A lot of credit unions have sub-par mobile and web offerings. I have accounts with 2 credit unions but I rarely use them because of this reason. So if you're going to look for a credit union take that into consideration.
Well, unless you really really enjoy watching loading bars and reaching your data limit with ease, Chase's website and mobile app are a dumpster fire.
So you won't have a problem finding something better.
USAA is probably the best your going to get but they aren't open to everyone.
I've had accounts at probably 20 different banks due to churning bank account bonuses. I never had PNC before but I did have a TD account. Wouldn't recommend that one because when I signed up online it only made a shadow account and I had to go to a branch to "really" open the account to be able to use it. Of course, they didn't tell me this I had to call and be like wtf?
For anyone worried about leaving a "big" bank, often credit unions will offer mobile deposit and free (reimbursed) ATM withdrawls. I'm actually happier using a bank with no local branches because there's no more thinking about driving to the "right" ATM. (mine reimburses up to $15/mo which is more than enough for me; these days even the sketchy taqueria ATMs only charge $1.25 or so where it used to be $3+)
In my local area the credit unions have fees equal to or worse than the big banks. If you're in the same boat I highly recommend an internet-only bank. I've personally chosen Fidelity and it's been wonderful, but I'm sure others like Schwab, etc. are just as good. There's no minimum balance and reimbursed ATM fees just like some credit unions.
There are upsides and down-sides to this approach vs a local credit union.
Upsides are traditional banks usually have insane fees for investment accounts, but with Fidelity (and probably Schwab) you can have it all under one roof. You generally get more options, too. For example, when I opened a 529 I could choose to "open it" in one of several states. My previous big chain bank only allowed me to open an account with the investment options in my state.
There are only two downsides I've seen so far. The first is that Fidelity does not offer personal Health Savings Accounts. This may not be a problem if you have one through your employer, or don't use one. The second is for rare instances when you might need large amounts of cash, larger than you could reasonably withdraw from an ATM. For example, purchasing a car from a private owner. Doing this might require some finagling. In my case, my employer has my 401k at a national chain bank, so I am confident I could cut a check there if I needed to, but it is a concern.
Yeah, I use USAA and hence have no local branches. For 4 or 5 years I kept a local credit union account, but to withdraw cash there I'd likely have to xfer it, wait 3-5 days, THEN withdraw it it wasn't a great solution either. Eventually I closed it because it was not useful to me.
When I had a BofA account, I once asked a teller if I'd need to notify them in advance if I wanted to take out a large amount of cash; when she asked how large she was thankfully able to stifle a laugh and instead say "that should be fine" when I told her "About $5k"
No credit union that I've ever seen offers such a thing without balances of $10,000+ and you should probably not be keeping that's much money in a checking account. Credit union and bank fees aren't significantly different from each other. I had a credit union that charged $.30 for using their own ATM.
Best to get a local account without any hoops to jump through to keep it fee free in case you have to go to the bank for some odd reason and open up a fidelity or Schwab account for daily use.
Like I said (I probably sound like Chase sales guy) they have been pretty good to me and it's nice to use a big bank to have all your stuff in one place.
Car loans / Home Loans get bought up by Chase and you can service all that sort of thing in one web interface. I'm worried that local banks will make me switch back to snail mail days - I'd have personal access but boy I just want to be able to do it all virtually.