One of the first things I did when establishing The Spry Group was choose a bank account. I didn’t put a lot of thought into it. I chose TD Bank for their relatively low fees, long hours, and free ACH transfers. Unfortunately, TD bank no longer has free ACH, they don’t integrate with my online accounting system Xero. Also, I have to trudge to the bank to make a deposit. Also we’re a startup, our cash flow is irregular. I’d rather not have to worry about getting charged 20 bucks because I let our bank balance drop too low while waiting on a slow paying customer. I really want an account with no minimum balance requirements, no monthly fees, free mobile deposit, free bill pay. I started looking at some of our banking options this evening.
| Bank | Checking Account | Minimum Balance | Monthly Fee | Free Mobile Deposit | Free Bill Pay | Xero Integration |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chase | Business Select Checking | 7500 | 25 | Y | ? | Y |
| Citi Bank | Streamlined Checking Account | 5000 | 19 | Y | ? | ? |
| Bank Of America | Business Fundamentals | 3000 | 18 | Y | ? | ? |
| TD Bank | Business Simple Checking | 0 | 8 | N | Y | N |
| EverBank | Small Business Checking | 5000 | 0 | Y | Y | ? |
| SmallBusinessBank.com | No Bull Checking | 0 | 0 | ? | Y | ? |
| PNC | Free Business Checking | 0 | 0 | ? | Y | ? |
| 5/3 | Regular Business Checking | 0 | 0 | ? | ? | ? |
In terms of checking options the online banks have much better offerings when compared to the traditional brick and mortar focused banks. Especially for small start-ups with irregular cash flows. While I’m primarily looking to have an easier bookkeeping workflow and to re-coup the time spent travelling to the bank to deposit checks. If I can save 8-20 USD per month in the process, that’s a nice bottle of scotch at our holiday party!