I think it would be nice that you can talk to someone in person or walk to a local branch when you have questions or other complicated transactions that need to be done. 

Even though there isnt any local branch at your area, online banking with citi should be safe. 

Online banking with citi group should be safe.

Perfer 网上银行。

安全：

木马？我不担心，我有anti-virus+firewall软件。

网上交易系统？如果URL是https://，则没问题。ssl2还没被破解。

人员交易操作? 上网开户和local开户的操作人员不同，真不知道谁的操作错误少，也许没有。

服务：

CD上的服务不多，不象信用卡dispute时需要好服务。

利率：

看你的问题描述不象有citi
checking. 如果你追求高利率，Citi刚刚出现在高利率银行的list中，6个月renew时，如果他的利率不好，还要再移出来。我用Corus。 6个月CD，5.64%.
corus一直属于高利率的。每次renew时都没让我失望。如果追求高利率，还要考虑Tbill。

另外, citi CD hard pull，你在意吗？不是loan，还要hard pull，不懂，为了税表？

If you do not have citi's local bank, then use this one:

http://www.presidential.com/

I use it, pretty good (well, its online interface is not as good as other banks, but ok la). It saving is 5.12%. Also open its free checking account (just keep 500$ in it), then write checks to yourself if you need to withdraw. first 20 checks are free, later ones just buy the check from wal-mart finance.