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Ask HN: Moving small amounts of money between two accounts without ACH?

4 points by the_only_law ↗ HN
Just curious about this, as I ran into this problem recently.

Say I have two bank accounts, both of which are solely mine. I want to move a small amount (say <$1000) a close to instantly as possible, avoiding the time sink that is ACH. Fees are ok, but it should involve only yourself and your accounts, so no exchanging with other people.

My first thought was to use PayPal, load my balance from one card, and withdraw it to another. However, PayPal seems to not let you add to your balance with a debit card, only from a bank account, which involves and ACH transaction. You can for some reason, withdraw your balance to a debit card for a small fee.

The way I ended up getting to work was to load the money into my Apple Pay wallet, and then withdraw it into the other account, all through debit cards. This does carry a fee and Comes with the caveat of not working for very small amounts (<$10).

It got me thinking though, why is this such an issue. There are plenty of methods to do quick, p2p or retail transactions without resorting to ACH, why is is such a pain to move money between my own accounts.

9 comments

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emacsen
This is what Zelle is for. It was made by banks for small amounts.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zelle_(payment_service)

the_only_law
But Zelle is for p2p payments, I.e. sending money to someone else. You can’t move money in between two accounts you own, well without having two Zelle accounts I suppose.
togaen
Yes, that's exactly how you do it. I do that all the time with Zelle to move money between my bank accounts.
yuppie_scum
Just use a credit card for the small purchases and pay the bill from each account as desired. This has the added benefit of earning you credit card points and improving your credit rating.
perl4ever
Is there an implicit constraint that these are at two different banks?

Because I thought it was normal that a bank or credit union allows you to instantly move money between different accounts at the same institution.

DrJid
Zelle works for this. You can register Zelle on different bank accounts using different identifiers you have. Eg a phone and an email. I use this all the time to transfer between my own bank accounts, instantly. Over time , my Zelle limits also have increased.
BOOSTERHIDROGEN
I don’t understand why US is so lacking in real time transactions while in developing country they can transfer/receive immediately 24/7.
toomuchtodo
Zelle today, FedNow instant payments in about 12-18 months.
toast0
Go to ATM, insert card from account 1, withdrawl cash from account 1, return card, insert card from account 2, deposit cash into account 2, return card. Subject to ATM and account withdrawl limits.

If you really want it instant and don't mind fees, you can do a wire transfer during banking business hours. It's as instant as your bank's wire departments.