£125 First Direct Account Opening Bonus

[Deleted User]

Just found this offer on moneysupermarket.com if anybody is interested - £125 switching bonus to First Direct (with conditions - see below).

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/current-accounts/details/first-direct/first-direct-1st-account/0/?pageurl=/current-accounts/&area=expert-review&class=listing-table&position=1

Conditions are that:

You must credit this account with £1,500 per month to prevent £10 monthly account fee.
Joint accounts are available.
The £125 incentive offer is only available to new switching customers

jen245

That's First Direct, not Halifax. Good offer though

[Deleted User]

jen245 wrote: »

That's First Direct, not Halifax. Good offer though

Thanks Jen - have amended the title

mike216

A word of warning on the First Direct £125 (or indeed the 'normal' £100) reward deal: CHECK AND CHASE

I opened my account in August 2011, in Sept 2011 I called FD to check was informed that I needed to pay in £1,500 for 3 consecutive months to activate the £125 bonus, which would be paid 28 days after the third month's qualifying deposit(s) hit the account (i.e. end-November payday)

Fast-forward to Jan 2012, no sign of the money, on calling FD was told there was no sign of it as a pending credit, and that the offer was £100 not £125 (that particular advisor said they'd never heard of MoneySavingExpert and just assumed I meant MoneySupermarket). They said they'd look into it.

Impatiently, I called back a few days later to check; they'd confirmed I'd not been paid the money but that it would be £100, I reiterated my assertion that I was entitled to £125, they looked into it further and phoned me back later that day saying yes, the £125 would be paid on 31 Jan.

Finally a solution, and the one I'd originally envisaged would have happened automatically, but with a fair amount of faff to get there. A shame, because in all other encounters with FD thus far their service has indeed been very good.

Gromitt

First Direct have a good memory though, so even if you had an FD account 10 years ago, if you apply now, you will still not get the incentive. You must truly be a new customer.

[Deleted User]

Thanks Mike, your experience has put me off slightly (one of the reasons I've been thinking about First Direct is because of their reportedly excellent customer service)! Maybe I'll try the Halifax offer instead ...

jen245

Not that I would recommend doing any real banking with them, but if you are interested, Santander are offering £75 cashback through Quidco, plus £100 incentive to "switch" to them, was considering doing a dummy switch to them to bag the cash, but I actually want to take up the First Direct offer first, as I want their regular saver, so might have to wait for a bit.

peanuts92

I think i might go ahead with this switch to bag the £125, with an additional £100 after 6 months if you are unsatisfied but i think you need to make a complaint to get that.....
Also, would they ask questions about my income (as i'm a student) but i do have a part time job paying into a different account which i don't want switched. But clearly i don't earn £1500 a month. I can easily overcome this with transfering the £1500 from another one of my accounts but do they want it as proper income from an employer? Can they refuse me on this basis?
In addition, i am aware that first direct is pretty much all online based but i heard that you can do certain stuff at HSBC like deposit cash for your first direct account, what else can you do? Its just that i'm a little nervous and a bit skeptical about banking with them as for example if i have a problem i'd like to have somewhere i could go and someone i could talk to face to face for that sense of security if you understand what i mean...Because they're practically online based its a bit unusual for me and thats what worries me a little...

Thanks

mike216

peanuts92 wrote: »

I think i might go ahead with this switch to bag the £125, with an additional £100 after 6 months if you are unsatisfied but i think you need to make a complaint to get that.....
Also, would they ask questions about my income (as i'm a student) but i do have a part time job paying into a different account which i don't want switched. But clearly i don't earn £1500 a month. I can easily overcome this with transfering the £1500 from another one of my accounts but do they want it as proper income from an employer? Can they refuse me on this basis?
In addition, i am aware that first direct is pretty much all online based but i heard that you can do certain stuff at HSBC like deposit cash for your first direct account, what else can you do? Its just that i'm a little nervous and a bit skeptical about banking with them as for example if i have a problem i'd like to have somewhere i could go and someone i could talk to face to face for that sense of security if you understand what i mean...Because they're practically online based its a bit unusual for me and thats what worries me a little...

Thanks

With First Direct, you can indeed pay in cheques at HSBC branches. You can also send the cheques to FD (they'll provide you with pre-paid envelopes too) but of course unless you send it recorded delivery you wear the risk of the cheque going awol. I've not yet done this. (I'd photocopy/scan the cheque before sending it anywhere).

Other than the occasional cheque I have no need to use any branch facilities with banks so can't advise what else you can do in-branch at HSBC.

I must stress that, in my experience thus far with the exception of the £125 bonus, their customer service has been excellent - you get straight through to a human when you call them (no phone menu, no hold music, no waiting) and they have been friendly and helpful; they can usually answer all sorts of queries without having to transfer you to another dept.

Can't remember what they asked about income, I didn't have to provide any proof but it would probably be considered fraudulent if you have to state your income and lie about it so best avoided. Also they will charge you (£10 or £12 a month) if you don't pay in £1500 each month, unless you hold another qualifying product (check the website for the details of what qualifies - the esaver/regular saver accounts count, as would a mortgage, IIRC)

Unless it's changed, the £125 offer requires 3 payments of £1500 in consecutive months shortly after the account is opened, and you must switch DDs and S/Os, in order to qualify for the bonus cash. I don't think they're fussy where the £1500 comes from (obviously as long as it's not proceeds of crime/laundered cash! )

UnderControl_2

I opened my account with First Direct at the end of March last year, and my joining bonus was credited on 22nd April, without any chasing required. When I joined it was £100 and you had to credit £1500 once.

I have found them to be excellent, absolutely first class and I couldn't recommend them highly enough.

Nine_Lives

I'm interested to see how this works.

I saw your link & it does indeed say £125.
Yet when i go on the FD website itself, it states £100.

So how does that work then & which one is accurate?