT reality. Please don’t rely on others (commercial institutions or anything else for that matter…) to do this for you.
Amen, Miachael. It’s up to the parent to guide and teach their children. Any child but a very young one (and if they are that young wouldn’t even care), if they do see the commercial would and should easily grasp the message that being mean, tricking someone, being dishonest is wrong. If a child becomes traumatized by a commercial like this then the child and the parents desperately need a reality check and psychological help.
How about parents taking responsbility to raise their children as secure, educated, truth seeking, and courageous individuals. This doesn’t happen by trying to protect them into a bubble. Life’s not fair. So let’s love our children into understanding that, in a truthful secure way that doesn’t frighten them.
Way to go Ally Bank. I love the commercials. TRUTH is (or at least was) the American way.
Good Lord, you must be so impressed with normal commercial business world where they only want new business and the public can’t trust them.
No regard for loyality what so ever. One of the problems that have caused a lot of this country present problems. You apparently don’t want young children to know what has taken place over the last number of years. Ally’s commercials are right on the money. Why won’t anyone want the public to know that it is even little children know when they are being taken advantage of. I for one and most people that I have spoken with about their commercials feel the same way. Think about it.
Joe, I hope your a painter and not a banker. The branding and financial strategy here is brilliant not to mention the economic advantage. They are creating demand. Something lost in the banking world oh about the last 25 years. And the demand is managed and well funded. WAMU fell because they were under capitalized and had acquisition debt as well as Federal franchise debt. Their CD ploy was an eleventh hour pinch hitter trick. Building capital with CDs is nothing like building with Savings. CDs are misunderstood and misused by the public and really hard to market as a remarkable option. They are stagnant. They are reinventing Savings which was and has been trusted for over 150 years. Not to mention kickbacks, ease of use and a complete customer focused experience. Like Apple, Facebook and Threadless.com, Ally is changing the way biz is done. They are reinventing banking. Absolutely brilliant.
does anyone remember just a short time ago when WaMu released a 5% CD attempting to build capital & had one of the largest purchases of CD’s? We all know what happened after that. The rates are tied to the Fed Funds rates. At the rates they are offering it is a loss to the bank, they are betting that rates are going to go up. If they do not & the economy doesn’t recover soon that is not going to be good news for this bank.
Ummmm…As far as I know, the way that banks are able to pay interest on various savings accounts is because they loan money. GMAC (now Ally) is a large lender. If I charge an average of 5% per loan, and dispense 1.5% per savings account, that leaves me 3.5% to pay for overhead and payroll. If I can keep my costs low, I remain solvent/profitable. The more loans/savings accounts I can do this way, the larger that 3.5% becomes.
I couldn’t do business with a bank that has such a mean spirited ad on television. Where do youo think kids get ideas to be so mean to each other? By following adult actions. Appalling
To L Frank….
But that is the whole point about their truly excellent advertisements….they are NOT going to do what the guy on the ad is doing….
that is….not telling you (or charging you for) about fees/rules/changes that are harmful or discriminatory to you…
…………not keeping information from you
…………not using deceptive practices for their own gain….
The point of the ads is to show how unfair and deceptive other banks are in their practices with their customers. The guy in the ad is doing to the kids what most banks do to their customers. Yes, it’s not only mean, it’s dishonest, deceptive, and fraudulent. Their commercials convinced me to check out Ally bank.
Pleeeeze give me a break……then take your business to a really vanilla institution that will give you .25 on your money.
It seems that the whole message of the ads went right over your head. Which is hard to believe because it was so obvious. The man in the suit is being ridiculed because he cares more about tricking people with absurd rules than being fair and straightforward. Didn’t you realize that that the man in the suit with the talking action figure/doll was mocking the run-around people get on the phone with impersonal recordings? Have you never had such an experience? If so, you are probably the only person in the USA who has not. How could anyone not get that? Not to be rude, but you don’t seem very bright.
ALLY banks is RUDE………. My vehicle payment is late (less than 30 days) due to loss of my job. I schedule payments on their website 2 months in advance and I still get collection calls EVERY DAY…. Maybe if they would have kept jobs in the USA instead of moving them to Montego Bay some of us could find jobs and pay our bills on time like we did before we lost our jobs. ALLY isn’t great……they just claim to be. The advertisement on TV is very accurate if you happen to get behind even 5 days on a payment. This is totally insane. I hope all of you that think they are great never lose your job, then you will see the TRUE side of ALLY.
its late…but you schedual them? most local car financing companies would come take your car quickly since you would be a financial risk…….you have a contract just bec something happened to you doesnt mean the contract is now broken
I completely agree with Diane. My experience with Ally has been great and they actually have faster transfers than most banks I have dealt with. I use Ally as my primary online bank and move the money to other banks for free as and when I need to since they let me add several external Banks unlike ING that limits how many I can link.
I would rate them very high given my experience.
I don’t know what all the complaining is about. I have CD’s with 6 different banks right now. When a CD. expires I look for the best rate a bank offers to transfer my money into another C.D. Ally (formally GMAC) has always been great. Their rates are always competative but if I do decide to close the CD once it expires they transfer my money into my checking and I can do this over the internet. With someother banks this has not been the case and I have had to fax my request to them. Sometimes repeatedly. I love Ally bank.
Diane-
Thanks for a meaningful comment. I just opened an Ally Checking and Savings account. I travel about 360 days a year, so its nearly impossible to find a traditional bank that has ATM’s everywhere I need them. With Ally I will pay NO ATM fees. Period. I’m looking forward to a good relationship with them, thanks for reaffirming my choice.
The major concern that I have with Ally Bank is that they do not send out monthly or quarterly statements for CD accounts and their website is very very difficult to access due to their high security settings. Yet, I have accounts with other Online banks and I have absolutely no problem accessing those bank websites. Ally had almost the highest 2 yr. CD interest rate of any bank at the time and I have no problem with the interest payments which are transferred monthly to my checking account a local bank. When I signed up with GMAC a few years ago, accessing their website was very easy, but that has changed since it has become Ally.
I appreciate and welcome the extra securities measures Ally Bank has chosen to require its investors to comply with. Ally is in essence “bucking” the banking system by granting very low fees and non-standard banking terms.
I for one applaud a well capitalized group for funding the new banking ways that will help the consumer instead of continuing to place them in financial crisis due to absurd banking fees that gouge and deplete the hard working Americans.
Screw the standard banking industry, the days of screwing the customer are over. Customers are taking control of their finances.
Well said Michele. I worked for Key Bank and was one of those laid off due to poor management of the business. They didn’t even have the decency to offer a buy-out to senior employees, instead, slashed those of us who were High Performers and who had a family.
I also applaud Ally and support them as I truly believe they have my interest at heart as well.
Hi, i am 11 and what is a CD? can you please explain this to me.
Good question. A CD is just a type of bank account. CD stands for Certificate of Deposit. The differenct between a CD and a regular bank account is that you usually get a higher interest rate in exchange for promising to leave your money in the bank for a certain period of time. But if you decide to take the money out of the bank before the amount of time you promised, then they will charge you a penalty, which means that they will take back some of the interest that they paid you.
Personally, I think you all, need to really think. We don’t know each other and can’t trust eachother eather. Who knows, many of the comments could be executives working for brick and mortar banks wanting to play damage control.
I think Ally has a fantastic business model and one that I’m going to embrace. I’m going to be cautious, but believe me after what I have been through regarding banks, I’m keeping an open mind. I use to work for a very poor brick and mortar bank based in Cleveland OH and Albany NY.
STAY AWAY FROM ALLY BANK.
i opened an account online and noted that i want my free checks to be mailed. i called a couple of days later to double check and make sure everything went through. the representative told me that i did not note that i want my free checks to be mailed. so he took care of it and told me that my debit card and checks should arrive in 7-10 business days. today is the 10th business day and nothing is here – no debit card, no checks.
i called them and asked them why i havent received anything. after 15 minutes of holding, they told me that the debit card was returned after three days because the address i gave them was insufficient. this doesnt make sense because i received my welcome packet on time with no trouble at all.
what pissed me off was that the bank didnt even bother to call me when the debit card was returned to them. what the fuck kind of customer service is that? and then here is the icing on the cake…the bitch asked, “what would you like us to do?” DO I WORK THERE? FIGURE IT OUT BITCH.
and then i asked about my checks. they told me that NO CHECKS WERE ORDERED. that was the last straw. i withdrew my funds and moved on to greener pastures.
fuck ally bank. end of story.
I have just started banking with Ally and while I think the experience is mostly positive, you can tell that they’re straining to keep up with business demands that they have never faced before.
1. Disappearing transaction – I made a deposit of $6,002 recently and while it shows a correct total balance, the actual transaction does not show in either my online account or on the monthly statement. Called them about it and they’re “working” on the problem but it’s scary really when you think about it, because there”s no proof that you have actually deposited anything and Quicken obviously can’t reconcile an invisible item. Ally does not provide scans of deposited checks like other banks do. They also do not e-mail you immediately to let you know a deposit has been received, a terrible weakness for a bank that’s only available online. I have made suggestions, but given that they’ve been in business for 18 months now as a bank, that’s not going to happen very soon, clearly.
2. PIN change – I could not change the PIN from my home phone number. Some strange problem prevents me from completing the transaction. Once again, they’re “working” on a solution but it’s another critical issue for an online bank to have. Of course, once again, you’re dead in the ether because all you can do is reach out to their call center in Washington state, far removed from the actual bankers in Philadelphia.
3. Wire request – I faxed in a wire request last night. You would expect an instant e-mail from them the next morning saying they received it, but no, it takes “12-24 hours for them to respond” the CSR tells me. And this is a service they charge $20 for.
I love the low-cost banking Ally offers. I also think their site is pretty good despite not offering check scans or deposit alerts. But my sense is that their inability to manage these basic processes properly as a bank, which is obviously growing fast with all their online and TV ads, is only going to lead to bigger problems down the line.
I’m going to look for another bank right now. I wish I hadn’t canceled my Wachovia account so fast. 🙁
I have just been subjected to the latest of your ads belittling children. Obviously you think these ads are drawing the kind of attention you want to generate as you have left them running. Don’t be fooled into thinking that they hype the Bank and cause interest and favorable disagreement. They are a sophomoric attempt to create a buzz due to the universal controversy with which they are received. I would never do business with your Company. You are hatefully portraying putting down children. It is distasteful, disturbing, nasty and transparently stupid on your part. Every one I know feels the same way. Get them off the airways immediately.
I have never had a problem with ALLY Bank. I have been blessed to have had knowledgable and courteous staff assist me. Whatever I had a problem or question I just called or chatted online with them and no problem. ALLY is quickly leading me away from my credit union of 25+years due to the numerous fees they have starting adding to my accounts. ALLY I am happy with you and have recommended you to several family members and friends.
I was going to try one of your no penalty CDs but after reading all the above, am I nuts?
I have about half mil. green.
I was thinking about 50 thousand just to test your bank.
I’m old and can’t take problems.
But I love money.
People: Please don’t support Ally.
Ally: Stop exploiting children and invalidating them in your ads. Those expressions of disappointments aren’t acted… you should be ashamed of yourselves.
ALLY BANK’s new high security web site makes getting into it very difficult. I Called ALLY bank and complained. They told me to delete all the computer cookies to the bank from my computer. Yea, like I know how to do that with out ruining my computer. It is much easier to close the account when the CD is mature and go to a savings institute with a much user friendly website…. GOODBYE ALLY.
Never bank with Ally. I normally do not open accounts over the
phone but I did anyways. I opened an account with 100 from my checking, the
next couple if days I get a call saying they processed two 100 transfers
from my checking which caused overdrafts, which they refunded. But never having an overdrawn account before it still pissed me off. The only reason I opened an account was to be able to open CDs from the ally checking and to have the interest disbursed to another linked account. When I tried to do this online it doesn’t give the option of selecting the interest to go to a linked account, only to receive a check or have the interest stay in the cd. So unfortunately I was forced to call and open the cd. I discussed with the representative my recent experience with the double debit, he assured me it would not happen this time. I looked at my ally checking after he completed the transaction and saw that the correct amount of 50 had been withdrawn from the ally checking account and thought everything was fine. A couple days later I got another call advising me that the representative withdrew another 50 from my other credit union account which was now also overdrawn, they did refund that charge as well. The sheer incompetence that it would take to make the same mistake twice especially after you just discussed the mistake they made last time is completely unnaceptable and ridiculous. Now they screwed up both my other checking accounts. This type of screw up is completely unneccesary and I will never do business with them again, nor should anyone else unless you want all your other accounts to take the brunt of their incompetence. I know ING is paying a little lower rate but they are great, try them.
Ally is the worst banking institution I have ever dealt with.. It will take you forever to open an account with them…that is, if you succeed at all. They’ll tell you to send them certain documents and then contact you to let you know that the documents are not sufficient [even if you could provide them with the names of the people you spoke with, including their supervisors, who told you exactly what they needed and despite the fact that you supplied them with exactly what they asked for.] They then apologize for the incorrect information that was given to yuo and ask you to send more documents and the whole cycle starts all over again. I am at a stage where there 2% interest rate is not worth the effort any longer.
Before anyone says, “you must work for a competitor’s bank” let me assure you that I have no financial background whatsoever other than managing the family finances. We have three bank accounts, an ING and two local banks which we manage online. I attempted to set up a CD with Ally and they were so incompetent that I had to shut down the account before it was funded. Here’s why.
The first call I made after entering my information online was to remove my name from their onerous third party sharing agreement. That went fine. The second call was the secondary account holder trying the same thing. This rep said that it was not possible. Finally, we got her to take down our information and “forward it to the people who take care of that.”
The next day the two small deposits and one debit showed up in the externally linked account. When I went online to enter them they said the numbers were invalid. A call to customer service got this response: “Those aren’t numbers we use. There is nothing I can do about it. Wait to see if more small deposits show up in your account.” What? They were marked Ally – from what other source did they originate?
While mulling over whether I wanted to bother anymore, the rep said, “By the way, your birthday is wrong.” Even though it was correct in the previous day’s database, somehow in her database the primary and secondary birthdays were switched. She said, “You will have to fax over both driver’s licenses.” I finally sensed the last straw and said, “No. This is too much incompetence. Close down the account” and she said, “I can’t do that. It will close down automatically in 60 days after it is not funded. And anyway, you still need to fax that driver’s license because we will have you in our database forever.” I said, “You will close it right now.” Hemming and hawing. Finally, “FINE, I will put in a request to close it.”
This is giving them money on deposit, not even taking out a loan. That is scary. Even at the FDIC insured max of $250,000, save more each month to make up the difference in interest rates and put your money in a competent bank.
Do you work for Ally, Larry? lol. So the money deposited by members in Ally is used for providing dealer finance right? isn’t there a certain ethical question in relation to that? Just throwing it out there considering most of the readers wouldn’t get a car loan themselves or probably buy a new car it seems curious that they’d be happy to help someone else do that?
I have a good feeling after reading ech and every comment on this page that a lot of these ‘negative reviews’ of Ally are by people who work for other banks and credit unions.
A bank as big as Ally would not just ‘not let you withdraw ‘ your own money, that is complete nonsense. Come on people, get real. I’m opening an account with them today.
i think i’ve posted a couple of times in this thread.i like the idea of online banks so much more than the brick n mortars.this site helped me make some informed decisions regarding my finances.i hope i can do the same for others.so far i have about 6k in Ally CD ladders.i needed customer service because my log in wasn’t allowing me access.the lady on the phone stayed w me 20 mins or so until we figured out the problem.i gave up b4 she did.i’ll be adding about 8k more this week in a longer term CD, 5 years or so.close to a 3% rate gives a 1200 dollar return.i’ll be putting about 15k into a Discover bank savings account as it offers 1.35 where as the best MMA i could find (Ally yet again) was 1.29.it’ll be my first dealings w Discover, but they seem more than capable.i wouldn’t mind putting all my money in Ally but diversity in finance makes sense in all areas i would think
I hate Ally commercials with the man and the kids. He comes on like a Pediphile does to children. Could someone point that out to Ally and perhaps they could change the commercials. Certainly I would not open an account looking at those.
Ally Bank was formerly known as GMAC Bank. Their 1st Quarter numbers are now posted on the FDIC Web Site. For the Quarter ending March 31st, they posted a profit for the first time since 2007. A number of the above posts complain about service. If you want service, find a local bank. Is it worth dealing with a bank in Utah, or would you prefer to have the opportunity to walk into a local branch?
Folks I would not open an account with these theives under any circumstance. I made that mistake and still paying for it. Seems they could not automatic deposit my first paycheck in to the account. so I overnitghed at cost of $52 the check. Seems there was no one there on Saturday to accept the check so It was not delivered unitl Monday morning. Tuesday my Account showed the check deposited and my available balance was what I was expecting to be, so I started paying my bills. Next morning I now see a negative current balance and multiple 9.00 fees. Called the bank and they informed the check had a 10 day hold on it. So here I sit being payed but not able to access the funds. Next up they start sending out bill pays for bills I expected to have money for. They sent one out the 21st of the month and it has yet to arrives and tomorrow it will be late. Look at my account today and they sent another one to the same place that was not authorized. I have closed the savings account and just waiting for the hold to finally clear and I am gone from this bank. I would not trust ally to take out my trash let alone handle my money.
We are Ally Customer Care and are sorry to hear you did not have a good experience with us. We’d like to look into your situation further to see what can be done to address your concerns. Please send us an email at allycommunity@ally.com and provide your contact information so that we can contact you directly. We look forward to hearing from you at your earliest convenience.
Ally Customer Care
hahaha child abuse. Watch the behind the scenes and tell me those kids were abused.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FclBMT0RTA
Lighten up people, you see kids hurt in movies every day. Is that child abuse? or child actors? No one needs to act like you don’t let your kids watch movies where a child ACTOR may be subjected to sadness, misfortune, or pain. Is anyone calling movie companies complaining? So why call Ally?
Just tried to open an account today online – the error message asked me to call them directly. CSR was very friendly and explained that a rep will review my application and call me Mon. or Tues. to confirm. I will see how it goes.
BTW: I have banked with Wells Fargo, B of A, Washington Mutual, and am currently w/Citibank so I am familiar of the ups and downs of banks. I do like Ally’s interest rate for checking acct. and no ATM fees 🙂
P.S. Their ads are meant to generate buzz…obviously if they get your attention they’re working LOL.
Wow. I’ve been with Ally for 1-1/2 years and have been extremely pleased with the rates, ease of use and customer service by phone. I too wish one could transfer the funds from a maturing CD to savings via computer, but a simple phone call still beats driving to my local bank and waiting for a personal banker to perform the subject task.
Can’t believe people are actually offended by the commercials-they’re so truthful. Bet the poor, abused child actors will be happy have a little money in their college savings accounts when they get older…
This May, I recently have been hit with one of Ally’s computer gliches. I had opened an initial account about one month ago and because it was going well, I decided to open another account with them.
Then the huge problem arose.
Ally bank has a feature that if you verify an account with the same test deposit numbers than it automatically initiates a transfer from an external bank into your other account.
For example,
1. Account # 1- You open your account with $1000.00 and you have verified your test deposits.
2. Account # 2- You decide to open another account and use the same test deposits but this time only want to open your new account with $100.00,
Then
3. A transfer of 1000.00 will initiate to account # 1.
Leaving you with no solution and alot of overdraft fees from the external bank account.
Ally bank made it clear that they don’t have a gliche in their system, and I informed them that if I wanted to transfer $1000.00 from my external account into my Ally bank account then I would have specifically did just that. But this was not the case. Instead you use the same test deposits of $0.45 and $0.22 and this is what happens.
Has anyone else incurred this type of problem because I do not believe that I am the only one.
For professional purposes, Ally bank should have at least tried to care about this gliche or the customer but that was surely not the case. They were dumbfounded.
What else can I say, I’ve been duped by this bank, hmmm no surprise there I guess.
I have not had any problems with ALLY Bank. I set up my account, deposited my money start earning interest that day. I have moved money made withdrawals NO Problems. I have contacted Customer Service several times 1 when I did not understand how to verify my exteral accounts, and other time just for general information, questions answered no problems. At this time Ally is working for me, Oh I like the Sleeping Money Alerts, too. My 25+ year Credit Union no interest checking little interest saving $10,000.00 min CD low rate now that it has been taken over is quickly losing me to Ally Bank.
Quit using little kids in your ads. Children are used and bullied enough in this world, your ads don’t help. I get the point of your ads, but don’t like them. Please stop using kids.
Gerri, COUNTLESS companies use children in their advertising. There is absolutely nothing wrong with it. Are you going around admonishing McDonald’s, too? Or toy and video game companies? What about car commercials which show parents puttig their children in spacious SUV’s to sell them? Let’s get real. Complain about something worth complaining about.
I have been with GMAC/ ALLY for years now and NEVER had a problem.
One time I got a rep who screwed up and mailed my interest to me off my 9 MO cd but that was quickly resolved . I was with ING before that ,also a great bank ,but rates were higher w/ GMAC . I wonder if all the Bitchin is because THEIR banks were screwing up ? just a thought
Until someone else comes out w/ higher interest rates ,Iam sticking w/ ALLY Bank….
Don’t open an account with Ally no matter what you do.. I opened my accounts a month ago. Things started out fine enough but on Friday I tried to do a wire transfer. It didn’t go out. No notification about why, it just didn’t go. Today (Monday) I jumped through the hoops again and was told it would go out but again…it didn’t.
This is not the worst of it. When I tried to login to my account, I received a message that the account was now blocked. When I called I was told they could see why it was blocked, but they weren’t permitted to disclose any information about the account and that they would have a representative call me back in 3-5 business days.
In the meantime, my debit cards don’t work, I can’t get money from the ATM and I’m scared that some outstanding checks won’t be honored if they’re presented during this time of unknown account blockage. For the record, there’s no reason at all to block the account, nor was any notification given or even a reason of why it was blocked. It just got blocked out of the blue.
So effectively they’ve stolen my money (at least in the short term until I can get the account unblocked and there’s no telling when or if that will happen). DO NOT go with Ally unless you want MAJOR MAJOR hassles, headaches and stress. ALLY IS A MISTAKE.. Seriously, I didn’t listen to the poor reviews on this site before I moved my money there and now I’m paying the price with hours upon hours of calls, stress, worry and headaches as I scramble to come up with some money to handle my issues until this mess is resolved…a mess THEY created by the way.
Anyway, that’s all I have to say, for the love of god DON’T BANK WITH ALLY..
Kristin,
I manage Ally Bank customer service and came across your post. I am terribly sorry to hear you did not have a good experience with us. Doing right by our customers is our core tenet. I would love to understand what happened and resolve it. Please email me directly at allycommunity@ally.com with your contact information so I can call you directly.
Best Regards,
Dave
I opened a savings account at Ally a couple of months ago. Their APY on savings is currently 1.29%. My local credit union pays .25%. Ally’s rates on CDs are also better than my local credit union. For me, the Ally account was a no-brainer.
Setting up and linking the accounts was easy. I haven’t tried to electronically transfer money from Ally back to the linked account yet, but I expect it will be simple and will take a couple of business days. I’m very happy with Ally so far.
I signed up for an Ally savings account when I saw they got rated #1 by Kiplingers. I just saw they also got rated #1 by Money Magazine. I have only been a customer (a happy customer so far) for a few months but that is quite an achievement.
After reading many of the comments, I was worried that I would not be able to transfer my money out of my Ally savings account. So last week I made a transfer out, and it went very smoothly. The money appeared in my non-Ally account within a few days.
Gmac needed 13 billion dollars from American tax payers and now they want to change their name so people wont associate them with gmac but its the same people running the same company no thanks I will stay away from ally or whatever name they want to use.
I personally love the commercial, Great Advertisement..
If this is the same bank that is shown in commercials with that idiot abusing children in those idiotic ads, I feel that the board of directors and seniors who authorize such garbage should all be turfed. Those ads are the most sickening waste of shareholder’s funds and of our TV viewing time, seeing ‘any adult co-ercing innocent children by bribery’ hence the one young boy who said it right ‘you jerk’. Most banks (banks) even the worst have never lowered themselves and their (credibility) in such crap, hopefully to end soon.
The CEO should ask his grandsons to approve. WJE.
Obviously, you’re not getting the commericals or you work for another bank. It’s an analogy, “even children know it’s wrong to cheat someone” which is what the banks do to consumers everyday while demanding their money.
WE get it but the ads are mean spirited. I would therfore never use ALLY.
I have been a customer for two years and have opened several accounts over the two years. My observations would be that the account opening process is quite simple, money transfers work faster than most other banks and the loyalty bonus for renewing a CD is outstanding. I rarely need to speak to customer service but when I do, I usually get someone pretty quickly and they are very helpful.
The only downside is that when you need to close a CD you need to call rather than do it online, but as I mentioned that usually is pretty quick.
This is the worst bank in the world. Do not use this bank under any circumstances. Save yourself LOTS of time and TROUBLE go somewhere else. DO NOT USE…I cannot stress enough …..DO NOT USE THIS BANK.
After opening the acct and making $1500 monthly transfers from an outside checking acct into Ally for over a year, I tried to transfer $5K from the Ally acct back to the same outside checking acct on 4/22 online and got a message, telling me I could not do it online and to call Ally CS#. I did and they could not transfer either. I was told SOMEONE would contact me in 24-48 hrs.
On 4/26, I received an e-mail that there are new documents in my account for review, but when I went to login, my login is now “deactivated”. I cannot read these documents or what they pertain to.
It is now 4/27, I have called yesterday and today and still being told “wait for someone to call in 24-48 hrs”.
I cannot transfer money out, stop scheduled transfers into this Ally acct from my reg checking acct, close the account or get any information from anybody. I feel the acct is being held hostage…
I’m not a huge depositor at Ally Bank yet, but the ease of transferring dollars from my hometown bank to it are wonderful. Setup was easy, the site is getting better, I like it. Also, the rate of return is wonderful.
Well, after closing out of ING to open and account with Ally, I am sorry I did. When I opened my account, I was double drafted for tha amount that I opened the account with. It put me into overdraft. Not wanting to take a chance, I funded my account to not get any fees. When I called Ally, they said it was probably their fault, as this has been happening and would refund any fees I incurred. Well, 2 weeks later, they called me back and said they couldn’t refund fees, as this was my fault. Well, I have closed my account and will go back to ING. I simply can’t trust them.
I just opened an Interest Checking and an Online savings account with ally. The system gave me a number to call to process my application further. Hearing a bank representative say “I don’t know what that means” or “I’m not sure about that” doesn’t instill a great sense of confidence when it comes to me giving them my money. Plus having me call just to be told that I’ll get another call in a few days doesn’t make much sense. We will see where this goes.
ive been researching ally and discover bank for the past few hours.basically, i have about 5k i want to put in an mma and 10k i want to use for a 4 cd ladder.i was leaning toward ally due to the attractive 1.28% mma offer (1.oo% w discover although it jumps to 1.24 w a 10k balance), but the cd rates w discover are so much better.and from what i can tell a lot of you have bad experiences w cds from ally.so ill stick to discover after all.i decided i will use ally for a simple 3 month cd .80% seems to be the best rate out there by a full tenth at least.it will allow me to experience them on my own without making too big a commitment.i still find the 1.28% mma reasonable, as well as the no fees ever.this is a nice site.im hoping to find an article on brokerage houses, and maybe peer2peer lending
I opened their checking account a couple of months ago and I think it is truly amazing. I can now use any ATM without a fee and the interest rate is higher than the savings account I was getting in the savings account at Chase.
I use the electronic transfer capability to move funds but do wish there was an alternate to mailing checks into Ally. I currently use the brick and mortar bank to deposit checks but would love to stop giving them by business all together.
I have now been with Ally Bank for one year and for the most part I am happy with them but I have had one problem with a renewing CD as far as changing its term it took ten days to complete that request.
I have spent over 3 weeks trying to link my Ally account to another bank. I have made repeated calls for assistance in linking the account. After 4 attempts to link electronically, I was offered the option for them to send me the micro deposits used for verification via the U.S. mail. I was guaranteed (after guarantees on each of the other 4 attempts) that it would properly link the accounts. I was told the letter whould arrive in 3-5 business days. I waited 2 1/2 weeks for the mail to arrive. I called to find out what was going on. I was informed that the mail was never sent. I decided that if I could not get my money the higher interest rates available were not worth the hassle. I asked to close my accounts. My CD had just matured and had a 10 day grace period. I was told by the agent that there would be a 60 day interest penalty. I challenged the agent saying the CD had just recently matured. They insisted that once the CD matured and rolled over in an automatic renewal the 60 day interest penalty applied. After asking to talk to their supervisor, the supervisor advised them that there was not a 60 day penalty. I was then told I could only receive my money via a certified check in the mail or wire transfer. I once again had to ask for the supervisor to get the funds transferred electronically to another bank already linked to the account. I am now waiting to see if I will get my funds within the promised 3-5 business days. Ally has done a great job in builiding my expectations that I will need to call again in a week to follow up. I can only hope I am wrong.
Used Ally for a while now. They’re efficient, open for business 24 hours a day, and no matter when I call I get a customer service rep who seems very knowledgeable and willing to discuss almost anything with no obfuscation. Their back office seems a little slower than quoted sometimes, but I’ve generally had no problems, especially if I share with the rep when I need funds and why. They work hard to get it done and have procedures for making things even faster if you need to.
I’m transferring my savings from Capital One to Ally, because Capital tried to double my “fixed” interest rate on my credit card. When I inquired and tried to reason with Capital representatives that they had in fact contacted me and offered the “fixed” rate, they basically said “we’re sorry, but too bad”.
I’m sick of being “loan-sharked” and bullied by these banks. I ended up closing my account with them, even though it will affect my credit rating (mine is currently stellar by the way). I’m not paying 17.99% to any bank.
High yield CD – at 1.5%?. I get three times that from my credit union without all the hassle that Ally requires. I cannot believe that people actually think 1.5% is a high yield on anything.
Richard-
I’d love to know the name of your CU so I can deposit there because the best the 2 CU’s I am in can offer is under 1% for 12 months. Others in the area are comparable.
Richard,
What is the name of your Credit Union? My credit union has not been able to match ALLY’s rates for some time now. I have a 5.16% 60 month rate that I got in February of 2008 from my credit union, but the current 60 month rate is down to 2.10%. Discover Bank/AAA currently offers 3.05% for 60mo. I believe ALLY was forced – due to complaints to FDIC- to lower their rates this year & offers a comparable 2.99% 60 CD.
I would like to know the name of your CU, I cannot believe that they offer that much. Thankyou
Yes, Richard PLEASE tells us the name of your CU. 🙂
arent a lot of credit unions not fdic covered?
Simply the best customer service available. I had several 9 Month No Penalty CDs mature and they offered me the New 11 month No Penalty CDs with the higher rate and gave me a loyalty bonus on top of it for renewing.
Not sure about the comments above since I have had no problem with getting funds when CDs mature or transferring money (in fact their transfers work much better than most other banks I have tried).
DON NOT USE ALLY BANK….. My husband and myself chose Ally because we wanted a higher rate with an online bank and refund of our ATM fees. After a 4 week nightmare, I’m willing to pay max ATM fees. Despite opening a joint account, my personal information was pulled for a car loan over 7 years old from GMAC. I have tried unsuccessfully for 4 weeks to change that information. While my husbands info is fine, mine is not and it is the SAME account. Because of this my ATM card was sent to an address which I don’t live at any more. It came back and we had a security hold put on our account it took 6+ calls to remove it and another 3 calls to get my new address in place. Then I received the card and could not activate, problems again with the old data in the system. Then I finall activated it and could not change the default pin. Their sales reps were NOT helpful. They kept tellimg me someone would call me back in 2-3 business days. Discovered upon using their site that I cannot do bill pay, but my husband can and anything he enters into the system (i.e. linked external accounts) does not show up in mine and has to be redone, this has caused huge problems. Evidently their backend systems are broken. I no longer think my money is secure with them and am moving it now. I beg you. DO NOT USE THEM…..
Oh god, how dare they not share your personal information with someone that is not you, thereby violating multiple federal regulations about privacy and protection just so that you and your husband don’t have to set up a linked external account more than once?
On all Joint accounts in the US there is one primary holder to whom the interest is posted for tax purposes. For security and regulation purposes, mailings can only be sent to that holder and if that address is incorrect it takes a driver’s license to fix it sometimes.
This is because some assholes blew up those two buildings on 9/11. Remember that? I’m amazed by the number of people here who scream and rave about Ally’s policies when they’re some of the best anti-terrorism policies in the business and perfectly in line with federal regulation. I’d rather do a little extra than have someone that wants to harm us have an easier time with setting up an account and transferring funds.
Better yet, how about they change to link the account with them to the outside bank and then you set up three or four accounts with them and then complain when you have to link your own external account four times, once per account, because the bank links accounts instead of adding an account to your customer profile thereby making it unshareable with your husband for your protection.
Benjamin Franklin –
He who would trade liberty for some temporary security, deserves neither liberty nor security. He who sacrifices freedom for security deserves neither. …
Search Architects and Engineers for 911 truth.
After a year of tolerating the worst customer service I have ever experienced at a financial institution, I am moving my money out of Ally. Every request requires a “management decision” which takes days. I keep over a $100K balance at Ally, which begs the question “How much money do you need to get good service?”. I am only asking for simple transactions, like moving money from a matured CD back into savings but everything is so convoluted and slow with Ally. It took two weeks to set up the account and I missed a good CD rate once completely due to their ineptness. The final straw happened yesterday – I asked to move another CD into savings and they froze my account. After four calls I was finally told I had answered a security question wrongly and that it would take two days to un-freeze my account. This was a total fabrication. If you look elsewhere on the web you will find the same sort of comments. I don’t care how good their rates are, it’s not worth it if you have to beg to get your own money back…
Ally Bank has a policy of sharing your information to “affiliates” for marketing purposes. You provide the most personal information to them and they use it in that way. You have to jump through hoops to ask them not to do so. I would not recommend any financial institution that would use your personal information in this way. Very disappointing.
The hoop you have to jump through is to call one number one time and then it’s done for life.
And the affiliates, without the scare quotes, are GMAC companies who never call or send mail anyway.
The only difference between Ally and other banks here is that Ally has the good grace to notify you about the sharing in large print and provide an easy number for opting out.
LIE. TOTAL LIE.
First who wants to call? Why can’t their “dealings” be handled via internet?
I have so far called 3 times, they got my money, and I closed the account because of all the nonsense, they have yet to send my money back.
EGG MANAGEMENT FEE?
STAY AWAY. Use ING.
Just to add a quick clarification/caveat. Being FDIC insured is not as simple as it sounds above. Your limit is per type of account. meaning 100k (going w/ the standard amount for the example) is your limit for ALL individual accounts combined, per bank. Then another 100k for your part of ALL joint accounts combined, per bank, regardless of who owns them with you (i.e. 50% of your account with your mom + 50% of your account with your brother). It’s also only considered a joint account if both people have equal legal right to the funds, so adding a beneficiary does not count as a joint account. Those are just examples. My point is, if you are in a position to worry about this, go to the FDIC site online and read the details and use their calculator; then email the FDIC to confirm/ask about your particular situation based on your interpretation. It’s very confusing and bank tellers are not experts on the subject (whether they pretend to be or not) and are generally not allowed to give you advise on it. You’ll be hard pressed to even get a straight answer out of the FDIC, but you can try. I’ve done my homework of this before, so I just thought I’d share.
The rates are good and competitive. I have multiple accounts and CD’s. There customer service experience is exasperating and painful. Even after calling the corporate office, they do not care. The constant shuffle off until you give up. Don’t bother. In the future I will take the lower rate of my local bank and deal with folks who actually care about my business.
I will wholeheartedly agree customer service is awful. I believe there only purpose is to dream up excuses for their failings. Quick to take your money, but hard to get it back. I’ve been going round and round with different people and each has a differing excuse.
I don’t have any accounts at this bank, but I want to voice my disapproval of your ads on TV. The pony, the ice-cream and the candy are absolutely terrible. I understand you are trying to say this would not happen at your facility, but neither my sister or me will listen to them. Please remove them, yesterday.
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