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There are a lot of banking promotions from US banks. For more information about recent banking promotions, you can visit the special “Banking News” section. I believe you can get a lot of useful information from Banking News section. If you have some information regarding banking promotions, please let me know. I think it will be very useful for those who want to open a new bank account soon.

First Bank is offering a free iPod Shuffle for opening a new personal checking account with minimum $50 initial deposit. There is no direct deposit or other banking activities required. You have to keep the new checking account active for more than 6 months otherwise First Bank will retract the reward.

Fine print:

Offer valid for personal checking accounts opened. Limit one gift award per customer, per calendar year. Limit one gift per account. FirstBank employees are not eligible to receive the award. Minimum opening deposit of $50 required to receive the gift. To be eligible for the award, you must open your new personal checking account on or before March 31, 2009. The $48.05 award is considered interest and is subject to IRS and other tax reporting. Upon account opening, FirstBank will mail a voucher letter for the iPod to the account holder. The voucher is only redeemable at any FirstBank location. The $48.05 award is considered a bonus that can be revoked if the account is closed within 6 months of opening.

To receive the reward, you have to open the checking account before March 31, 2009 and make a $50 initial deposit. If you choose the free checking account, there is no minimum balance, and no monthly service charges.

The only limitation of this promotion is the free iPod Shuffle is only available to residents in CO, AZ and CA. First Bank is FDIC insured.

The WaMu Visa Platinum Credit Card was very popular among credit card members due to its unique free FICO credit score check. Actually, the credit card was previously owned by Providian. Now, since WaMu was acquired by Chase, all financial products provided by WaMu will be merged to Chase system. In this way. the bad news is no more FREE FICO credit score will be displayed.

I believe all WaMu credit card members have received the email sent out by WaMu titled “Important information about your credit card online access”. There will be many new important changes in the near future about the WaMu credit cards. All online access to WaMu credit cards will be moved to Chase online on March 9, 2009, including credit card account management, online payments and email alerts.

The most important point in the email is “However, please note that your free FICO credit score will no longer be displayed, and only 3 months of transaction history will be available online.” If you wish to access your historical transaction information currently available online, you will need to save, download, or print it by March 1, 2009.

Online access to wamucards.com will be unavailable from March 4-8, 2009. The new website for WaMu credit card members is www.chase.com/wamucards.

But actually all the online credit card account features keep the same:

Your credit card account number will remain the same.
Just keep using your WaMu card until it expires; we’ll send you a new Chase card before the expiration date.

You can reach us at the same toll-free number.
Continue to call the phone number on the back of your card whenever you need help from a Service Representative.

You’ll pay your credit card the same way you always have.
Simply mail your payment to the mailing address on your statement. Or, beginning March 9, you can pay by phone, online or at any of our Chase or WaMu branches. We’ll send you a new payment address when your Chase card arrives.

From my points of view, there is no need to keep the WaMu credit card since the free FICO credit score feature will be no longer available.

Compass Bank is offering $150 bonus for opening a new checking account and savings account together. The $150 bonus seems not difficult to get. The first $75 bonus is from checking account with required online bill pay activities. Or you can sign up direct deposit with your new checking account. The second $75 bonus is from savings account with automatic transfer from your checking account with minimum $50 per month.

The promotion page can be found here. Following are some important points to get the $150 bonus.

• Open a new Compass checking account （Build-to-Order Free Checking account）and sign up for Online Bill Pay by 2/28/09
• Pay at least 5 bills online every 30 days for the first three months your account is open
• For each month that you do, you’ll get $25 — up to $75 total

Open a new Compass checking account from January 5, 2009 to 02/28/09 and pay at least 5 bills via CompassPC Online Bill Pay every 30 days for the first 90 days your account is open, and receive $25 for each qualifying period up to $75.　Online bill payments must be made to a third party and be at least $25.00 in order to be eligible.

The other way to make $75 bonus from Compass Bank is sign up for direct deposit with your employer’s payroll and you can get $75 bonus! It’s very easy! Minimum $100 opening deposit required. Account opened between 01/05/2009 and 02/28/2009 that establish a recurring payroll direct deposit within the month following the account open date will receive $75.

The second savings account seems also sweet!

• Open a new Compass checking account by February 28, 2009
• Set up automatic transfers of at least $50 a month from your new checking to a savings or money market account
• After the third transfer, we’ll credit your account an extra $75

To take advantage of the sign up bonus opportunity, you can visit Compass Bank local branches, call 1-800-COMPASS (1-800-266-7277) or you can apply online here.

There are many co-branded credit card products from Citi and other organizations or banks. I introduced the Associated Bank Platinum Credit Card which offers 0% APR on balance transfer for 12 months with no fees. This is a great credit card if you are in need of money and want to do balance transfer to cover your need. There is another Citi co-branded credit card—ADA World MasterCard which offers similar balance transfer offer to everyone.

The ADA world mastercard has two versions: travel rewards and platinum. The travel rewards has 10,000 bonus points which can be redeemed for a $100 gift card. Therefore I suggest you apply for the travel rewards version instead of the platinum card. Although this is a co-branded credit card, you don’t have to be an ADA member to be eligible to apply for this credit card.

The balance transfer fee is 3% with $5 minimum and $75 maximum. The $75 maximum is pretty good nowadays. For the 0% APR balance transfer fee, as long as first balance transfer is completed within 12 months from date of account opening, 0.00% for 12 months from date of first balance transfer. You can request a balance transfer check online after registering your credit card. Or you can wait for the mail package. There is no annual fee associated with this credit card.

Terms and conditions can be found here.

You can take $100 gift card bonus with 0% APR balance transfer offer with this Citi ADA world mastercard. I think this is a great opportunity!

ADA is the American Dental Association but as I mentioned at the first beginning of this post, you don’t have to be an ADA member to apply for this credit card.

HSBC Bank is having a great promotion for its Plus Checking Account. The promotion is very simple. Open a new Plus Checking Account with minimum required amount and you will receive a free gift from HSBC Bank. The gift is PowerCost Monitor which is an electricity meter monitor that helps you monitor your kWh power consumption.

Using the information provided by the PowerCost Monitor, you can start to manage your kWh usage to save money. According to the studies, you can save 10% of your power bill simply by monitoring and understanding use! So it’s possible that you can earn more bonus for using it. More information can be found at www.powercostmonitor.com.

The promotion page can be found at this. Here are some of the important points on how to get the bonus:

• Offer valid for opening a new Plus relationship and depositing a minimum of $8,000 in new money to any qualifying personal accounts between 1/12/09 and 2/28/09, and maintaining at least $8,000 in new money in total combined balances through 3/31/09.
• Existing HSBC checking customers can qualify by upgrading to Plus and meeting new money requirements. New money is defined as funds not previously held by any member of the HSBC Group over the past consecutive six months.
• Qualified customers will be notified via mail by 5/31/09; notification will include instructions for redeeming gift of choice. Gifts not redeemed by 9/30/09 will be forfeited.
• The cost of the gift will be reported on IRS Form 1099 ($150 value)

Plus relationship must remain open for 180 days or value of gift will be deducted from account proceeds at closing

Note 3 indicates that there is a $15 monthly fee for balance under $15,000. “To avoid a monthly $15 maintenance fee for a Plus account, you need to maintain $15,000 in total combined balances including personal deposit, investment and qualifying credit balances.”

It seems that all the balances in you accounts at HSBC Bank including savings account, checking account and credit card account can be counted to the $15,000 requirement.

There are many great credit card promotions out there that I haven’t reported for a while. This is a summary of current credit card promotions from American Express, Chase and Discover Card. If you want to use your good credit standing/current credit cards to earn some extra money/bonus, you can refer to your credit card issuers for more details.

Chase Amazon.com Rewards Visa Card is offering 10X bonus points for paying your bills with the Chase Amazon.com Rewards Visa Card. The title of the email I received is “Start 2009 with More Amazon Rewards – Earn 10x Points for Paying Bills”. If you use this card to pay your monthly bills and earn 10 points per eligible $1 spent between January 15 and March 31, 2009. Chase Credit card can do automatic payments for you. It’s easy to setup:

1. Contact the companies that bill you via phone or the company website (check your statement for contact information or visit www.chasebillmanager.com).

2. Arrange for your bills to be charged to your Amazon.com Rewards Visa Card.

3. Earn reward points for paying your monthly bills!

Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express is offering free 3 months trial of Clear for fast pass at airport security. The process is pretty easy. All SPG members can register at this website with SPG membership number to get a free three-month clear service. If you’re pleased you’ll be renewed automatically for a one-year membership at $199. More information about Clear can be found at www.flyclear.com.

25,000 bonus miles for applying for a new Miles by Discover Card. The invitation code is DBAW. You can apply for this credit card at apply.Discovercard.com or call 1-800-206-8854. This is a no-annual-fee credit card. Usually this credit card only offers 12,000 bonus miles. I personally think this is a great offer. The link to this invitation letter is here. You’d better keep a copy of the offer.

The Discover Motiva Card is also offering $100 bonus for opening a new account.

Apply for a new discover Motiva card and get $100 cash back bonus, NEW CARD MEMBERS Only – if you have any other Discover card then you do not qualify.

site: http://apply.discovercard.com
Call: 1-800-210-9022
INVITATION CODE: DBHR

Under Banking News section, I have updated a lot of posts recently talking about the banking promotions from US banks and credit union. Bonuses are available from PNC Bank, NuVision Federal Credit Union, TCF Bank, FlagStar Bank and HomeStreet Bank. If you want to open a new checking account soon, it a great time to catch one of the promotions. Of course, the $100/$125 checking account bonus from Chase is always available (You can find a coupon from USPS moving kit.).

The Signal Financial Federal Credit Union is offering $101 sign up bonus for opening a new checking account with direct deposit. The Signal Financial Federal Credit Union is a credit union insured by the NCUA. The branches are located in Washington DC, Virginia and Maryland.

According to the membership page (decides who can open an account), if you or a family member live, work, attend school, or worship in Washington DC or inside the Beltway in Prince George’s County or are employed by one of the companies listed on that page, you are eligible to be a member of the credit union.

The requirement seems to be very simple: open a new checking account with a Share Savings account with $5 minimum deposit and make direct deposit to this new checking account.

About the direct deposit, Signal Financial Federal Credit Union defines:

Direct deposit is defined as your entire net paycheck being electronically deposited into your Signal Financial account each payday. It must take affect on account before prize money is awarded. Prize money will be deposited into your share (savings) account and be held for 6 months. One incentive offer per member. Offer expires January 31, 2009. Other restrictions may apply.

This offer expires on January 31, 2009.

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This is my monthly updated list of credit card sign-up bonus. I missed some posts (November and December 2008) due to the severe financial situation. I posted some similar posts in the past several months. The purpose of this post is to keep you updated about the latest sign-up bonus opportunities from major US credit card issuers. I have a special page for credit card sign-up bonus where you can find a complete list of credit cards which will offer you a certain amount of sign-up bonus. I hope this list will be helpful for those App-O-Rama planners. I think it’s necessary to keep a tidy list of credit cards with some fulfillment requirements. The aim is to keep you updated with sign-up bonus offers. There are two main requirements for a specific credit card entering in this list: minimum $50 sign-up bonus and must be a mainstream brand like American Express, Discover, Citi, Chase, BOA, etc. Thus all the credit cards on this list are available to everyone.

All the credit cards are listed in order of value and I will try my best to keep this list updated in a monthly manner. Basically, I assume 100 points/miles=$1. Because you can always redeem your points or miles for certain gift cards. If you have more credit card deals, please let me know.