Last month, Peter over at Bible Money Matters wrote about his horrendous experience with closing his Bank of America account. Well, he is not alone with his Bank of America troubles.

I opened my account last March (15 months ago) and in July 2009, I wanted to take advantage of a promotion to use bill pay for $25. I had just graduated college and started to pay my bills, so it was great timing to get some free money for something I was going to do anyway.

I expected to see the money deposited in my account within 3 months. Nothing. I called up to see what the deal was and they told me that I was not eligible for the promotion because when I opened the account in the branch, I had technically “activated” bill-pay even though I had never used it.

For obvious reasons, that didn’t sit well with me, so I went into the branch where a nice woman named Jenny made a few calls and said that it would be taken care of.

Two months later and I still hadn’t heard anything. I went back to Jenny, who apologized, investigated again, and came to the same conclusion that I should be eligible and compensated. I sat there while she made a few calls to confirm that I should get paid.

2 months later? Bingo: still no payment.

Now it’s getting a bit ridiculous. I was ready to go back to Jenny, who agreed months ago that if they couldn’t get it done the proper way, would find another way to credit me my $25, possibly through a referral that didn’t really occur (see? I told you she was nice!).

Instead of going back to the branch, I used Peter’s tip and contacted Bank of America through twitter. Sure enough, mere minutes after I sent them a message, I got one back with contact information (Their twitter handle is @BofA_Help).

I told them my situation, gave them my bank information, and they looked into it. What did they find? That I had previously been credited. What? Did I make a HUGE mistake? Nope, they did. They saw a referral bonus and assumed it was the same thing.

I made it clear that I was quickly losing patience and explained their mistake. Finally, I got another email back saying that in order to keep my business, they would be crediting me $35 and they hoped that would make me happy.

Sure, it solved the problem, but it took too much of my time and I’ve already switched to ING as my primary bank. I don’t stand for bad customer service.

I love my savings account. I love knowing that I’m earning money on my money. I especially love it because I know that I’m earning more than anyone else is.

Still, there comes a point where it’s just not worth it to micro-manage your finances and throw every last dollar in the account with the hopes of making a little bit of extra interest.

There are four reasons why it’s just not worth it:

• The Stress Factor
• The Low Reward Factor
• The High Risk Factor
• The Time Factor

Let me explain:

I usually leave about $200-$300 in each of my checking accounts (Bank of America and ING) and put everything else on my credit card. I don’t use cash all that often so I rarely have to worry about running low.

Well, rarely isn’t always, and last week I ran into a problem. After transferring a large majority of my paycheck into savings, my roommate reminded him that I owed him for groceries (we switch off, and it adds up for about a $150 transfer each time). No problem, right? Well…as it turns out, I also had a $100 automatic transfer coming out of that same account to pay off my student loan. To make it worse, this all happened on a Friday and two business days to transfer more money in from my other checking account wouldn’t happen until Tuesday so I was stuck.

I had a few choices: I could just suck up a $35 overdraft fee, then try and get it reversed. When I get within $50-$100 every month, I’m probably cutting it too close. This is a case of The High Risk Factor.

I could withdraw money from the ING ATM and deposit in my Bank of America ATM, which would post immediately an save me. Sounds like an obvious choice, even if it is a little time consuming. This is a perfect example of The Stress Factor.

Anyway, I headed to the CVS which has the ING ATM, and it was out of service. No problem, they must have another one somewhere. I whipped out my free iPhone, plugged in my location and up popped another ATM about 15 minutes away. I got there but that one was ALSO out of service. What gives ING? Ah, the frustration. Plus, I had just spent 25 minutes to find out that two ATMs weren’t working. This is clearly The Time Factor.

The next closest one was REALLY out of the way, so I headed home a bit disappointed. I stopped by the Bank of America ATM, deposited the $20 I had in my wallet and saw that I was $6 in the red. Don’t forget that I did all of this because I wanted to keep an extra $100 in my savings account! That $100 would make me only $2 per year, or less than 20 cents per month! That’s not exactly going to get me rich any time soon. It actually isn’t even enough money for me to spend even a minute thinking about! Yes readers, this is The Low Reward Factor.

When I got home, my roommate was waiting for me and had some unimportant news for me: “Oh, by the way, you transferred me too much, I’m sending you $12 back right now.”

So in the end, I didn’t go over and I wasn’t charged, but I did waste about 40 minutes walking around D.C. searching for an ING ATM and aged about 15 years while worrying about a $35 fee. I wanted to save a very little bit of money so I risked a whole lot more. I think it’s time to take a step back and relax a little bit.

Readers, have you ever been so intent on saving money that you forgot to take a look at the big picture?

As if I didn’t love SmartyPig enough.

I got an email yesterday letting me know that my interest rate was changing. I got a little nervous, thinking that all good things must come to an end. But then, something amazing happened. They’re actually increasing the interest rates on May 19th!

Ok, so now I’ll have a bank that gives me 2.15% interest. That just makes my decision to move my savings from ING (which currently gives 1.10% interest) even better!

If you already have your money in a savings account, you should definitely switch. Why?

Well, if you make 1.10% on your account, then you obviously value that 1.10%. And if you like that 1.10%, wouldn’t you like another 1.05%? It sounds like a no-brainer to me.

How often does someone offer to double your money at no cost?

I’m pretty pumped about this because while 2.15% isn’t a huge amount, it gets me that much closer to the 2.9% interest I’m paying on my student loans. Of course, the interest rates will rise on the loans too eventually, but the smaller the margin, the less I’m losing on the student loan interest (plus it’s tax deductible!).

If you haven’t had a chance to check them out, read my review of SmartyPig and find out why I think they’re the greatest.

I haven’t even mentioned the bonus you can get when withdrawing part of your money onto a gift card of many popular retailers.

Readers, Do you guys use SmartyPig? Why or why not? Is the hassle of adding another bank too much to outweigh the benefits?

I’m pretty sure Bank of America hates me. And I’m pretty sure Mint loves me. When one gives me lemons…the other one alerts me and reminds me to nag the first one for my money back.

Each morning, I log into Mint and get the latest transactions from my bank account. I like keeping track of my spending and renaming and organizing my finances. The faster I do this, the better success I have at remembering why there is a $20 charge from “Buff Bill” (that would be a local bar, Buffalo Billiards). My budget is always in sync and I can clearly see how I’m doing for the month and which areas to watch.

On Wednesday, I logged in as usual and I had an alert! I was charged a $5 maintenance fee by guess who – Bank of America! Of course it was them. I called up and found out that my one year grace period had expired on my savings account (that gives a whopping 0.10% interest!) I now had to either keep a $300 average daily balance in my saving account or set up recurring transfers of $25 per month. Plus, I have no idea why they didn’t give me a warning.

They refunded the fee, and my solution for the future is to set up a $25/month transfer in, followed by a $25/month transfer out a few days later. It’s a silly system, but if this is what they want, that’s fine with me. This will only last until November when I earn my Keep the Change bonus, at which point I’ll probably close the savings account (and leave the bank completely? I wish!).

So Bank of America, no matter how many times you try and steal my money, I won’t let you. Mint will keep reminding me, and I’ll keep fighting. Plus, you still haven’t given me my $25 bonus for using bill-pay, and I’m coming for that, too.

Daily Yakezie Short Carnival:

Garbage and excessive spending @ Early Retirement Extreme

Spending Money Wisely @ Canadian Finance Blog

Right now I have three banks, each of which serves a different purpose. I have one bank I love, one I hate but use anyway because it’s convenient, and one that gives a “high” (2.01%) rate of interest but I just opened recently and am not sure how I feel about it yet.

I get my direct deposits to my ING Direct Orange Checking account and everything else flows through there. I pay my student loans from my ING account and my automatic investing also originates with ING. ING is great. It is easy to use and I’ve only had positive experiences with them. How can’t you love a company that when you call, they answer, “How can I help you save your money?”

I transfer rent money to my Bank of America checking account each month, only doing so because my roommates send me their rent and I send one payment to the landlord. I also use Bank of America for ATM withdrawals because the have many more convenient locations in my area than ING. I’ve had my share of problems with Bank of America, but the convenience is what keeps me there. If I lived with a roommate that used ING, maybe I’d leave Bank of America alltogether.

I have used ING for my savings accounts (which are also great, easy to use, and allow me to create sub-savings accounts. However, I recently set up an account at SmartyPig, which is an online bank that right now gives 2.01%. It’s an interesting site, which is all about automatically saving for goals and gives bonuses if you withdraw your money in the form of a gift card (only use this feature if you’re planning on buying something from one of the merchants!). However, taking money out is a hassle. It took me a few days to find out how (not that I wanted to withdraw, but I wanted to know how to do it.) So far, I’ve had no problems with SmartyPig and I actually like it. We’ll see if the interest rate remains high, but for now, I’m keeping it. If I ever decide to go back to ING, that’s always an option.

How many bank accounts do you have and which are your favorites?