Methodology and sources

How we collect fee data

1. Official provider pages first. We look for the provider’s own fee schedule or product page.
2. Comparison sites where we found no official page. When a provider’s fees weren’t on a page we could find, we use third-party comparisons and industry articles, and we say so.
3. Blank beats a guess. If no source states a figure, the cell says “Not confirmed.” That does not mean the fee is $0.

Each provider page links to the specific source used and carries notes on anything uncertain. A provider’s public retail account can also differ from the plan your employer offers, so your employer’s fee schedule is the one that counts.

What is official and what is secondary

Of our 11 providers, 4 are based on an official provider document or page, and 7 still rely mainly on comparison sites or articles. Even “official” rows can have individual fields we could not confirm, and some official pages are old. Each row’s note says what the gap is. This is a work in progress, and we are replacing secondary sources with official ones as we confirm them.

How often we review

We aim to review the data monthly. That is a goal, not a guarantee, and fees can change between reviews. The “last checked” date above shows when each provider’s row was last reviewed. Check the provider’s own page before you move money.

How sorting and ranking work

The directory is not a “best of” ranking. It starts sorted by monthly fee, and you can re-sort by name, invest-from balance, transfer-out fee, or cash rate. Providers with a blank (“Not confirmed”) figure are placed at the end of a sort, so a missing number never looks cheaper than a real one. No provider can pay to change its position, its numbers, or its notes, and we list providers that pay us nothing. See How we make money.

Account comparison tables (IRAs and more)

The tables under Accounts follow the same rules as the HSA directory, with a stricter source standard: a figure appears only if we read it on the provider’s own page, and each row links to the pages we used and shows the date we checked. Anything we couldn’t confirm says “Not verified” instead of a guess. Providers are listed alphabetically, not ranked, and no provider can pay to change its row. IRS limits, income ranges and tax rules come from irs.gov and are cited on the page. Cash-interest rates are shown only when a provider’s page states one, with its date if given. If a provider’s own pages disagree with each other, we show “Not verified” instead of picking one. The donor-advised fund table follows the same rules for each sponsor’s minimums, fees, investments and accepted assets, and its tax explainer cites IRS Publication 526 and the IRS donor-advised fund page.

The calculator

The math and its limits are explained on the About page, and you can try it in the calculator.

Report an error

Found a fee that’s wrong or out of date? Email hsacompare@mail.grokbot.com with the provider and a link to the page showing the right figure. We’ll check it and fix confirmed errors.