Update 1/14/24: Extended through April 1, 2024
Update 1/12/23: Extended through December 31, 2023.
Update 6/23/22: Deal has been extended until December 31, 2022.
Update 5/5/22: Deal has been extended until June 22, 2022.
Update 3/3/22: Deal has been extended until May 4, 2022
Update 12/16/21: Deal has been extended until March 2, 2022.
Update 10/14/21: Extended until December 15, 2021
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, 2019March 4th, 2020April 29th, 2020 August 3rd, 2020September 30th, 2020 December 4, 2020March 3rd, 2021June 23, 2021October 13, 2021
The 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:
- A Beginners Guide To Bank Account Bonuses
- Bank Account Quick Reference Table (Spreadsheet) (very useful for sorting bonuses by different parameters)
- PSA: Don’t Call The Bank
- Introduction To ChexSystems
- Banks & Credit Unions That Are ChexSystems Inquiry Sensitive
- What Banks & Credit Unions Do/Don’t Pull ChexSystems?
- How To Use Our Direct Deposit Page For Bank Bonuses Page
- Common Bank Bonus Misconceptions + Why You Should Give Them A Go
- How Many Bank Accounts Can I Safely Open Within A Year For Bank Bonus Purposes?
- Affiliate Links & Bank Bonuses – We Won’t Be Using Them
- Complete List Of Ways To Close Bank Accounts At Each Bank
- Banks That Allow/Don’t Allow Out Of State Checking Applications
- Bank Bonus Posting Times
Post history:
- Update 6/24/21: Extended until August 18, 2021
- Update 5/2/21: Extended until June 23, 2021.
- Update 3/4/21: Extended until April 28, 2021
- Update 10/7/20: Extended until December 4, 2020.
- 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.
FYI FirstBank allows CC funding of the savings account up to $500, but you have to call in after the accounts have been opened. Also, they only allow funding from a personal CC, not a business.
12/5 Opened account online, asked to go into branch. I have hella accounts on chex so had to fight for them to open it.
12/29 First legit DD $501
1/30 Second legit DD $501
2/29 Third legit DD $501
3/1 $300 bonus paid
Pretty simple and fast payout if you have the time to go into branch. This was CO.
+1 on YMMV…
92506 (zip code in Riverside, CA) does not work: “We are unable to open an account since you do not reside in our service areas within Colorado, Arizona, or Riverside County, California.”
In Orange Count and it stated that I wasn;t allowed to join. “We are unable to open an account since you do not reside in our service areas within Colorado, Arizona, or Riverside County, California.”
I am going to do 3 DD within the first 30 days and see if the bonus will trigger earlier than 90….will report back for the DP
Does not work based on my experience. I did quite a few (fake) DDs in the first 30 days; it wasn’t until I hit it with real DDs for 3+ consecutive months that I qualified. That being said, I did need to go in-branch to argue for the bonus (the real DD for July posted in June due to the weekend so technically I didn’t get a DD for July) so YMMV.
Denied due to Chex Systems as well. First they said it was my TU freeze. Then they told me it was ChexSystems.
Only have 4 inquiries for the entire year, of which only 2 of the accounts I actually opened (1 just for savings and the other I’m just a joint owner for a CU savings acct on a car loan that isn’t even mine), no churn at all this year or SUB.
Crazy strict and this is local to me too and I chose them because of the branches nearby. Thought of keeping it after the SUB. Guess they don’t want real customers.
Has anyone living in So Cal (but NOT Riverside County) successfully been approved w/o an in-branch visit?
Applied using an Indio address of a relative. Received instant notification that I am conditionally approved but have to go in-branch for ID verification within 14 days…I do have an open Saturday coming up and will determine if a little road trip from OC is worth it…
updated DP…did the drive. Account was opened. The banker was definitely looking at something and trying to confirm if there was someone attempting to open accounts in my name…just not sure it was Chex or the soft pulls. I confirmed one that I had done in the past week and then told him I have LifeLock and get notified of any activity and there wasn’t anything I was concerned about it being someone other than me.
Anyone have a dp if a recurring ACH from Fidelity works?
Denied due to Chex Systems. They said if there are 3 or more items on there then they will not approve a bank account.
Might be different depending on location/manager approval? I finished the application in-branch and def had way more than 3 inquiries. The system wasn’t happy about something and the manager had to approve it, so it might’ve been that. I’m in CO.
Any DPs on the strictness of the lifetime language in the fine print (“Past customers who ever received a gift from FirstBank are ineligible for this offer”)?
I would be very curious about this too. When I was in branch a few years ago closing my account, their IT systems looked like they were from 1980, so I am somewhat skeptical they have updated their IT to track this.