Checking Account $100 Cash Bonus at Comerica Bank

Update 8/15/2011: Comerica Bank is still offering the $100 bonus as part of the Comerica Welcome Rewards.

Comerica Bank is offering a $100 cash bonus for opening any new personal checking account. Direct deposit isn't required. However, it does require some work. This offer is called Welcome Rewards and is listed on Comerica's front page and in this bank's promotion page as of 2/10/2011.

The required steps to qualify for the $100 bonus are shown below:

• Be a new Comerica personal checking account customer. All personal checking account types are eligible.
• Register online for the program within 30 days of opening your new checking account
• Establish a recurring direct deposit of at least $150 per month OR recurring ACH payments that total at least $150 per month (within 90 days of opening account)
• Make at least 10 check card purchases totaling $250 within 90 days OR sign up for Comerica Web Bill Pay and conduct at least 10 transactions totaling $250 (within 90 days of opening account)

Some of the important small print include:

if it is closed before six full monthly statement cycles, we reserve the right to deduct the amount of the bonus we paid you from your Account at closing. Once we have verified that you have met the terms of this offer, within 60 days we will credit your new Comerica checking account with your qualifying bonus payment.

The maximum bonus you may receive is $100. Bonus is considered interest and will be reported on IRS Form 1099-INT.

Comerica is still offering its Office Perks Program in which businesses can qualify for a $200 bonus. Please refer to my September Office Perks Program review for more details.

Monthly Fees and Qualifications

The main issue with Comerica's checking accounts is that they all have potential monthly fees. The checking account that is easiest to have the fees waived is the Access Checking. Fees can be waived if you maintain a $750 minimum balance, or have direct deposit, or if you are a full time college student. There's also a quarterly inactivity fee that you have to watch out for.

When I called Comerica last year about a similar promotion, I was told you could apply and qualify for the bonus even if you don't live near a branch. Their toll-free number is 800.979.0850. If you are told something different, please leave a comment.

Most of Comerica's branches are located in Michigan, California and Texas. There are only a few branches in Arizona and Florida.

Readers' Comerica Bonus Experiences

Readers who applied for that $300 promotion left some useful comments in my April 2010 post. For those who have recently opened accounts at other banks, they might find out about that via ChexSystems and close your account. Here's what one reader described about his experience:

I am a California resident and I opened a Comerica checking account in mid-May at a California branch. Two days later I opened three other online checking accounts at other institutions (I was bonus chasing). Six days after I opened the Comerica account the branch's manager called me and said the bank's fraud unit in Michigan had detected my opening of the other accounts and they wanted to close my Comerica account. We went round and round for a couple of weeks-but in the end they insisted on closing my account and not allowing me to earn the $225 in bonuses.

Comerica Bank Overview

Comerica Bank is headquartered in Dallas with branches in Texas, California, Michigan, Florida and Arizona. It's the 36th largest bank in the nation with $55 billion in assets. It has an overall health score at DepositAccounts.com of 4 out of 5 with a Texas Ratio of 19.90% (excellent) based on September 2010 data. Please refer to our financial overview of Comerica Bank for more details. It has been a FDIC member since 1934 (FDIC Certificate # 983).

Other Bank Bonuses

To find other bonus deals, please refer to my bank bonus page which has all of my recent bank bonus blog posts. Additional bonuses are listed in the checking discussion forum.