Savings Bond gifts in Treasury Direct

While it's quite easy to buy electronic Savings Bonds as gifts, unless the recipient has a TreasuryDirect account, the bond is held in the Gift Box area of your own account and there's nothing tangible to give as a present.

To create an electronic gift Savings Bond, log into your TreasuryDirect account and click the Manage Direct tab in the row of buttons across the top of the screen.

On the page that appears, the first section of links is called Manage My Account. One of the links in that section is called Update my Registration List. Use that link to add the new gift registration to your list of registrations.

You will need the Social Security Number of the gift recipient to create the registration. Use the recipient's name in the box for the first-named registrant. At the bottom of the screen, check the This is a gift box.

When you've completed the registration, you can buy the gift bond as you would normally buy one for yourself. However, select the registration information for the recipient rather than yourself. That's all there is to it.

Keep in mind that gift bonds appear in the area of TreasuryDirect called the Gift Box rather than in the section that lists your own bonds. And the recipient eventually has to open his or her own TreasuryDirect account to take delivery of your gift. There's no time limit on when a gift bond has to be delivered to the recipient's account, but it can't be redeemed until it's delivered.

Treasury Direct also provides a feature called linked accounts that allows you to separate bonds belonging to your children from your own bonds, while accessing them all from one primary Treasury Direct account.

However, to use this feature, you must be the parent, natural guardian, or person providing chief support for the child and the child must be less than 18 years old. In particular, this feature of off-limits to grandparents.

If you want to use this feature rather than the Gift Box, first set up the linked account. Then go to that account to purchase, redeem, accept gift deliveries, and perform other transactions within the account on behalf of the minor.

When your child reaches 18 you will no longer be able to perform transactions in the linked account. At that point you have to establish a primary Treasury Direct account for the child and transfer his or her bonds to the new account.