Offer has expired, you can view new offers here.
Offer at a glance
- Maximum bonus amount: $200 for checking & $100 for savings
- Availability:Â Northeastern PA only
- Direct deposit required: Yes or recurring credit, must total $400+
- Additional requirements: EZ Statements & 5 point of sale transactions
- Hard/soft pull:Â Soft
- ChexSystems:Â Yes
- Credit card funding: Up to $500, all credit card payment networks are accepted (e.g Visa, Mastercard, American Express & Discover)
- Monthly fees: $2-$7, waivable
- Early account termination fee:Â 180 days, unknown fee
- Expiration date: None listed
Contents
The Offer
- Fidelity Bank is offering $200 for opening a checking account and $100 for opening a savings account. Here are the two deals:
- Open a new checking account, complete the following requirements (within 60 days of account opening) and receive a bonus of $200:
- Enroll in EZ Statements
- Activate Fidelity VISA Check Card and complete 5 point of sale transactions
- Receive direct deposits or recurring credits totaling $400+
- Open a new savings account within 30 days of opening checking account and receive a bonus of $100 when you:
- Deposit $10,000 or more of funds not currently held with Fidelity Bank, according to this comment this needs to be done at account opening.
- Maintain a balance of at least $10,000 for sixty days after account opening
- Open a new checking account, complete the following requirements (within 60 days of account opening) and receive a bonus of $200:
The Fine Print
- Offer valid for customers who currently do not have an existing personal checking account at Fidelity Bank.
- A $200.00 deposit will be earned when the following requirements are completed: Direct deposit(s) or recurring credit(s) totaling $400.00 are received, enrollment in EZ Statements is completed and a Fidelity VISA® Check Card is activated and five (5) point-of-sale transactions are processed.
- All requirements must be satisfied within sixty (60) days of account opening;
- Deposit will be made on the sixty-first (61st) business day from account opening.
- Minimum deposit to open a checking account may range between $25.00 and $100.00, minimum balance requirements and monthly service charges depend on which checking account is chosen.
- Offer is valid beginning May 31st, 2016 and may be rescinded or changed at any time.
- **Offer valid within thirty (30) days of opening of a new personal checking account at Fidelity Bank.
- A $100.00 Deposit will be earned if a new personal savings account is opened with at least $10,000.00 of money not currently held on deposit with Fidelity Bank.
- A daily balance of at least $10,000.00 must be maintained for sixty (60) days from account opening.
- Deposit will be made into your personal checking account on the sixty first (61st) business day from savings account opening.
- For certain Fidelity Bank savings accounts, the annual percentage yield (APY) is 0.05% for balances over $100. APY is current as of May 31st, 2016. Minimum balance requirements and monthly service charges depend on which savings account is chosen.
- Customers may only receive one (1) new checking account and savings account opening-related bonus per calendar year.
- All bank account bonuses are treated as income/interest and as such you have to pay taxes on them
Avoiding Fees
Reliance Checking $7 Monthly Fee
This account is the easiest to keep fee free, the $7 monthly charged is waived if you do any of the following:
- $1500 average daily balance OR
- $400 aggregated monthly direct deposit
- or ten (10) signature based Fidelity Visa® Check Card transactions
Statement Savings $2 Monthly Fee
This is waived if you have a balance over $100
Early Account Termination Fee
There is a fee if closed within 180 days, but I’m unsure what this fee is.
Our Verdict
They have offered the same $300 bonus in the past as well. This looks like a pretty good deal, it’s a soft pull and it doesn’t actually look like they require a traditional direct deposit (e.g any recurring credit will count). I’m interested to see what the maximum you can fund with a credit card is. We’ve added this to our list of the best bank account bonuses. They also have a $200 business checking account bonus as well.
Big thanks to reader, Andrew who let us know. Please consider sharing bank bonuses with this site so we can make it even better.
Useful posts regarding bank bonuses:
- A Beginners Guide To Bank Account Bonuses
- 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
I went for this bonus last year, and there’s a few things you should know. https://www.doctorofcredit.com/pa-only-fidelity-bank-offering-200-checking-100-savings-bonus-2/
When they say that you need to open a savings account and fund it with 10k dollars within 30 days of opening the checking account, they really mean that you need to do those two things at the same time. Your opening deposit must be the amount listed(although you can wait 30 days to open the savings account). When I opened the account, the banker didn’t know this(especially since the offer fine print was vague on this point). I opened the checking and savings the same day, and he said I could hit the 10k balance requirement within 30 days. Well, I did that. No bonus. After nearly a year of calling the banker every couple months to ask about it, he finally got he paperwork through to give me the savings bonus anyway(since he had told me I had 30 days). So, save yourself a year and ~20 phone calls and deposit the required amount when you open the savings.
You don’t need to live in PA to get this bonus. I live in NY, and not near the PA border, and I happened to be driving through northeastern PA on the way to somewhere else. I stopped by a branch, and the banker didn’t give me any trouble about opening the account despite living hours away from the nearest branch(and in a different state). That offer didn’t allow for opening online, so no idea if that changes things here.
Another thing to note; their website is terrible. They’re a small regional bank system, and their website is about what you’d expect. There’s no way to transfer money to external accounts, or even setup bill pays online. Clearly the website is meant to be something you use between visiting an actual branch, not a replacement.
Of course, things may have changed since the last time they offered this bonus, so YMMV.
Thanks, Dave. Updated post.
I’m in New York, still applied for the checking account online and account approved instantly. However, I do not know whether they will be cancelling my account later due to too many inquires in Chex like what Popular Bank done to me.
At least some data points here:
Credit Card Funding: Yes, all four major type of CC. Min. $25, Max. $500 (It doesn’t matter how many accounts you open but the max. should add up to max of $500)
Funded with Citi Double Cash, $500, coded as purchase, BUSINESS SERVICES,NOT ELSEWHERE CLASSED
I am not supposed to be eligible but using one of their branch’s zip code and easily pass their area limitation (Northeast of PA). And when filling out the application, they don’t limit the state to PA , so open to select from other states. Their branches zip codes can be found here:
https://bankatfidelity.com/about/locations/
In the application form there is a place where you can enter the promotion code, I don’t know what it is. It’s not required to continue the application but I entered 300 and didn’t get a invalid message and let me proceed. However, this does not mean the promotion code “300” is working. I don’t think it’s necessary to get the promotion either.
You can select to add their saving account but I did not test whether adding multiple saving accounts is possible, because I am not doing the saving account bonus anyway. But whether or not adding any saving account, the total funding amount should not exceed $500.
I got my checking account full number and bank’s routing number after approval.
You don’t have to wait for the debit card to create online banking login. You can create online account with full account number and banking PIN. The banking PIN by default is your last four digit of SSN, was told by their CS @ 800-388-4380. It can be changed by calling 888-343-3525, after entering the full digit of account number and select the account type (1 for checking), system will read the account balance which is 0. (so the initial funding is not even showing pending status in their system but my Citibank credit card showing pending already). Follow instruction to change PIN.
The initial setup of the online account still pulls from Chex to generate 3 security questions for identification purpose. It even asked me the total buying price of my house that I am having mortgage with. After login, I see balance 0, cannot see pending $500, so that’s why I said I don’t know whether my account will be closed later as this happened to me when I opened up Popular Bank account but not seeing the pending initial funding.
I’ll use discover and/or alliant to test for DD later.
My recent experiences with out of area enrollment have been very discouraging. In the case of Webster Bank and Central Bank, applications opened the accounts fine and they even deposited the initial funding, but within 24-48 hours, both accounts were closed with no notice.
Webster Bank even sent the Visa debit card but the online banking I configured was suddenly locked. When I called, I learned the higher-ups closed the account because I did not reside within 50 miles of the nearest Webster Bank branch. Central Bank closed the account on the next business day and returned the funds with a letter indicating the account was closed because I did not live in their service area. In that case, it was my own fault for trying to apply.
My assumption with regional bank promotions published online showing state restrictions implied anyone in those states could apply for an account, but in the case of Webster Bank (I’m in New York) it is much more than that. You also have to live near a branch.
What I am doing now is (without referencing any promotion) calling up these banks as a prospective customer and asking about their account holder residency rules. I don’t feel like wasting any more ChexSystems inquiries on DOA accounts because at some point, many banks get antsy when they see a lot of inquiries over a period like a year. So it may not be an issue with ChexSystems at all. It could be as simple as residing too far away.
We need more data points on this.
I would be cautious about calling as that will kill the deal for sure.
CSR’s are often clueless and will either cite the fineprint, or provide misinformation.
Often they don’t know, and ask higher ups, who will then make sure that nobody will slip through.
You missed what I said. I would be cold calling as a new customer, not mentioning any promotion whatsoever. The majority of new banking customers do not sign up with a promotion. I am well aware not to draw attention to it, but if there is a clearly understood policy of account closures for out of area customers, it would save a lot of ChexSystems inquiries if we knew sooner than later. Hopefully Jason will keep us updated.
Account closed but this is what I expected at the beginning. You are right it wasn’t even because of inquires on Chex. CSR(customer service representative, not the CSR recently released by Chase) did advise the reason that it was because I’ve lived in New York, not their serving area therefore account is closed. The initial funding will be returned to the original funding sources. That being said, my credit card.
Some review:
1) Even account is closed, I can still login to online banking (at least for now)but the account info is unlinked. Most functions have been disabled except the security message still allows me to use. I can still change password for login and reset security questions.
2) Their security message is like an internal bank email, they assign unique email address to customer by using your full SSN @link.securebanksolutions.com . So if one’s SSN is 123-45-6789, the email will be [email protected]
That being said, your full SSN is exposed to all of their CSR. This is totally different than the Chase online security message.
3) Their CSR is nice.
4) Of course they check address used on application to determine eligibility.
5) Not much review on their apps but you should know which right Fidelity is before downloading.
You nailed it with this comment. My account was opened 8/29, funded, and then closed today. CSR specifically stated that the account was closed because my primary address was out of state. Funny thing is that I have a local PA address, just not as local as they needed it.
You win some, you lose some.
Thanks for the detailed update!
Thanks for all the information, very useful! I’ve updated the post.