Marcus Review

Marcus Visit Marcus

Advantages Over Regular Bank

Goldman Sachs created Marcus in order to provide Americans with a way of accessing banking services more simply and cheaply. With Marcus, you get access to savings accounts and personal loans straight from your desktop. By operating online, Marcus saves costs, passing on most of those savings to consumers in the form of better interest rates.

These are the main reasons to choose Marcus over a traditional bank:

• Higher yields than most regular banks.
• Open and manage your savings accounts and CDs from your computer, with no need to go into a physical branch.
• Customer service by phone from real support staff.
• None of those crazy rates and fees that physical banks tend to hide in the fine print.

Cutting-Edge Banking Services 

As mentioned above, Marcus deals solely with personal loans and savings products (for now). It doesn’t offer any other types of banking products. If you’re planning to open a checking account with an online bank—look elsewhere.

Traditional Banking Services

Marcus makes it easy to open and manage your savings accounts. Account holders get 24/7 access to their balance online or over the phone. Separately, Marcus also offers personal loans of up to $40,000, with zero fees, APRs from 6.99% to 19.99%, and repayment terms from 36 to 72 months.

Marcus offers multiple ways of accessing and transferring money into your savings account, including:

• Electronic funds transfer from your external bank account into your Marcus savings account.
• Wire transfer from external account at any bank in the US and its territories into your Marcus account.
• Automatic transfers from your linked accounts into your Marcus savings accounts. Select the frequency and timing for your deposits, and let Marcus and your external bank do all the rest.
• Deposit by check.
• Direct deposits from your payroll or Social Security benefits.

Interest Rates and Fees 

Marcus by Goldman Sachs offers a choice of 1 savings account, 1 no-penalty certificate of deposit, and 12 high-yield certificates of deposit ranging from 6 months to 6 years. There are no maintenance fees for any of the accounts, although early withdrawal fees do apply for some of the accounts. The following table shows the annual percentage yield for selected certificates of deposit, along with minimum deposit requirements:

Customer Service 

Marcus is different from other online banks in that it deals with savings accounts and personal loans only, with no checking accounts and no access to ATMs. To open a Marcus savings account or CD, it’s best to already have a checking account with an external bank in order to make deposits into your Marcus account.

Although it doesn’t offer day-to-day personal banking, Marcus does offer customer service to anyone looking to open an account or needing help with making a deposit. It only takes a few minutes to open an account online. Just click the “Open an Account” button on the Marcus website, enter your name, address, date of birth, and Social Security number, and link to your account at another bank to transfer funds. Alternatively, call Marcus customer service on the number below.

Phone: 855-730-7283, available Monday to Friday from 8am – 10pm ET, and Saturday to Sunday from 9am to 7pm ET. 

HQ: Marcus by Goldman Sachs, 11850 South Election Road, Draper, Utah 84020

Mobile Apps

Marcus doesn’t have a mobile app. This isn’t such a big deal. Marcus only offers personal loans and savings accounts, and therefore there isn’t really any need for customers to access Marcus’s services with a mobile app. Of course, Marcus’s website is mobile-optimized and can be accessed from a web browser on your smartphone or tablet.

Security

It’s fair to say Marcus is very security conscious, with several security features in place to protect account holders. For full information, head to the Security Center section of the Marcus website.

Here’s how Marcus protects your security:

• Encrypted network transports data between Marcus’s systems.
• Customers are required to use multi-factor authentication to log in.
• Deploys EV SSL, which combines regular SSL encryption with an Extended Validation, a stringent identity verification process performed by a third-party certificate authority.

Marcus Visit Marcus

Conclusion

You won’t find everyday online banking services at Marcus, but you will find some of the highest-yielding savings accounts and CDs on the internet. Goldman Sachs created Marcus to compete with traditional banks on savings accounts and personal loans. Judging by the APYs on its accounts, the Marcus by Goldman Sachs experiment has been a success. It’s rare to find a bank that can beat Marcus’ rate for a one-year CD, and those that do tend to require 4-figure minimum balances. With Marcus, you can set up your account in minutes, transfer the minimum balance of $500 from your regular bank account, and start earning high yields straight away.