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Comment by tedeh | Hacker News Reader

A bank account is a right for every EU citizen: https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-pr...

Banks are not allowed to refuse account opening to any resident.

Well, I don't know if it's the difference between “resident” and “citizen”, but i was told “no” or “maybe in a few weeks” many times when trying to open a bank account in October/November last year in Germany. “Maybe in a few weeks” is as good as a refusal.

I've lived two years in Germany and hung out with lots of foreigners. Not only tech employees with high and steady incomes, but also freelancers or people on working holiday visas, working part-time at bars and restaurants.

Between big commercial banks and savings banks, online banks (comdirect, ING, DKB, ...) and challengers like N26, I've never met anyone who had trouble opening a bank account. Americans didn't have access to some non-essential investment products thanks to FATCA, but that's it.

How are the KYC requirements handled in Germany? What sort of documentation do you need to open a bank account?

You should not need more than an ID and the certificate of registration from your municipality.

Some online banks outsource this process to the Post: https://www.deutschepost.de/en/p/postident.html

I'm not sure how N26 does it these days, at the time it was over videochat. I believe it's just a picture of your ID and a selfie now?

I opened an account this week and it was a videochat (they call it IDNow).

However, while you need a German address, no registration is necessary (which I'm only having done on Monday). I didn't even have any German phone number yet at that point.

>challengers like N26

Don't you need a bank account to transfer money into N26? As far as I know there is no way to deposit cash into any of these disrupter service providers.

In Germany, N26 is partnered with a service that lets you deposit up to 100 EUR / month into your account, in cash, for free at supermarkets (and more for a fee).

https://n26.com/en-de/cash26

AFAIK it's the only challenger bank to support doing something like this for free, even in a limited amount. Even Bunq, which I pay for, doesn't support it (https://together.bunq.com/d/2933-how-do-i-deposit-money-or-t...).

Monzo does the same, in the UK.

I can live with that. The last time I had to deposit cash at a bank was 20 years ago after a summer job.

If you should get into this situation again refer them to §§30 et seq. ZKG [0].

§31 specifically states that anyone with legal residence in the EU must be allowed to open a "basic" account. Occasionally banks will list this as a separate offering from their normal account, but they really should have told you about that. Sorry to hear they didn't.

[0] https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/zkg/__30.html

From your link:

> In some EU countries, your bank might still charge you an annual fee for this basic payment account. This fee should remain reasonable.

For someone who is really poor, that annual account keeping fee is a much bigger hit to their pocket when compared to others not doing it so tough.

It is around $20 a year, there are no people poor enough for that to be an issue in Europe.

Believe me, there are people in Europe for who paying 20€ extra can be an issue. Even worse: unexpectedly having to pay 20€. Source: been there, done that.

It's not an unexpected 20€, more like 1-2 euros a month. Every month. At the same time.

Minimum wage in Bulgaria (part of the EU) is €3,743 per year. Now imagine someone that's not full-time employed. €20 for them is not nothing. For them that would be the equivalent of someone earning $100k a year having to pay $500 to have a bank account. Note that often these low income accounts also have to pay when doing (some) transactions.

"Reasonable" in Bulgaria will be a lower fee than in Denmark, where the fee is more like €30/year for a standard account (cheaper options are probably available).

One thing that has always seemed strange to me is you have to prove you have an address to access many parts of society like banks and schools. This leaves out the homeless and people who have a residency but for some reason (bad landlord, staying at a friend’s place and not on the lease, etc.) can’t prove it in a way that satisfies the authorities.

I've never seen a school ask for proof of address in Europe.

As for banks, it depends a lot on the country. While it's an issue for the homeless, it shouldn't be for people who're staying at some temporary accommodation. For instance in Germany, where most banks ask for proof of address (the registration at your municipality), it's also trivial get a valid document from whoever is hosting you (landlord or main tenant, it doesn't matter, you don't have to be on the lease).

Since you can choose any school in Sweden, and schools are funded by the local community (communities pay for students going to other communities) they do require a proof of address

Icelandic banks make 2FA mandatory, and your only 2FA choice is phone SMS.

So now there is a ~1000kr/month fee for using the bank here, with a ~8000kr startup cost, because you need a phone and a sim card.

You don't have prepaid card and used phones on Iceland?

Oh yeah, there are used phones. But there are two ways to pay someone for one:

A) Direct bank to bank transfer

B) Cash

On the other hand basically no one pays for a phone landline anymore so I guess the cost is about equal to what it used to be?

Though in Sweden the 2FA we tend to use is called BankId which is a standalone app only requiring an internet connection.

> only requiring an internet connection.

Oh, so how do you interface with your IP router for this?

1000kr/month = $7,93/€7,00

8000kr = $63,40/€55,97

But they can refuse to take your cash and point to the regulations against money laundering.

If you're poor, you aren't going to deposit cash in amounts that are anywhere close to what a bank should consider suspicious.

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