Bank of America's flagship savings account still pays a 0.01% annual percentage yield, a rate that has barely budged even as the Federal Reserve kept its benchmark rate elevated for most of the past two years.
On a $10,000 balance, that works out to about $1 a year.
Meanwhile, a growing list of online banks and credit unions are paying 4% or more on the same money.
It's the difference between a dinner out and a car payment.
At a 4.25% yield, that same $10,000 earns roughly $425 annually — money that costs you nothing to collect beyond a few clicks and a waiting period.
Big banks with millions of legacy customers don't have to compete hard for deposits.
Their customers tend to stay put, often because switching feels annoying or because the accounts are tangled up with checking, direct deposit, and bill pay.
That loyalty is expensive, and it's paid for out of your interest.
The Federal Reserve has started trimming rates, which means the headline yields on high-yield savings accounts will drift lower too.
But here's the math that matters: even after a couple of cuts, top online accounts could still pay 3.5% to 4%, while Bank of America's 0.01% stays roughly where it's always been.
If you're keeping a big cushion at Bank of America out of habit, you have options.
You can open a high-yield savings account elsewhere and link it to your existing checking for transfers.
You can also ask a Bank of America branch about promotional rates or relationship pricing, though those offers usually require large balances or specific account bundles and often expire after a few months.
Watch the fine print on any account you switch to.
Some high-yield savings accounts have minimum balance requirements, monthly fees, or rate tiers that drop once your balance crosses a certain threshold.
A few pay the highest rate only on the first few thousand dollars.
None of that makes them bad — it just means reading the terms before you move money.
A simple move many people use: keep one to two months of expenses in your everyday checking account, park the rest in a higher-yield savings account, and set up an automatic transfer if you need to cover a big bill.
That way you're not chasing rates daily, but you're also not leaving hundreds of dollars on the table each year.
The quiet part is that nobody at your bank is going to call and tell you a competitor pays 400 times more.
That's not a conspiracy — it's just how deposit pricing works when customers don't shop around.
My take: loyalty to a bank is a one-way street.
They'll happily hold your money at 0.01% while advertising better rates to new customers.
Final Thoughts
Spend ten minutes comparing yields and you'll likely find that the biggest raise you get this year comes from moving your own savings.