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Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
41–50 of 92 posts
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#42My credit union (in USA) is awesome. It offers all "other stuff" like checking accounts and atms. They are open "normal business hours" which doesnt matter to me since I live out of state anyway, theyre exceptionally fast at allowing me to withdraw, and are 100% online. I mostly interact with my credit union via my iPhone, and have no problems.
Yes, Im way out of range of my credit union's ATMs. No biggie, they pay me $20 a month to cover any ATM charges! In fact, just yesterday, I got a free $80 long term member award (its been more than a decade).
Basically my credit union kicks all kinds of *ss. If they ever grow huge and get pwned by big bankery, Ill likely change my mind.
Im totally down for the open source non profit bank though.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#43My Credit Union (in Oregon) * Offers Checking accounts * Has ATM's * Are open as much as most banks are. * Are exceptionally friendly. * Have an online presence that... well it's not exceptional, but it's not that bad either as far as these things go. That's why I've always kept my personal and business accounts there over the past 20 years.
Same basic idea for my credit union in the Atlanta area. Sure nationwide banks have better mobile apps and on-line features, more branches, and are not regional... but my credit union is still usable as a bank.
I think if you were to look at the three things I mentioned - online, non profit and open source, non profit is the one I think is least differentiable if that makes any sense. I think an online open source bank is the real innovative part, not the non profit part. So I'm not trying to be an alternative to credit unions, I'd prefer to be an option for 20 something year olds who spend most of their life online who want to bank online with a bank that's different to other banks. Not sure CU's have the best online systems (have experience in this)
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#44>Credit Unions [...] don't offer stuff like checking accounts, atms etc, aren't really open that much, are exceptionally slow at allowing you withdraw and are completely offline. That's just my experience, but I don't think you could actually bank with a credit union, which is what I'm trying to get at.
I'll chime in with a bunch of the other people in the thread and say that none of these things are true of my (US) credit union. Their online banking could use a design refresh, but fulfills all of my needs pretty well.
Plenty of atms and free checking, also a few convenient physical locations in case I need to look someone in the eye. Been with them for 10 years.
edit: branches close at 6, but the drive through is open until 8. Also open on Saturday and Sunday mornings.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#45As other people mentioned, most of what you described is offered through credit unions. But most credit unions are small and don't have the capacity to offer great online/mobile experiences. I would be interested to see a project to open source a solution for credit unions to customize and use to offer a better user experience.
Interesting.. but I think you can go further.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#46My Credit Union (in Oregon) * Offers Checking accounts * Has ATM's * Are open as much as most banks are. * Are exceptionally friendly. * Have an online presence that... well it's not exceptional, but it's not that bad either as far as these things go. That's why I've always kept my personal and business accounts there over the past 20 years.
That's cool. Business accounts aswell? CU's seem much more developed in the US. I think if you were to look at the three things I mentioned - online, non profit and open source, non profit is the one I think is least differentiable if that makes any sense. I think an online open source bank is the real innovative part, not the non profit part.
Yes, my business account as well.
I love open source software, but from a bank...I just want them to give me a good deal and be helpful.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#47>Credit Unions [...] don't offer stuff like checking accounts, atms etc, aren't really open that much, are exceptionally slow at allowing you withdraw and are completely offline. That's just my experience, but I don't think you could actually bank with a credit union, which is what I'm trying to get at. I'll chime in with a bunch of the other people in the thread and say that none of these things are true of my (US)…
I think like always, the US is a bit different. As I think I mentioned, I'm not thinking of something like a credit union, rather something quite different.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#48In Italy we have
http://www.bancaetica.it/
it's a 'popular' bank, it means that collects money on the local district to borrow to local/italian entrepreneurs. And it's ehical, it borrows only to projects with high levels of sustainability: green economy, innovation, alternative energies etc.
Now it's quite up also the concept of 'social banking'
http://www.social-banking.org/the-institute/what-is-social-b...
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#49The US has credit unions, which (generally) address the non-technical things here - they're owned by their depositors and any profits beyond what's needed to operate get returned as dividends. I've had very good experiences thus far with Simple, as well.
I can see why you're linking credit unions with the non profit thing, but I think the non profit thing is there, for me at least, as more of a statement to show aims, so not nessecarily the same reason why a credit union is non profit. My experience with CU's here is that they are even worse than banks (almost impossible to withdraw, no current accounts, no atms, rarely open) is that similar in the US?
Very different here in the States. They have ATMs, are open about the same hours as banks, checking/business accounts, offer credit, mortgages, car loans, etc.
Re: Ask HN: Sick of your bank? Want to build a open source, non-profit, online bank?
#50[deleted]
Here's an example: Imagine if your bank account had a profile, almost like a social network, and you could go to someone else's profile and quickly see recent transactions you've had with them. I'm not thinking of something like a credit union, rather something quite different, and I really feel there's lots more that can be done with banking from a tech pov