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Peek
Peek (@guest_2039561)
April 7, 2025 11:57

Starting to see my referral bonuses come in. Got $100 on Saturday (I assume that’s from my account open), $400 today (I assume referrals). I hope there’s more since I had a lot more than 4 people I referred but I’m not sure how many got approved.

LBP
LBP (@guest_2039612)
April 7, 2025 12:51

I also received 100.00 today for opening my account..but also had one referral should I look to receive a separate 100.00 deposit for that ???

RM
RM (@guest_2039961)
April 7, 2025 20:41

LBP The referral bonus will be applied separately, and it will say referral on the line item. However, if you only referred one person, there is only about a 10-20% chance that the bonus will come through unless you know for sure that that person used your referral, was approved, and satisfied all the requirements. https://www.doctorofcredit.com/harvard-federal-credit-union-100-referral-bonus-direct-deposit-not-required/#comment-2039372

RM
RM (@guest_2039967)
April 7, 2025 20:47

Peek I also received a few more referral bonuses today. Thank you, everyone!

So far I am at about 10% conversion rate [number of bonuses I received/number of people I referred]. I would be shocked if the conversion rate turned out to be more than 20%.

Peek
Peek (@guest_2039978)
April 7, 2025 21:07
  RM

I’m at about 20%. Really can’t expect much more, a lot of people probably got declined.

TomsRiver
TomsRiver (@guest_2039373)
April 7, 2025 00:18

How long after meeting the requirements did you receive the bonus?

SandraV
SandraV (@guest_2039272)
April 6, 2025 19:17

Has anyone referrers received their referral bonus? And did they receive more than one? Not sure if there was anything in the terms limiting the bonus to 1 but I only received a bonus (posted Apr 2). About 5 people emailed to request a referral from the thread.

So either the bonus is limited to 1, the bonus is still pending meeting the requirements or they didnt follow through ie complete their application.

Matt
Matt (@guest_2039334)
April 6, 2025 22:32

I’m still waiting to receive a referral bonus…will post if/when I receive it.

Matt
Matt (@guest_2040973)
April 9, 2025 02:32

Received one yesterday…has tagline “member referral” in HFCU email

RM
RM (@guest_2039372)
April 7, 2025 00:17

SandraV The terms stated that there was no limit to the number of referral bonuses you could get. https://harvardfcu.org/referral/?utm_campaign=2021+Referral+Campaign

However, just because you referred 5 people does not mean that you will get 5 bonuses. Assume that some of the people you referred also asked for referrals from others and did not end up using yours. Also assume that 50-75% of the people who used your referral did not get approved. And assume that some fraction of those who did get approved did not follow through and meet the terms, for one reason or another. So if you referred 5, you may only get one or two bonuses in the end.

I referred many people for this bonus because I was the one who originally posted about this deal. I’ve received only one referral bonus so far, and I would be surprised if I got more than a few more.

This doesn’t bother me overly much because I did the referrals primarily to help fellow DoC readers who wanted to apply with a referral from someone reliable — the bonus for me was just a nice cherry on top. But you have to be realistic about the conversion rate in these types of situations.

Eric 🔗
Eric 🔗 (@guest_2039442)
April 7, 2025 07:49
  RM

RM,

Your analysis is very spot on. Were you around when there was a mad rush to refer people to DCU?

What I liked about DCU was that they only allowed each email address to be referred once and then you received an error.

Despite that, I still received a very small % (maybe 10% or 20%) of bonuses of the many referrals that I sent out.

1 person even accused me of cheating by being so quick to send them out. Of course, if you know me, you would know that I would never do such a thing so I was quite offended!

RM
RM (@guest_2039446)
April 7, 2025 08:02

Eric 🔗 No, I didn’t do the DCU bonus.

Harvard was the very first time I referred anyone for anything on DoC, and I did it because I had been a member for many years and I assumed that there weren’t going to be many (or any) other Harvard FCU members on this blog to do it.

Eric 🔗
Eric 🔗 (@guest_2039593)
April 7, 2025 12:33
  RM

That turned out to be a bad assumption on your part. 😀

Eddy V
Eddy V (@guest_2041333)
April 9, 2025 14:57
  RM

You make a great point there. I had a few referrals too and have gotten 2 post about 5 days apart. So it’s either they are trickling in or you wont have a 100% conversion rate because folks were “referral shopping”. It’s also possible people who applied using your email didnt get approved or didnt finish the application for whatever reason (not sure how common that was)

Eric 🔗
Eric 🔗 (@guest_2041354)
April 9, 2025 15:15

From my memory, Harvard seemed to be quite Chex-sensitive so there’s a good chance that many that applied were denied for an account.

SandraV
SandraV (@guest_2041514)
April 9, 2025 20:10
  RM

Thanks for clarifying/confirming and reading the comments now it makes sense.

Matt
Matt (@guest_2038500)
April 5, 2025 06:46

Applied 2/22. Approved 3/7. $100 bonus posted 4/4.

Larrabeedrill
Larrabeedrill (@guest_2037160)
April 3, 2025 09:38

DP:PayPal loads with Debit card track a purchases for the Smart Rewards Cashback Checking. That’s a free $10 per month.

Requirements-

“Earn your rewards by meeting 3 basic qualifications each month: 12 Debit Card Purchases, 1 Online/Mobile Login, and get statements electronically, that’s it!”

NJ
NJ (@guest_2034232)
March 29, 2025 10:18

3/17 – applied for Share Savings, no referral, entered CC funding details. Residence nowhere near the east coast.
3/25 – online chat asking about status of application, uploaded requested Utility bill for address verification (DL images and selfie submitted during initial application).
3/26 – application was approved, Credit card funding of $2500 on US Bank Triple Cash went through as purchase.

Nate
Nate (@guest_2030945)
March 25, 2025 14:08

I applied with a referral long before the promotion ended, but they didn’t approve me until well after the promotion ended. I wonder If I’ll still get the bonus.

gosavorla
gosavorla (@guest_2020678)
March 11, 2025 12:29

I’ve did 3 debit charges on Amazon over a week ago and I still haven’t seen it posted… :/

Idahoan
Idahoan (@guest_2020702)
March 11, 2025 12:55

New Member Bonus and Member Referral Bonus will be paid when new member opens an account by February 28, 2025 and completes FIVE transactions on their new Harvard FCU debit or credit card within 90 days of account opening

RM
RM (@guest_2021870)
March 13, 2025 02:00

gosavorla Did you mean to say 5 debit charges? Bonus requires 5, not 3.

GoSavorLA
GoSavorLA (@guest_2021872)
March 13, 2025 02:07
  RM

I only tried 3 so far to make sure my charges will go through. But yeah, I might just go get some bananas at the local grocery store now since I’m not seeing any of the charges post yet

Keith
Keith (@guest_2025280)
March 18, 2025 10:06

After card activation, my debit card transactions never go through.
I called Harvard FCU and told the issue, they fixed it within a few minutes.
Now my transactions go through without a problem.

I guess the same issue is happening to you and you need to call Harvard FCU.

Peek
Peek (@guest_2025292)
March 18, 2025 10:22

I had to call as well, the card wasn’t linked to my account. They fixed it quickly. Keith

gosavorla
gosavorla (@guest_2025680)
March 18, 2025 16:44

I called this morning and they had to transfer me to membership services, which the phone said I was 7 in line. I pressed the button for call back and never got a call back. Now I’m on the online chat to get an answer. Not really the type of customer service and hold wait time I expect from a CU :/

Keith
Keith (@guest_2017127)
March 5, 2025 13:15

Applied on 2/21 after receiving a referral email, and the application was pended.
Today on 3/5, received a email from Harvard FCU to request uploading some additional documents (DL, utility, SSN, selfie, etc) for verification.

The referral email contains sentence “As a welcome gift we’re offering $100 when you join in the month of February!”
If I applied in February and am approved in March, am I eligible for the $100 bonus?

RM
RM (@guest_2017695)
March 6, 2025 03:24

Keith Nobody knows, but, at this point, what have you got to lose? They already pulled your Chex. MIght as well try. All you have to do is buy five bananas at self-checkout to satisfy the requirements.

Additionally, in my experience, this is a small CU and they generally treat members fairly. I’ve been a member for 20+ years, and the couple of times that I’ve had issues, I was able to talk to upper management and get things resolved in a way that I found satisfactory. In other words, if you don’t get the bonus automatically, I think you have a reasonable chance of having it applied manually by arguing that you did everything you could on time, and the rest was out of your control.

Keith
Keith (@guest_2020246)
March 10, 2025 16:09
  RM

I uploaded additional documents and was approved.
I could confirm via secure message that I am eligible for the $100 bonus since I submitted my application in February.

CH
CH (@guest_2016996)
March 5, 2025 10:51

Applied via referral on 2/24. Pending as of 3/5. Anyone got approved recently?