DreamR2I said:nethunter said:Are there any minimum charge requirement ($1?) of each debit card transaction? Does .02 charge count?

Good question, don't know the answer though!

Where do you plan to do 0.02 transactions?

/beginning of conjectures and opinions

• I think we can assume that banks offering these reward checking products do so because they expect a net benefit (profit) from the product, either within the product itself, because the product serves as a loss leader for exposure to more profitable products, or a combination of the two.

• It's probably also reasonable to assume that a bank will discontinue their reward checking product if they determine that it provides no benefit to them.

• Pure speculation, but I believe that if a bank perceives that people are trying to "game" the system (i.e. the reward checking product), then the bank will be more inclined to think that the product isn't beneficial to them.

• The number of debit card transactions requirement is the most onerous requirement to meet in order to get that nice high interest rate. It makes sense to meet that requirement as easily as possible, using minimal amounts in order to maximize the account balance that's earning the interest.

• Keep in mind, though, that there is a cost associated with the debit card transaction. It could be some sort of flat fee in addition to a small percentage of the transaction amount, but I don't really know.

• I would rather have the bank make some sort of profit from each of my debit card transactions, no matter how minimal. Otherwise, I fear the perception that the bank will think I'm trying to take unfair advantage of them in order to reap the earned interest "rewards" from this product.

• I'm pretty confident that racking up $.01 and $.02 debit card transactions will cause the bank to lose money on these transactions. So where's the break-even point? I've arbitrarily decided that it's somewhat less than a dollar.

• This is why each of my debit card transactions is at least $1, and why I'm not going to investigate if a transaction amount less than that will work.

/end of conjectures and opinions

polo2883 said:What about making 10 or 12 $1 payments either to my cable bill or cell phone bill?I do that. I even add $1 at a time to my EZpass account.

stfs said:$30 vs. earning an extra $1000? Am I missing something?

$30

Why not just pay one of your utility bills that you would be paying anyway $10 or so at a clip. Maybe cell phone, phone, cable, internet, insurance, or some other bill that you would be paying anyway. Getting greedy over loss of credit card reward $$ is stupid. I doubt anyone at the banks in question could argue that kind of Debit card usage as a loser for them.

stfs said:Possible misunderstandings...My original point/question was that the earning of 1%+ from these 6% accounts is considerable more than savings from lost of CC usage. Plus the fact that based on my experience, 10 debit card transactions/month require little effort. I'm done for the month for SBoT which is why I'm seriously considering another reward checking account.I understand you perfectly and people who think a debit card 10x a month means they are losing more in cc rewards than they are earning on interest, are deluded, but to each his own.

I added my dad to the account to double my insurance. Figuring I'd rather have one account than two. If my 0% money is going to be re-offered, I might decide to add my mother to the account as well to tripple the insurance.

mhesidence said:GroveStreetOG said:
Where do you get 5% on lunch and sundries?

To name a few...Discover would be lunches.

Discover Card 5% Get more for Oct-Dec 2007 and Jan-Mar 2008

Citi CashReturns MasterCard - UNLIMITED 5% cash back for 3 months

TARGETED OFFER: Citi PremierPass 5 TY points all purchases till 12/31/2007 for existing cardholder
Love my Discover 5% card...starting January that's good for airline tickets and hotels, I believe. Awesome. Wish more people took the card though.

I think you're overthinking this - any benefits to your CU from the small transactions will be trivial in the context of the damage they'll suffer from the 6% rate you're making on the money. If you want to hurt the phone company then try making free calls all evening on mother's day, etc.

Perhaps I'm just nasty at heart but I'm in a hate-hate relationship with my CU and my phone company. So I do 1-3c gas transactions to get my 6% and I use my work cell phone.

manuel said:I think you're overthinking this - any benefits to your CU from the small transactions will be trivial in the context of the damage they'll suffer from the 6% rate you're making on the money. If you want to hurt the phone company then try making free calls all evening on mother's day, etc.

Perhaps I'm just nasty at heart but I'm in a hate-hate relationship with my CU and my phone company. So I do 1-3c gas transactions to get my 6% and I use my work cell phone.

Manuel, thanks for your perspective. I understand my small transactions will be trivial but if I do at least my "part" out of all CU members, and hope not all CU members have balances as high as mine, the CU should be able to get a good amount of fee revenue still. I agree, if I wanted to offset my interest I'd have to step up my debit transactions effort to KTC to the power of ten. My CU seems like a very honest institution and I want to help them succeed, while also getting high interest.

I just added the following to quick summary:

Air Academy Federal Credit Union - MAX Checking
6.01% APY with no minimum balance required up to $50,000 (1.01% over $50,000)
To qualify for membership, join USAF - Association of Graduates for $50
To earn the Bonus Rate, perform all of the following requirements each cycle:
1) 12 Check Card Transactions (12 debit/credit card purchases each month)
2) One Direct Deposit or ACH Auto Debit
3) Receive Electronic Statement
-Free Bill Payer
-No monthly fee
-No minimum balance requirement
-Free ATM Free ATM/Visa® Check Card with Rainbow Rewards

The one thing not-so great thing about this, is that the easiest way I can see to join, is to pay $50 by joining the USAF Association of Graduates. (Unless someone sees another way to join?)

Summary by Bank Deals of FOMC .25% Rate Cut also references reward checking accounts. No rate changes (yet) for the ones in the Quick Summary. Banking Guy speculates that "reward checking accounts with small deposit maximums of $25K should have a better chance at maintaining a higher rate."