topic Re: Discover Checking Bonus? in Personal Finance

Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 19:53:18 GMT

Seems like the $50 bonus for opening a Discover checking account is still available and it's redeemable as a cash back bonus on a Discover card. Would this bonus be doubled by the current 2X promo going on for DiscoverIt cards? Free $100 seems juicy, but I'll take $50 + 10c back on small transactions too if that's not the case.

Also, would opening it cost a HP? Currently bank primarily with Chase and have a couple hundred bucks parked on my school's CU checking account, and wondering if it'll be worth it to deal with another checking account. Thanks in advance for any input!

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

kdm31091 — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:00:44 GMT

Theres no HP for it, but I would doubt it about the bonus being doubled. Its not really the same as a reward earned with spend and im sure Discover is smart enough to know the difference and not double it.

It seems like a good checking account otherwise. Problem is I almost never pay with debit. If I was in a situation where a place only took debit, lets be honest they probably would also be restrictive enough to not take discover. So for me, wouldn't get meaningful use and the 10c would add up very slowly.

If you dont use debit much, it may not be worth opening a new checking account for the small reward.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:02:25 GMT

I can't image the double would apply. It would be only $50. I have a checking account through them. It's OK. The bonus takes a while and it is taxable. So factor that in as well.

Cash back, Nice black debit card, Free checks. It's a nice account. If I ACH from my regular checking it takes a long ass time so become available. Like a full 3 biz days for the transfer and then it sits pending and unavailable for a few more days. Good ATM network near me. My regular bank and all of their ATM's are in the network. I don't use it much for ATM but have a few times. Cash back transfers into Discover CC cash back account which is kinda nice. The website has been buggy a few times and the customer service when I've called has been bad.

I don't have a ton of confidence in the account and the non local checking with daily withdraw limits so I don't use the account a ton or direct deposit anything into it but it's a nice backup and I did get the $50 bonus from it. When I'm really on my game I keep some money in there and use the debit for tiny food/convenience purchases to maximize cash.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Bman70 — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:11:07 GMT

The CSRs were saying that all cash back is doubled. They specifically included sign-up bonuses in this (as I and others have logged). I think the computer just looks for cash credits and then doubles it.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

longtime_lurker — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:22:31 GMT

@Bman70 wrote:

The CSRs were saying that all cash back is doubled. They specifically included sign-up bonuses in this (as I and others have logged). I think the computer just looks for cash credits and then doubles it.

I'll let you know, I got an offer for $25 after my first DD is deposited. If it credits as $50, we'll know.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:32:29 GMT

Missed the fine print: "Bonus will be issued by 7/31/15 as a credit to your checking account." Looks like it won't be doubled as it'll be a credit on the checking account rather than a transferable cash back bonus to the It card.

I think the 10c/transaction may be doubled since it can be redeemed as a "cash back reward to the Cashback Bonus®account of your Discover card," making it effectilvely 20c/transaction (unless anyone disagrees with this logic). Solid for small transactions.

*All quotes are from the Discover checking site.

@longtime_lurker wrote:
@Bman70 wrote:

The CSRs were saying that all cash back is doubled. They specifically included sign-up bonuses in this (as I and others have logged). I think the computer just looks for cash credits and then doubles it.
I'll let you know, I got an offer for $25 after my first DD is deposited. If it credits as $50, we'll know.

I think cash back will be doubled at the end of the the 12 statements, so you won't find out anytime soon

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

kdm31091 — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:35:14 GMT

Id never want a strictly online checking as my only account, so id have to keep two open anyway, which IMO is just a hassle for little gain. Im not gonna buy 20 sodas in seperate transactions to make tiny amounts of rewards lol.

Too much hassle for a 50 dollar bonus. Ive heard a lot of people say ACH is slow with it, too. Bottom line is if you were relying on it as your only checking account I think thatd be bad. As a second account it seems ok, but you have to decide for yourself if its worth the hassle. Even 50 transactions gets you 5 bucks which is better than nothing, yes, but nobody in the "credit card world" like us makes 50 debit charges a month unless they do the tiny purchase thing which is an awful lot of hassle for 5 bucks in this example. To each their own

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:51:56 GMT

@kdm31091 wrote:
Id never want a strictly online checking as my only account, so id have to keep two open anyway, which IMO is just a hassle for little gain. Im not gonna buy 20 sodas in seperate transactions to make tiny amounts of rewards lol.

Too much hassle for a 50 dollar bonus. Ive heard a lot of people say ACH is slow with it, too. Bottom line is if you were relying on it as your only checking account I think thatd be bad. As a second account it seems ok, but you have to decide for yourself if its worth the hassle. Even 50 transactions gets you 5 bucks which is better than nothing, yes, but nobody in the "credit card world" like us makes 50 debit charges a month unless they do the tiny purchase thing which is an awful lot of hassle for 5 bucks in this example. To each their own

Yeah, I do 99% of my banking through Chase. It would be my third checking account and I wouldn't mind parking a few hundred dollars on it and using it to pay for things that costs a few dollars. Still in college, so I make a fair number of small purchases. I swipe whenever I can, so that if it's actually 20c/transaction, it beats any card I currently hold for those purchases.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

kdm31091 — Sun, 28 Jun 2015 20:57:56 GMT

The plus about it is that at least you can merge the rewards with your discover credit account.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

CreditDunce — Mon, 29 Jun 2015 01:12:39 GMT

I am fairly sure the Discover banking (savings/checking) computers are different than the credit card computers. I am required to have two logins because the two don't currently talk with one another. I don't think there is any chance the credit card double cash promo counting the checking account cash back.

But, the checking account has its own double rewards promo going this quarter. Each debit, check or online bill earns $0.20 instead of the normal $0.10, max of 100 total transactions per month.

It is a great way to use SD credit cards. Use the SD card for a small transaction. Then use the online bill pay to pay the SD credit card off. Even if ths SD card doesn't earn any rewards, you are still earning 4% rewards on a $5 charge. It helped me reach the 100 online bill payments this month. An easy extra $20. Or $60 if you managed to max out the online bill pay all three months.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

kdm31091 — Tue, 30 Jun 2015 11:09:22 GMT

Interestingly, I was just looking at Discover's cashback checking page and I don't know if this is new or not, but it says earn 10c on up to 100 transactions a month. So the most you can get is $10 a month. Which is better than nothing for a debit account, but I don't remember a limit being mentioned before. I'm assuming people gaming it with lots of tiny gum pack purchases probably caused them to impose this limit.

Nevertheless, it's still $10 more than my TD would give me; however, I make nowhere near 100 debit transactions a month.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Tue, 30 Jun 2015 22:25:14 GMT

kdm31091 - the cap you mentioned has been on my account since day one (11/2014). Maybe others have not had it?

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

CreditDunce — Sun, 05 Jul 2015 05:15:18 GMT

In my earlier post I said the Discover Double Cash bonus for checking accounts applied to Debit, Checks and Bill Pay. I was not correct. I was looking at my July statement and I did not receive the June promo cash back for Checks or Bill Pay. The promo cash back is one month after your normal cash back. Reading the terms again, I am fairly sure it only applies to debit transactions.

Still a good promo. But much more limited than I thought.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

KDKobes — Tue, 14 Jul 2015 13:16:10 GMT

Yep, just got done posting that elsewhere, and I thought I would add it here. Just talked to a rep the other day with that question and the DOUBLE cashback is strictly DEBIT CARD NOT bill pay or checks. Using bill pay and checks in the "double rewards" time period eats into the 100 transactions a month as well lowering your ability to get 100 debit transactions if that makes sense. Either way I still love my account.

To comment on the ACH taking forever....I agree. I actuallly have an American Express savings as well as my Discover and I can tell you this. Discover is exactly 3 days, BUT what you don't hear is thats "business days" and DEPOSITS on the 4th day. My American Express on the other hand, although it has varied, takes 2 days and deposits on the 3rd. My way around this is just to write out one of the thousands of checks I never use from my local bank to myself or wife and deposit it into the account that way which if done before 6:30pm eastern time is deposited to your account the next day. Obviously with the first 30 days of account opening there is a limit of $2500 I think and also only the first $200 is available right away with the rest being held for up to 7 business days (This sucks, but again just for first 30 days then no restrictions). You can also bypass this if you already had an account before opening the checking acount. For instance my savings account I got back in 2011 so instead of depositing into my checking I just put it straight into my savings account to avoid the 7 day hold. (keep in mind federal restrictions of 6 withdrawls from this savings per month) ANOTHER way around it is just to deposit checks in $200 incriments to avoid the hold as well.

Also tested Discovers Bill Pay system on my Capital One card if anyone was interested in knowing. Really easy to set up a payee. Entered CapOne into their search and selected the CapOne Card option and entered my card number and that was all. First electronic payment I set up for a Monday to test out how fast they work. The payment started processing on Saturday, showed paid on Sunday and Monday, but never showed on my CapOne until Monday night since thats when CapOne processes my payments. Discover didn't pull the money from my account until CapOne posted it to my card. In case anyone else was wondering Bill Pay payments don't show in the payment activity section instead just show as an electronic payment in your transaction log. So far I am very happy, except for the fact that I got my checks yesterday and still no debit cards yet....convenient considering double cash back from debit purchases window is closing fast. They said a piece of mail was sent back saying it was undeliverable......hmmmm my cards. So far thats the only issue. Hope this helps anyone interested in the account in the future.

Re: Discover Checking Bonus?

Anonymous — Fri, 17 Jul 2015 07:41:22 GMT

Pros:

No Fees

10 cents for every online bill pay or debit card transaction

Cons:

Only way to deposit cash into your account is through money order (I miss chase when it comes to this)

it takes a week for a transfer to enter your account