To take cash out of a passbook savings account, you carry a small booklet into a branch and hand it to a teller, who writes the withdrawal inside it.
There's no debit card involved and no ATM. It's how most savings accounts worked before online banking, and a handful of banks still open them.
The Passbook Is a Paper Log of Deposits and Withdrawals
The passbook is what separates this account from an ordinary savings account. It's a physical book holding the written record of money going in and coming out, updated at the moment of the transaction rather than on a statement that arrives later.
Before electronic banking, that book was the only running record a customer had of their own balance. Today a limited number of banks still offer it, usually framed as a more hands-on way to manage money.
In other respects these are ordinary deposit accounts. Monthly fees tend to be small or waived entirely. You can link one to a checking account online, and the FDIC insurance works the same as it does anywhere else.
The paper format brings its own wrinkle. The booklet is the record you hold, so a lost or damaged passbook means a trip to the bank to sort out.
Interest credited or transfers made since your last visit won't appear on the page until the book is updated, which is one reason most banks offering these accounts also give you online access to the same balance.
Deposits and Withdrawals Go Through a Teller, Not a Card
No card comes with a passbook account, which rules out the ATM for both sides of the transaction: you can't pull cash from one and you can't feed a deposit into one either.
The transaction happens at the counter: you bring the passbook, the teller completes the deposit or withdrawal, and the amount goes into the book.
Both Cathay Bank and Dollar Bank list their passbook accounts as having no ATM access.
Branch-Only Access Slows Withdrawals Down
Having to visit a branch is the inconvenience and, for some savers, the appeal. If moving money out of savings requires showing up during banking hours with a booklet in hand, small impulse transfers get harder to make.
Picture someone whose emergency fund sits in an app two taps away from their checking account. Moving that money into a passbook account doesn't change the interest math much, but it does replace those two taps with a drive to the branch, which is the friction some people are after.
The teller visit also comes with in-person help, which can matter for a first bank account or for anyone who prefers handling money face to face.
Rates Are Modest, and the Top Tiers Need Large Balances
How much a passbook account pays comes down to the bank, and within a bank often to the balance. Cathay's bottom tier, 0.03% APY, sits at the low end of what banks publish for these accounts; 1.15% APY marks the high end, and reaching it generally means keeping a large balance.
Cathay Bank's passbook account shows how the tiering works: its variable rate runs 0.03%–0.05% (as of 07/06/26) depending on the balance, and the highest APY calls for $50,000.
Dollar Bank takes the flat approach instead, paying 0.10% (as of 10/28/25) with no minimum balance required to earn it.
Two Banks That Still Open Passbook Accounts
| Cathay Bank | Dollar Bank | |
|---|---|---|
| APY | 0.03%–0.05% (as of 07/06/26), by balance | 0.10% (as of 10/28/25) |
| Minimum balance for APY | $50,000 for highest APY | None |
| Minimum opening deposit | $100 | $25.00 |
| Monthly maintenance fee | $3 if daily balance stays under $500 | $0 |
| ATM access | No | No |
| FDIC insured | Yes | Yes |
| Locations | CA, IL, MD, MA, NV, NJ, NY, TX, WA | All 50 states and Washington, D.C. |
Because availability is limited, smaller community banks and credit unions are worth checking too; passbook accounts tend to survive at institutions built around branch banking.
How a Balance Minimum Turns Into a Monthly Fee
The fee structures here reward close reading, because they're tied to behavior rather than to a flat charge. Cathay Bank's $3 monthly fee applies only when the daily balance drops below $500.
Someone who opens with the $100 minimum and leaves it there would sit under that threshold, so what the account costs depends on how it gets used, not on the headline number in the fee schedule.
Opening an Account Takes a Minimum Deposit and ID Verification
The bank hands over the physical passbook once the account exists. Getting to that point takes a minimum deposit, which runs from $25 to $500 depending on the bank, and an identity check: expect to supply a Social Security number and a driver's license number, and to say whether the account will be individual or joint.
Branch-based as these accounts are, plenty of banks will still take the application online.
FDIC Coverage Is the Same as on Any Deposit Account
A passbook account held at an FDIC-insured institution carries the same federal deposit protection, up to the legal limits, as a standard savings account. The paper record doesn't change the insurance; the institution does.
Confirming that a bank is FDIC insured before depositing is the same step that applies to any deposit account, online or in person.
What the Passbook Buys and What It Costs
Dollar Bank's account asks little to get in and charges nothing monthly. Cathay's rewards a large balance and exists only in the states where it has branches.
Either way the trade is the same: the paper trail and the built-in delay cost you convenience and, usually, the yield that rate-driven savings accounts pay.
For a saver who doesn't actively want the booklet or the counter visit, the structure isn't offering much that a standard savings account doesn't already do.
