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N26 will be leaving the UK

n26.com

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Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#331

Post by magduf »

briandear wrote: post #222
Glawen wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

French banks are slow, but they provide good services. When i lived in the UK, i had only a debit card (maestro). If you wanted a mastercard you needed a credit card account where you needed to manually balance at the end of the month. Mind you this was 10 years ago, when the UK was Just introducing PIN code for every card transaction, a security feature found in France since the 90s. In France you get mastercard as…

French banks provide terrible services. To send an international wire, I had to go into the bank to “set up” the service. Online banking requires ever changing pin codes in the name of “security.” In the US, I can interact almost 100% of the time online. The only time I enter my US bank is if I need a physical cashiers check or counter checks. But that’s very rare.

I don't even have a local branch; I use Ally, which has no branches at all and is 100% online. I have no idea why anyone uses physical banks any more unless they need to deposit cash or get cashiers checks. The online banks offer far higher interest rates and low/no fees.

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#332

Post by szatkus »

alibarber wrote: post #260
bbbobbb wrote: post #243

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This really depends on the country you moved to. Banking in Germany will be much shittier while what you describe is norm in other countries for example.

Not Germany, but one that in many other ways is very efficient and forward thinking. I think the banking issues are more historical and due to having a small population with generally conservative attitudes towards money and financial institutions. But my point is that N26's offering is just not going to cut it across the whole EU(+UK), and any risk introduced by Brexit (or anything else that might happen) probably w…

Why don't you just say where you moved to? It's quite interesting in context of your earlier comment.

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#333

Post by Matsta »

virgilp wrote: post #324
Nextgrid wrote: post #236

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Problem is that Revolut is an electronic money institution while Monzo is a bank. If they go bust with the former you’re out of money, with the latter the government will refund your money up to 85k£.

Are you sure they're not a bank yet? They got their banking license a while ago: https://blog.revolut.com/we-got-a-banking-licence/

Their current license is in Estonia. They're still trying to acquire their UK banking license (their HQ is in London).

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#334

Post by insomniacity »

cmsj wrote: post #157
mietek wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Both HSBC and the HSBC-owned FirstDirect still have absolutely terrible apps.

Trivial anecdote: My wife is with HSBC and the iOS app doubles as both a banking interface, and the authorisation code response generator. When she's in a web browser and needs to generate a code for the HSBC website (eg to add a new payee), she has to log out of the phone app to be able to get to the response code UI. It blows my mind every time she does it. How on earth did they come up with that UX. It's like they…

It's worse than you know - (at least with First Direct) if you log in to the app it logs you out of the website.

I suspect the flow you noticed actually helps enforce that - if they gave you a code to let you use on the website, they'd have to log you out of the app anyway.

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#335

Post by mynameisvlad »

Nextgrid wrote: post #233
nullandvoid wrote: post #218

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No card alias support at the minute they are trailing behind there

Curious, what’s card alias?

I'm guessing they're referring to having virtual cards you can use for one transaction or merchant, and which you can kill at any time without having to change your primary card number.

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#336

Post by Matsta »

user5994461 wrote: post #242
eat_veggies wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I got my paycheck paid into my monzo. They don't require a proof of address, so I was able to open an account from my hotel room and have my card sent to my new workplace before I had my own flat.

+1 Monzo doesn't ask for proof of address, while other banks will need something like a utility bill. As a newcomer to the UK, one is pretty much obliged to open a bank account with Monzo.

Monzo also use Transunion for their credit checking which are lot more relaxed compared to the other big 2 (Equifax and Experian), which usually require 3 years of address proof to run through their KYC/credit checks.

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#337

Post by qubex »

speedski1 wrote: post #179
Nursie wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anecdote time - the only person I know who had an account (I work in London fintech at the moment) never used it and only opened it for the fancy translucent card. He seems to have accounts with all the 'challenger' banks.

Random question, but I'm moving to London in a few months, do you have any suggestions on banks or "challenger" banks I should go with? (couldn't figure out how to DM you, not sure if it's possible on Hacker News)

Revolut

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#338

Post by BTinfinity »

szatkus wrote: post #332
alibarber wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not Germany, but one that in many other ways is very efficient and forward thinking. I think the banking issues are more historical and due to having a small population with generally conservative attitudes towards money and financial institutions. But my point is that N26's offering is just not going to cut it across the whole EU(+UK), and any risk introduced by Brexit (or anything else that might happen) probably w…

Why don't you just say where you moved to? It's quite interesting in context of your earlier comment.

Finland if we believe his LinkedIn, no idea if it's up to date though

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#339

Post by Matsta »

growse wrote: post #301
easytiger wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that legal under KYC laws etc?

I'm a little rusty on this, so some details may not be correct. My understanding is that UK KYC basically don't specify exactly how to validate an individual's identity, only that the bank should do that ( https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/identity-proofing... ). It does suggest that a person's identity is "often someone’s name, date of birth and address", but it doesn't seem to mandate that. I believe the r…

Yes, you are correct, you only really need proof of address once you start offering credit (running hard credit check).

And you're also correct in terms of AML - once a person crosses over a certain threshold or raises and risk alarms, they'll be required run further AML checks. Eg. if you were to signup to Monzo and then put 50 grand in there from a foreign account.

What Monzo has to do since they are new, is keep a squeaky clean record with the authorities. This is why Monzo usually blocks or even bans anyone that buys Cryptocurrency eg: https://www.reddit.com/r/monzo/comments/avdw8o/notice_regard...

Source: I work in Crypto

Re: N26 will be leaving the UK

#340

Post by ukprisoner »

alibarber wrote: post #216
danpalmer wrote: post #11

Businesses pulling out of the UK based on the Brexit process is bad for the UK, and I'm sure this was indeed mainly motivated by N26's need for a UK banking licence, which is a costly and difficult process to go through. However, it's worth noting that they are pretty small in the UK (~200k users). They're very successful in Germany where banking is a very slow, difficult, manually run industry (from what I've heard)…

I've recently moved from the UK to another European country, and whilst I despise the way the politics is going back home - I'm amazed at how much better banking is back in the UK. It's free to have an account and debit card, often with a modest free overdraft. And transfers are really instant. As in I can transfer from Barclays to Santander and by the time I've double-tapped between bank apps the money will be there…

You havent been on the receiving end of all the automation, like having your bank account frozen for no reason, bank card frozen just because the security services feel like it, because I'm related to someone who was the highest Cat A prisoner whose Parkhurst prison break came in at number 3. All this automation means I darent speak in front of a laptop, dont have a mobile or bank account and havent worked for nearly ten years. Gave up the driving licence so I no longer have any photo ID. Dont even have a GP, not that I can afford prescriptions, as I'm not classed as unemployed. Cant get my records removed from the NHS despite the UK Govt selling them to US companies because like Google, "the UK population is the product". The UK security services are terrible because they make your life shit, I've had that online jihadist provocation that so many muslims who end up getting suicided by police guns end up and its always made to look like its your fault when they mess with your exam results (you never get exam papers back to independently check your paper against text books) so they can mess with you lives in so many ways. Criminals run the UK and keep lapping up the bullshit from tech surveillance industry in all its guises including banking.
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