Consumer Finance Awards 2025: Bank of the Year - Retirees
ING has been named Money's Bank of the Year - Retirees as part of the 2025 Consumer Finance Awards.
- Find out how we chose the winners
- Order your copy of the July awards issue
- Check out more from the 2025 Consumer Finance Awards
It's probably fair to say that at some point (possibly several points) during our working lives, most of us have sighed and made a mental count of how long to go before we can down tools and retire for good.
But the idyllic images of silver-haired couples strolling along the beach don't always depict reality for Australia's 4.2 million retirees.
A survey by National Seniors Australia found fear of not having enough money to live a comfortable lifestyle is a major worry for Australians who are already retired or preparing for retirement. T
his highlights the need to make every dollar work hard in retirement - while you relax. This doesn't have to be a complicated process.
Your choice of bank can play a valuable role when it comes to getting more from your money once you hang up your work boots.
ING tops the leaderboard among retirees in 2025, having climbed from third place last year. What is ING doing that resonates so strongly with retirees?
One obvious answer is paying a high return on cash savings. Cash is a very safe investment for retirees. However, low risk typically goes hand in hand with low returns. But not so at ING.
Dina Kotsopoulos, head of daily banking at ING, says, "One of our savings products for over-55s is the Savings Accelerator, offering tiered interest rates - higher for balances over $150,000, with no monthly fees or deposit requirements."
Customers new to ING can open a Savings Accelerator account and score a variable rate up to 5.15% (as at mid-May 2025). This includes a special 0.70% for the first four months on balances of up to $500,000. After that, a variable rate up to 4.45% applies.
What makes ING's Savings Accelerator so attractive to retirees is the flexibility to access funds without monthly deposit requirements (which can be a challenge for retirees) or lock-in terms.
For retirees seeking the certainty of a fixed rate, Kotsopoulos says, "Our Personal Term Deposits are also popular among over-55s, as they guarantee a fixed interest rate for different timeframes for deposits of $10,000 or more."
Term deposits often hold a lot of appeal to retirees, who typically rely on fixed incomes, and who cannot afford to wear the market fluctuations we often see with sharemarkets.
Even better, ING term deposits don't come with ongoing fees that can eat into returns. With a suite of fixed terms to select from, retirees can mix and match the ideal combination of deposits to meet their personal cashflow needs.
For pre-retirees, ING also offers a superannuation option - Living Super, which features admin fees from as low as $5 per month, so more of your money goes towards building your retirement nest egg.
Why they won
Savings accounts that allow retirees to earn more from their money.
Top product
Savings Accelerator - a high interest account without monthly deposit requirements.
Get stories like this in our newsletters.
