You know you should be saving money, but sometimes it’s hard to get started. In the old days, you could start simply by emptying the change in your pockets into a jar or piggy bank at night, but today we pay for just about everything with a card and don’t find ourselves with much loose change. Paying with a card is convenient and makes it easy to spend money on fun things such as grabbing coffee with a friend or going out to lunch instead of packing something from home. But those $5 coffee breaks and $10 lunches can really add up. That’s where the free PSECU Savings App for members can help.
After you download the app, you’ll need to set a goal. Maybe it’s to go on that trip you’ve been planning, but never seem to have enough money to book. Or perhaps you want to set some money aside for a rainy day. When you set a goal in the app, you’re given a separate Savings Share, so it’s easy to keep track of how much you’ve saved.
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Easy Ways to Save More
Once you set your goal, the app gives you a number of fun and easy ways to save.
For instance, the next time you’re at the coffee shop, skip the specialty drink and go for something simple. Then open the app, tap Skip, and you’ll move the amount you would have spent on that latte from your Checking Share into your Savings Share.
And that jar of coins you used to keep on the dresser but don’t have anymore? That really used to add up, didn’t it? The app gives you a way to collect loose change in today’s digital world. Instead of paying cash and saving up coins throughout the day, just use your debit card and activate the Sweep option.
There are two ways to save using the Sweep option. You can perform a once-daily account sweep, in which the app will collect the “loose change” in your Checking Share and transfer it into your digital piggy bank. For example, if your balance was $1,250.75 at the end of the day, $0.75 would be moved to your Savings Share. Or, if you want to save even more, you can do a Debit Card Sweep. This means that each debit card transaction will be rounded up to the nearest dollar at the end of the day and the “loose change” will be moved to your Savings Share. If you made purchases of $3.75 and $2.65, for example, $0.25 and $0.35 (a total of $.60) will be moved to your Savings Share at the end of the day.
There’s one other fun way to save with the app – Spin. We all know how tempting it can be to dream about what we would do if we hit the lottery jackpot. But the simple truth is that buying a lottery ticket is like putting money down the drain. Next time you’re feeling lucky, hit the Spin button. You’ll land on a certain amount of money and can decide if you want to transfer that into your Savings Share. Your checking account will have a few dollars less in it, but instead of holding a losing ticket in your hand, you’ll be a few dollars closer to hitting your savings goal.
Of course, you can also use the savings app to conveniently transfer any amount directly from your Checking Share toward your savings goal. You can make one-time transfers or set up a regular transfer, such as $25 each week. This is a great way to control how much and how often you set money aside to reach your goal even faster.
If you’re already a PSECU member, you can go to the App Store or Google Play Store to download the PSECU Savings App. Just make sure you’re enrolled in online banking before you log into the app.
If you’re not a PSECU member, open an account at psecu.com/join.
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