[CA, AZ & CO] $300 FirstBank Checking Bonus

Update 10/7/20: Extended until December 4, 2020.

Offer at a glance

Maximum bonus amount: $300
Availability: Only available for those in Colorado, Arizona, or Riverside County, California (possibly only Palm Desert). This is a bit YMMV, so just hope for the best.
Direct deposit required: Yes, $500+ per month for three months $500+
Additional requirements: Enroll in internet banking
Hard/soft pull: Soft according to a reader via e-mail. Report of a hard pull here. and another report of hard pull. Another hard
ChexSystems: Unknown
Credit card funding:
Monthly fees:
Early account termination fee: 12 months, bonus forfeit
Household limit: One
Expiration date: ~~June 24th, 2018 August 17th, 2018 October 12th, 2018 December 7th, 2018 March 6, 2019 April 30th, 2019 June 26th, 2019 August 20th, 2019 October 15th, 2019 December 6th, 2019~~ ~~March 4th, 2020~~ ~~April 29th, 2020 August 3rd, 2020~~ ~~September 30th, 2020~~ December 4, 2020

Contents

1 The Offer
2 The Fine Print
3 Avoiding Fees
- 3.1 Early Account Termination Fee
4 Our Verdict

The Offer

Direct link to offer

FirstBank is offering a bonus of $300 when you open a new Anywhere account and complete the following requirements:
- Have at least one qualifying direct deposit of $500 or more for 3 consecutive months.

The Fine Print

Cash offer is not available to existing FirstBank consumer checking customers or those whose accounts have been closed within 90 days or closed with a negative balance.
Past customers who ever received a gift from FirstBank are ineligible for this offer.
Offer valid for new personal checking accounts opened between April 28, 2018 to June 24, 2018.
The account must be opened online at efirstbank.com/offers or bring in this advertisement to any FirstBank location to receive the $300 offer.
Limit one gift per household, per lifetime.
Limit one gift per account.
The cash offer will be given if the account opened is in good standing, and the customer enrolls for online banking, and one direct deposit greater than $500 posts to the new checking account.
Direct deposit must be new to FirstBank and must be payroll, pension, Social Security or other recurring government benefits.
Direct deposit cannot be multiple direct deposits combined that exceed $500.
Requirements must be met within 60 days of account opening and the cash offer will be deposited into the new checking account within 90 days of account opening.
We reserve the right to substitute gifts offered at any time with an item of similar value. Limited time offer.
The $300 cash offer is considered interest and is subject to IRS and other tax reporting.
The cash offer is considered a bonus that can be revoked if the account is closed within six months of opening.
FirstBank employees are not eligible to receive the offer.
Online Banking plus direct deposit or Visa Debit Card purchases required.
The Visa Debit Card is free for the first year after which an annual fee (currently $10 per card) applies
All bank account bonuses are treated as income/interest and as such you have to pay taxes on them

Avoiding Fees

The visa debit card has a $10 annual fee, but that is waived the first year. The account has no monthly fees to worry about.

Early Account Termination Fee

If the account is closed within 12 months the bonus can be revoked

Our Verdict

Deal isn’t as good as it previously was as you now need a direct deposit. Because of the reports of it being a hard pull, I don’t think it is worth doing but that depends on how much hard pulls matter to you. Because of that we will not be adding this to our list of the best checking accounts.

Useful posts regarding bank bonuses:

Post history:

Update 8/3/20: Extended until September 30th, 2020.
Update 6/25/20: Extended until August 3rd, 2020
Extended until June 24th, 2020.
Extended until April 29th, 2020.

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Mik C

*Certain parts of Riverside County* my account was closed the next day because I was outside the “Trade Area”

Robert

Just to confirm the DDs are only required for the first 3 months. After that you just need to keep the account open for 12 to keep the bonus from being revoked, correct?

Dick

from the website:

Cash offer is not available to existing FirstBank consumer checking customers or those whose accounts have been closed within 90 days or closed with a negative balance. Past customers who ever received a gift from FirstBank are ineligible for this offer. Offer valid for new personal checking accounts opened between August 3, 2020 to September 30, 2020. The account must be opened online at efirstbank.com/offers or bring in this advertisement to any FirstBank location to receive the $300 offer. Limit one gift per household, per lifetime. Limit one gift per account. Customer must have at least one direct deposit ($500 minimum) per month for three consecutive months following the open date of the account. The first required deposit ($500 minimum) must be made within 60 days of the open date. Direct deposit must be new to FirstBank and must be payroll, pension, Social Security or other recurring government benefits. The monthly direct deposit cannot be multiple direct deposits combined that exceed $500. The cash offer will be given if the account opened is in good standing (i.e. is not overdrawn or at a zero balance), and the customer enrolls for online banking on or before the posting date of the required ($500 minimum) direct deposit in the third consecutive month. All requirements must be met within 120 days of account opening and the cash offer will be deposited into the new checking account within 30 days of the final qualifying requirement. We reserve the right to substitute gifts offered at any time with an item of similar value. Limited time offer. The $300 cash offer is considered interest and is subject to IRS and other tax reporting. The cash offer is considered a bonus that can be revoked if the account is closed within twelve months of the opening date. FirstBank employees are not eligible to receive the offer. Online Banking plus direct deposit required. Other conditions and restrictions apply. See branch for details.

-looks like you now need the direct deposit to qualify…

Karen Lipa

Required to go in branch to provide identification prior to account opening (Denver, CO)

Kona

Renewed from Aug 3 to Sept 30th
https://www.efirstbank.com/_jensen/pages/suns1910/suns.htm

William Charles

for what it’s worth, extended again till “December 4, 2020”
https://www.efirstbank.com/_advertisements/offers/
William Charles

Jordan

Yeah it’s definitely not all of riverside county CA. I live in Riverside county and it said my zip code was ineligible.

I got auto-approved last night, but apparently they manually reviewed it and are not opening it because of something on ChexSystems. I imagine due to too many accounts.

I got the same thing in less than 24 hrs. They sent an email stating it was Chex related as well.

Confirmed with the bank via FB that any new customer that has no relationship with the bank that opens a new account will result in a hard pull.

They sent another message stating they gave wrong info and a new consumer that opens a new checking account would only result in a soft pull.

Tired of all the back and forth I went to the local branch and asked and they confirmed it was soft and I went ahead an opened the account. I have credit monitoring and no hard pull.

Lemm

DP: This should be updated. ToC on their website now states they can claw back the bonus if you close within 12 months.