PNC Bank's $100 Checking Account Promotion in Certain States

Update: PNC has extended the promotion to 6/18/2011. Here's the new PNC promotion page.

PNC Bank has another $100 bonus for opening a checking account with some additional requirements. This was being advertised on their home page. Here's the direct link to their promo page. The offer ends on 1/22/2011. Here's a summary of the requirements for the first $75:

• Open a new Virtual Wallet or other new select new PNC Personal Checking account
• Established a qualifying direct deposit within 60 days of account opening
• Make 10 purchases with your Check Card that post within 60 days of account opening.

To receive an additional $25 requires the conditions for the $75 be met and a minimum of 5 payments be completed via PNC Online Bill Pay within 60 days of account opening.

The small print at the bottom of the page states the following:

Offer only available to residents of DC, DE, FL, IL, IN, KY, NJ, NY, PA, MD, MI, MO, OH, WI, WV and VA

The small print also includes what they consider as a qualifying direct deposit:

A qualifying Direct Deposit is defined as a recurring Direct Deposit of a paycheck, pension, Social Security or other regular monthly income electronically deposited into a Free, Performance or Performance Select Checking Account, or the Spend Account for Virtual Wallet. The minimum amount of any single Direct Deposit must be at least $400. The Direct Deposit must be made by an employer or an outside agency. Transfers from one account to another, or deposits made at a branch or ATM, do not qualify as Direct Deposits.

Also in the small print it describes that existing customers won't qualify:

New account will not be eligible for offer if any signer has signing authority on an existing PNC Bank consumer checking account.

For those who live near a PNC branch, you may want to check to see if your local branch is offering a better offer. In the past there have been reports of local PNC bonuses of $150 and $200.

PNC Bank's Virtual Wallet

The only PNC liquid account offering any decent interest rate is the Growth Account that's part of PNC's Virtual Wallet. Even for that account, it's nothing great. As of 1/3/2011, it's paying 1.00% APY on balances up to $25K. Please see my PNC Virtual Wallet review for more details.

PNC CDs and Checking Account Strategy

As I mentioned in August, PNC described its deposit strategy in its Q2 2010 earning report. Their plan was to increase checking account deposits and reduce nonrelationship CD accounts. Promotions like this and their low CD rates (i.e. 1.20% APY 5-year CD in Florida) show that they're executing on this strategy.

For former National City customers, you will probably be disappointed when your CDs mature. National City had some nice CD specials a few years ago before it was merged into PNC.

PNC Bank has been a FDIC member since 1934 (FDIC Certificate # 6384).

Other Bank Bonuses

To find other bonus deals at other banks, please refer to my bank bonus page which has all of my recent bank bonus blog posts. Some additional bonuses are also listed in the checking account deals section of the discussion forum.