Recently, a young relative was interested in opening his first bank account. He was 16 and knew that if he got a job for the summer with the city they required a bank account for making direct deposit payroll payments. He decided to start with a Tangerine chequing account, for a variety of reasons. Here’s what he had to do to open the account and get his id verified since he did not have another chequing or bank account from which to mail in a cheque.

Before You Apply to Open Your Tangerine Chequing Account

There are a few things to consider before you start typing in your info online.

• If you want to use a promotional code, get it first. For example, sometimes Tangerine offers a cash reward for opening your first account ever, or offers a bonus interest rate. Figure out which one will make you the most money and get that code handy.
• You will have to give them a PIN number for your online and telephone banking. This is a 6 digit number. You’ll probably want to pick a good one (not your phone number or your birth date!) before you start the application so you don’t have to come up with something secure quickly.
• You’ll need your Social Insurance Number.
• If you have a printer, it will be easier to do the final step of visiting a Canada Post outlet to verify your id and complete your application. (There is a scannable bar code the post office uses to start the procedure.) You don’t need a printer, though, if you don’t have one.

Is It Better to Get 2.4% Interest for 6 Months or $50 in Cash for Opening My First Tangerine Account Ever?

Right now, in June 2016, Tangerine is offering a promotional interest rate for the first 6 months of 2.4% for money in a Tangerine Savings Account. They are also offering a $50 bonus if you sign up using another person’s Orange Key, even if you only deposit $100.

At first, it seems like the higher interest is the best deal. But is it?

If you deposit and keep a $1000 balance in your Savings account for 6 months, you would earn about $12 in interest. You’d actually earn a bit more because interest is paid monthly, and after it’s paid, you’ll earn interest on your interest.

In addition, the June promotion offers a cash $25 bonus if you deposit at least $100. So in total you’d make a bit more than $37 over the 6 months. But that’s less than the $50 you could get immediately by using a “friends and family” Orange Key. And you’d also make 0.8% interest for the 6 months, or about another $8 for a total of $58.

So if you plan to keep $2000 or more in your Tangerine Savings account each day for the full six months, and put all of that money in on the day you open the account, then it may make you more money to sign up using the 2.4% rate Orange Key. If not, you may want to use an Orange Key that earns you $50 immediately.

What Do I Do To Open My First Tangerine Account?

UPDATE: These instructions have been updated as far as possible on October 2 2017 because Tangerine has rolled-out a new website design. I can only go so far, though, because I am not eligible to open a new account.

Go to the Tangerine website.

Click on the Sign Me Up tab.

There are four big buttons labeled

• Spending
• Saving
• Investing
• Borrowing
• Business

which are the types of accounts you can open.

To open a chequing account, click on the Spending button.

The Tangerine Spending Page

For the Tangerine Chequing Account, click on the Chequing Account link or button and read through the details. If you still want to go ahead, near the bottom of the info, click on the button Enroll Now.

The Are you already a Client Popup Window

Tangerine will ask if you are already a client.
Click on the button: No, sign me up.

Enrolling for a Tangerine No Fee Chequing Account

You will need

• Your complete mailing address, phone number and email address
• Your social insurance number, SIN
• Your Orange Key number so you can get your bonus cash and/or higher interest rate
• Your occupation (which can be unemployed, retired, student or homemaker etc. You don’t have to have a paying job.)
• An email address
• A 6-digit PIN you can use for your online and phone banking

The Great! Let’s get started Page

Type the appropriate info in the following text boxes:

• Email
• Email, again
• Create a PIN for online and phone banking:
• PIN, again
• Enter Orange Key*

Then click on the Next button.

The Basic Info Page

From the drop-down list, select your Title, for example, Mrs.

Type to fill in the text boxes for

• First name
• Last name
• Postal Code
• Street Number
• Street Address
• Suite/Unit/Apt (optional)
• City
• Province
• Home telephone number
• Mobile telephone number (optional)
• Business telephone number (optional)

Click to select whether your Home or Mobile telephone number should be the primary number at which to call you.

From the drop-down list select your Employment status. For example:

• Employed
• Self-employed
• Retired
• Student
• Homemaker
• Not working (Unemployed or Disability)

If you choose employed or self-employed, it will prompt you further.

From the drop-down list, select your Industry.

From the drop-down list, select your Occupation.

Ironically, although I selected Self-employed, it is demanding I type in a name in the Employer Name box!

Click on the Next button.

The A few more details Page

Type the appropriate info in the following text boxes:

• Date of Birth
• Social Insurance Number

To proceed, you will also have to check the following boxes.

Before you do so, think about whether these things are acceptable to you:

• Agreeing to the Tangerine Account Terms and Privacy Code AND agreeing to a credit bureau check. NOTE: this will have an impact on your credit rating.
• Optionally agreeing to receive documents electronically.
• Agreeing to the Tangerine Web Terms and Conditions.

Click on the Next button.

October 1 2017 UPDATE: That’s as far as I can go with a mock account setup. So I don’t know exactly what happened with the following screens that used to be next when signing up:

The Legal Stuff Screen

Choose the intended use of your bank account from the drop-down list:

• Daily banking
• Home Purchase
• Retirement
• Personal Savings
• Purchase a Vehicle
• Vacation/Leisure
• Education
• Emergency Fund
• Other

Answer the question Yes or No, Will this account be used on behalf of a third party other than the named Account Holder?

Your Account Confirmation

You will receive a Tangerine number. Make a note of it in case you need to call in to Tangerine and for future use when banking.

The Activate Your Tangerine Chequing Account Screen

Next, three choices are offered for how to authenticate your id and to provide a sample signature for cheques.

If you don’t have a bank account at another bank, you will need to choose either to visit a Tangerine Bank location or to visit a Canada Post Outlet.

There is no Tangerine Bank near here, so my relative made the Canada Post outlet choice.

When selected, instructions will be displayed about how to take your proof of id to a Canada Post outlet. There is a Canada Post DSS Barcode that the post office employee will scan to start the procedure.

Print the document to take with you to the Post Office. (Or write down the Canada Post DSS Barcode. They can manually type it in at the Post Office if necessary.)

Before heading for your local post office outlet, collect the required id to prove who you are. This could include

• a Canadian driver’s license;
• a Canadian passport;
• a Canadian provincial photo id card
• a Canadian Certificate of Indian Status;
• a Canadian Permanent Resident Card;
• a Canadian Citizenship Card with a photo (not the older cards); or
• a QC Health Card with a photo (not the older cards)

You will also need to bring proof of your residence address. This is usually proven by an official document with your mailing address on it, such as

• a lease or mortgage statement,
• a municipal tax notice,
• an income tax assessment
• a vehicle ownership certificate or
• other items listed on the website.

For a youth, living in their parents’ home, however, very few of these documents are applicable. In fact, my relative had to use his school report card to show his residence!

He went off to the Post Office at the nearby mall. After a 5 minute wait in line and a 2 minute interaction with the Canada Post employee, he was done.

He signed at the Canada Post outlet to provide a sample signature for his cheques.

His Tangerine Chequing Account was fully opened. Now to get that job!

Related Reading

• How to Open a Savings Account at Oaken Financial
• How to Open a Chequing Account at PC Financial in Person
• How to Open a Savings Account at EQ Bank

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Did you open a Tangerine bank account before opening an account at another bank? Did the id verification process work well for you? Please share your experience with a comment.