First National Bank Omaha's Pay Yourself First Savings Promotion

POSTED ON MONDAY, JULY 13, 2009 BY Ken Tumin

First National Bank Omaha is offering a savings account promotion called Pay Yourself First Savings. It's a little like Wachovia's Way2Save account (see post). You can make a nice little bonus with a small amount of money. It probably won't appeal to those with large savings. Like the Way2Save account, this requires that you have a FNBO checking account in addition to the Pay Yourself First Savings account. You then earn the bonuses when you set up monthly transfers from the checking to the savings account. Here's how much you can earn with the transfers:

Receive a $5 bonus per transfer of $25 or more
Maximum of $10/month can be received for 2 transfers
The $5/transfer bonus lasts the first 6 months
Bonus goes down from $5 to $1 after the first 6 months

Promotion expires 7/31/2009. For the first 6 months, you can earn $60. There's no incentive for large balances since the savings account interest rate is currently only 0.30%. On the plus side, the savings account doesn't have any minimum balance requirements. For the required checking account, they do have free checking which also has no monthly fees.

Note, this promotion is not associated with their internet bank, FNBO Direct. It's being offered directly from the main bank's website. There's an online application, and it appears to be available nationwide. I've sent an email to confirm. Update 7/13/09: I received a reply from FNBO about the availability of this account:

You may apply for a checking account online, however you must be reside within 50 miles of the Omaha Metro area.

FNBO has branches in Nebraska and Iowa. The bank has been a FDIC member since 1934 (FDIC Certificate # 5452).

Credit for this find goes to goes to FW member oopsz who posted it on this FW thread.