First Direct £100 re new current account question

Nine_Lives

Yorkie1 wrote: »

I'm not sure you're right; I'm going through the process now and have the application forms ready to complete later today.

Open the 1st account online. Once open you can open the regular saver and put up to £300 per month into it.

The £1500 relates to the 1st account and not the regular saver. It can be either a total credit of that amount into the 1st account every month, or an average balance of £1500 in that account for the month I think. So you can't just drip £1500 into the account over the year.

However, you can avoid the £1500 issue by opening an esaver or ordinary saver account at the same time as opening the 1st account (or later, I suppose), and keeping the minimum balance of £1 in it.

Which would tie in exactly with what I said & what happened to me & go against what some others have said/suggested.

We can't all be right, surely.

Also as I took a reg saver with them for 12month & then signed up again for another 12month reg saver, I'm guessing I can't leave with a complaint & bag another £100?ol

Svenena

Yorkie1 has stated things correctly.

To answer OP's question, I pay my £1500 by faster payment from a current account I hold with another bank, and don't have my wages paid directly to FD (because my net salary is less than £1500). I waited about a month to get my £100 when I opened my account 8 months ago, I seem to recall.

If you don't want to pay the £1500 in every month, you can either leave an average of £1500 in there throughout each month, or hold a savings account with £1 in (I don't think the regular saver counts for this, but you can have an e-savings account with just £1 in).

The 8% regular saver can only be opened once you have the current account, and you can only pay a maximum of £300 in the first month. If you don't manage to pay in the £300 every month, you can make it up in future months, but no more. Eg if you put £100 in the first month, next month the max you can put in is £500, to bring your total to £600, third month the balance can be no more than £900 in total, etc.

I think the person earlier saying you'd be better off with the regular saver was comparing it with the leaving "bonus", as you'd end up with £156 gross rather than £100. But this would obviously be dependent on being able to save £300 every month, which some people probably can't.

Subzero2003

ed123 wrote: »

....I've just rang First Direct and they say the £1500 has to come from a salary/pension via a bacs payment and could not come from another savings/current account....ed

This is worrying, can anyone else shed any light on whether this is true or not?

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

I switched in November 2011 and had to have my salary paid into FD directly from the company I wrk for.

Subzero2003

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS wrote: »

I switched in November 2011 and had to have my salary paid into FD directly from the company I wrk for.

The annoying thing is that some months i might be just short of this amount, other months i might be well over it

I was planning on topping up the "short months" with some money from another account to get the £1500. Are they really that fussy about where the money comes from as long as i pay it in? Some people are paid by cheque by their employers - how would they be able to use the account?

It doesn't stipulate anywhere on their website that the money must come from an employer.

Tilly_MFW_in_6_YRS

I would give them a quick call and check. They are really efficient.

Nine_Lives

I would imagine over the phone they may tell you that it would HAVE to be your salary - as this reduces the amount of people who can "play the game".

If that's the case then it's done a total U turn since i applied in Nov 2010. I think (note: THINK) it did say a salary, but the wizards of MSE said from any source will do, so i credited for 3 months from my Halifax account & i got the £100.

Subzero2003

I think i'll just risk it for a biscuit. I'll update this thread with what happens.

r1chscott

9th December - Joined First Direct, transferred £300 and set up new regular saver account.
23rd December - Paid in £1,900 by Faster Payment, transferred £1,600 out less than 5 minutes later.
11th January - Reread T&Cs (!) and saw it mentioned needing 2 SOs or DDs to be eligible for incentive.
11th January - Set up second SO (the first being regular saver)
13th January - 9 a.m. - SO left my account.
13th January - 11 a.m. - £100 incentive paid in.

Summing up, for me it didn't matter that the money was put in to my account via Faster Payment it just required 2 standing orders to be active on the account.

Cheers, Rich.

samwsmith1

r1chscott wrote: »

9th December - Joined First Direct, transferred £300 and set up new regular saver account.
23rd December - Paid in £1,900 by Faster Payment, transferred £1,600 out less than 5 minutes later.
11th January - Reread T&Cs (!) and saw it mentioned needing 2 SOs or DDs to be eligible for incentive.
11th January - Set up second SO (the first being regular saver)
13th January - 9 a.m. - SO left my account.
13th January - 11 a.m. - £100 incentive paid in.

Summing up, for me it didn't matter that the money was put in to my account via Faster Payment it just required 2 standing orders to be active on the account.

Cheers, Rich.

For the First Direct Offer when I did it you never needed to transfer any SOs or DDs unless this has changed recently.