Beautiful puppy day

Today was a lovely day at the Ranch.  It was very cool, in the mid 40's, and everyone was enjoying the end of winter and the 15 minutes of spring.  I'm still getting around enough to be able to do most of what I'd like with the dogs.  After a couple of hours I'm done but until then we do OK.  Once I get back home and rest I'm good again.  My hip is not going to get better until I fix it so for now I just tolerate it.  Sometime around October I'll be able to tie my shoes and pick things up off the ground without a lot of pain.

Meanwhile, I decided to move my infrastructure checking (mortgage, electricity, gas, etc) from my local credit union to a new Chase account.  I've been using Tiller and really like the management tools.  When it is working right it imports transactions, does the automatic categorization for the transactions that never change, and provides very clear results of what is going on.  It is the automatic imports that make the whole thing work and my Credit Union just hiccupped.  I've not gotten anything from then in nearly a month.  After a bunch of rabble rousing on the Tiller site I came to the conclusion that I just need to consolidate accounts.  I began using the CU so that I'd have a brick and mortar site if/when I need one to complement my more virtual USAA accounts.  Not too often I get cash and need a way to get it into checking.  So I've been using the CU.  Chase is opening a branch in our HEB plaza that could not be more convenient.  I could easily bike there.  And I've already got a Chase credit card.

It looks like the account will not cost me anything.  I don't have to have a minimum because: 
1 - I'm a veteran
2 - I'll automatically deposit one of our social security checks into the account
Either of the above qualifies me for free checking.

There might be a $300 gift in the deal since I've been using them for my Amazon credit card too.  They are offering the deal but I don't actually have it in an account yet so I'm not believing it.

I went online today to set up the account and, of course, they checked my Experian credit.  It is frozen as are the other two companies.  I leave all three frozen all the time.  The other nice thing about setting up the Chase account is it put me through the process of checking all three to be sure they are frozen and unfreezing Experian for a week so I can open the account.  I did that but it does not take effect until tomorrow at noon.  I'll start over tomorrow afternoon with Chase.

Once I get things set up I'll be in better shape and my finances will be more transparent.

This is more like it

I went on the Chase site and created a checking account in about five minutes. And transferred money from my USAA account which Chase recognized from my credit card payments. I'm working on consolidation still. I've got to reach out to all the automated stuff I had set to the credit union and move it to chase. Half a ACH kind of things. Not hard but I don't want to mess them up so I might just wait until tomorrow to let the dust settle a bit.

Meanwhile I got this in email:




Automated connection to Tiller.  I mean, Tiller isn't set up to recognize the Chase checking so it is going to be even more screwed up but I'm good with starting over in April anyway and obviously this piece has solved the problem that I was having with connections.

Once the local branch opens up I'll take Dana there and we'll get settled.  Right now the account is in my name alone so we'll need to get her set up too.  She understands brick and mortar pretty well.  

But it will be so nice to have this all moving around and recorded automatically with minimal effort on my part.