Last year when shopping around for a car loan I contacted the AIB and dealt with a person very keen to get our business. I cannot remember the exact rate quoted but the best they were willing to do was 3.5 or thereabouts! I then rang the EBS as we have a mortgage and managed to secure a rate exactly the same as our variable mortgage of 3.75 or thereabouts (even cheaper than a CU). Needless to say the AIB could not match this. Before anyone asks, it is completely seperate to our mortgage (it is not a top up) - I went to great lengths to prove this and even got an email from EBS stating that this was an independent loan and not tied to our mortgage.