Wells Fargo HSA Converted to Optum Bank

Back in June, it was announced that Wells Fargo was selling its HSA business to Optum Bank. The transfer went through recently and I finally logged into the Optum Bank website. Back at Wells Fargo, I invested my entire balance (except the required $1000) in the Wells Fargo Index Fund (WFIOX). This was the lowest cost option with an expense ratio of 0.25%. As my combined cash + investment balance was greater than $5000, the monthly fee of $4.25 was waived. This was one of the good features of the Wells Fargo HSA as it counted the investment portion towards the minimum balanace.

Now that my account is at Optum, I wanted to make sure there were no big changes. After logging in, there is a link with "Account Details" which says "$4.25 – Waived if average balance is $5,000 or more*". At the bottom of the page: "* The average balance to waive the monthly maintenance fee does not include investment funds." This was definitely worse than Wells Fargo, so I gave Optum a call.

The customer service representative reassured me multiple times that the investment balance DOES count towards the $5000 requirement to get the fee waived. I asked multiple times and they mentioned we were grandfathered in. Looks like there's no way to be sure other than waiting a couple months to see if the fee is charged.

The fund selection seemed to be the same as at Wells Fargo (no Fidelity/Vangurd). I read online that Optum Bank HSAs usually have Vanguard/Fidelity funds. The CSR mentioned we would get access to the usual slate of funds in January. They could not tell me if the fees would change at that time, but said they would let us know ahead of time if so.

If the fees stay the same and they add Vanguard/Fidelity funds, this could be one of the best HSA investment options. We will see in January 2017.