Arizona Family College Savings Program
Accepting New Accounts
Beginning in August 2005, the Arizona Family College Savings Program (AFCSP) managed by College Savings Bank resumed accepting new accounts. The 2004 revisions to the AFCSP enabling statute created some unique challenges for College Savings Bank. The statutory revisions transformed the AFCSP offerings to municipal securities. Such a transformation caused the federal deposit insurance coverage for each depositor to come into question. In August 2004, College Savings Bank stopped establishing new AFCSP accounts until it could obtain favorable guidance from the FDIC. However, existing accounts continued to operate under the prior statutory structure.
In May 2005, the FDIC is- sued an interim final rule permitting federal deposit insurance coverage to pass through to each depositor under the new AFCSP structure. College Savings Bank plans to convert existing accounts to the new structure later this year.
June 2005 marked the six-year anniversary of the AFCSP managed by College Savings Bank. The program offers the CollegeSure CD, a certificate of deposit indexed to college costs and guaranteed to meet future tuition, fees, room and board. It is backed by the full faith and credit of the U.S. Government up to $100,000 per depositor.
As of March 31, 2005, College Savings Bank has established 3,385 AFCSP accounts with nearly $67 million in deposits. This deposit amount is an increase of almost 10% over the $61 million on deposit a year ago.
In August 2005, the AFCSP Web site also received a face lift. Located at arizona.collegesavings.com, the program site is easily navigable, has a variety of research topics, calculators and forms needed to manage your account.
The relaunch of the site marks an ongoing commitment to provide a college savings resource that is second to none for our account holders. Site visitors will also be able to open an account online or request an information kit.
The site contains the FDIC Interim rule and disclosure statement.