Updated 2010-09-29 — see below

AspireFCU, the credit union where my Kasasa account was opened, recently changed its terms. It was affected by new legislation requiring that debit card “overdraft protection”—the thing where if you buy a stick of gum you can’t afford, they charge you a large fee (like $35) for it—is now an opt-in program. That means you have to ask for it, or they will just decline your card instead of charging you that fee if you can’t afford something.
The new terms for AspireFCU’s Kasasa checking account limit the amount of money that qualifies for the 3.51% APY. This was a good motivation for me to switch to a bank I mentioned before: Danversbank.

Danversbank has a 4.01% APY, a $25,000 limit on the balance to get that APY, and the same requirements as a Kasasa account. It’s one of the highest APYs around right now. Their social networking is also excellent: they are on both Facebook and Twitter, and respond to messages quickly.

But the icing on the cake is that the Danversbank debit card is a rewards card. The twelve mandatory debit transactions actually go towards something now! You can get gift cards, travel miles, and downloadable content. You get 1 point per $2.00 and everything on the rewards site is at less than a 1:1 exchange rate (a $25 Bed Bath & Beyond Gift Card
costs 3,500 Points), so the points rate isn’t that great, but it’s better than nothing. Also, by redeeming the points as gift cards and using Card Pool, the points can be treated as cash back (although using the gift card is probably better at the rate).

The account details are here: https://www.danversbank.com/Personal/Checking/Free-Rewards-Checking.aspx
I’m really looking forward to banking with Danversbank.

Update 2010-09-29

Well this makes me sad… Danversbank’s APY will be lowered to 3.01% as of October 4th. I will continue to make the switch from AspireFCU/Kasasa despite the 0.50% difference, since there is no upper limit on the amount earning this interest rate.
For amounts under $10,000, the Aspire account is obviously better.

If I had more than $25,000 in a checking account I would look in to some other investment options.

As for my choice, if you want to see some math:

$15,000 at Aspire/Kasasa rate will earn 3.51% for the first $10,000 ($351), then 1.01% for the last $5,000 ($50.50), for a total of $401.50.

$15,000 at Danversbank will earn 3.01% up to $25,000 for a total of $451.50.