Online bill pay against a savings account? I don't think so. The idea, last I checked, for having a savings account is so that you can have "liquid" funds which earn interest (not very much nowadays, but better than nothing). You then transfer money in small increments from savings to a checking account so you can pay bills. You do the online bill payment against the checking account. You don't just stick money into a savings account and forget it exists. Ultimately, you have to use it for something, or what good is it?

Sure, you can automate the transfers between savings and checking to cover routine monthly bills, but sometimes there are one-off expenses requiring manual transfers. Remote access does come in mighty handy.

Believe it or not, some "little old ladies" are pretty sophisticated about such matters. I've met them. Apparently you haven't, but that doesn't mean they don't exist.

It's also possible that the "little old lady's" son, or daughter, who lives a thousand miles away, may need to do the transfers for her. My uncle does this for my grandmother, who is not very Web savvy. Here too, remote access is very helpful. Otherwise, my uncle would have to hop on a plane much more often than he does now. A few years back he did, before he discovered on-line banking for himself.

Ultimately, we need to find secure ways to manage our affairs on-line. The Internet isn't going away, and our lives are getting ever more hectic. Questioning peoples' intelligence because their on-line needs differ from yours is rather insulting, don't you think?

And that's all I'll say on the matter.

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