# Opening Saving account in other Euro country



## 9282 (20 Feb 2010)

Anyone can recommend how to open saving account abroad & recommend me few reliable banks within euro zone €?

Other thread said that CIC (France) might do it. Any more banks that allow offshore banking (eg. Germany) ?

Only having Irish residence address and got Rabo Direct account but still wish to move my hard earn cash out from Ireland.

Any advise much appreciated.


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## chlipps (20 Feb 2010)

Have you tried investec as per best buys thread? UK govt backed as opposed to Ireland.... But are funds any safer in UK than they are in ireland?


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## Lightning (20 Feb 2010)

If you are looking the highest offshore rate then Anglo Isle of Man offer some good rates such as a 1 year EUR term deposit for 3.35%. 

If you are looking to stay away from Irish banks, many European banks allow non resident accounts, previous posts here suggested HSBC offshore.

If you are happy with a UK bank, you can pop up to Northern Ireland and open an account with a ROI address. From that point forward, you can do your transfers online.


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## Plover (24 Feb 2010)

Eurozone banks with accounts for non-residents paying decent interest are few and far between.

(The forum won't let me post links, so I'll have to mangle them)

If you're quick, (britline dot com) (Credit Agricole's English-speaking service) have the 'CSL Boost' at 3.25% for 3 months, but it needs to be opened before 1st March.  You also need to prove regular visits to France, though you might do this by paying some 99c fares to Mr Ryanair.  Otherwise their normal accounts pay about 1%.

There are a few French banks who offer non-resident accounts if you have some connection with France, but the rates are also about 1%.  (You can have a Livret A from several banks - a French tax-free account up to EUR15,000 - which pays 1.25% fixed by the government).

In Greece, FBBank are doing 3.45% tiered: 
www fbbank gr /330/article/greek/330/135/index.htm
(run that through Google translate), but we all know how Greece is at the moment.  I'm not sure of the residency position of this one (but non-resident Greeks can be found all over the place, so I guess they might be lenient).

There's also the offshore crowd - Best Buy table and search:
moneyfacts co uk /compare/offshore/euro/
But the ability of their banking systems to cope with a default was seriously called into question in October 2008 - search for KSF IOM to hear the sorry tale.  Many offshore banks are UK-based so might be seen to be more secure... but so was the Derbyshire Building Society that KSF bought.

I'm very interested if anyone manages to find any others...


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## Lightning (24 Feb 2010)

Great post Plover, you have done your research. 

I would not touch a Greek bank at the moment, there are too many unknowns.


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## Plover (25 Feb 2010)

Indeed.  I also spotted a Romanian bank paying 4% on Euro ('fraid I can't remember which).  In theory all the usual EU safeguards would apply, but I think I'll sharpen my bargepole.

There's a few banks in Spain designed for non-residents - eg Halifax dot es has a 12 month deposit at 2.25%, min EUR3000.  I think Santander might do something too.  There are also some in Gibraltar, but I haven't figured out the stability issues (they're kind-of in the EU).  None of the Gib rates were stunning.

There's also Switzerland, but I didn't spot any banks offering particularly good rates there either.  I also don't know how much of a hassle it is to open an account (some middlemen will take $1000 off you to open one, but I have no idea if they're just fleecing the stupid).

Germany is one place I haven't looked too hard as I don't speak the language.  Netherlands is apparently hard to open even as a resident.  I haven't really looked in other countries.

One other thing to consider is the tax position.  Many banks have the ability to exempt you from the local equivalent of DIRT if you declare non-resident, but some don't.  And you'd have to declare the earnings at home anyway... it makes your taxes more complicated.  If you pay more tax than you're supposed to, I don't know if you can claim it back at home.


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## Gervan (25 Feb 2010)

Interest rates from banks in Jersey and IOM are not brilliant, but you would have the advantage of spreading your risk. And they speak English. Just keep the deposit below the compensation guarantee.
I've looked at some that can be opened with (much) postal documentation, but they go further than Irish banks in asking for proof of source of funds. How can one prove that an SSIA that matured in 2005 and has been through several banking homes since then, is the source? Indeed, would one be asked how the SSIA was funded, and have to send in P60s for the relevant 5 Years? Does anyone have experience of how much "proof" is needed?


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## Plover (25 Feb 2010)

Having kept an eye on the Kaupthing Singer and Friedlander IOM debacle, I'm not convinced the offshore guarantees are worth the paper they're written on.

These are very small countries.  The original IOM guarantee was 75% of up to £20,000.  But this was based on a post-collapse levy on other financial institutions, which was capped at something like £5m/year.  With only 30 banks active, that means there's only £150m/year available.  Kaupthing had billions under deposit.

Secondly, the Tynwald (IOM parliament) spent a long time faffing around trying to put an improved protection scheme in place before they declare Kaupthing in default.  That meant people had to wait even longer to get any cash out at all (many had put their entire savings in there and were living off the interest, which stopped).  I get the impression that collapse completely overwhelmed the small island government.

Kaupthing originally had a guarantee that funds in KSF were 100% backed by the parent company.  But the UK government did some fancy footwork so they got first dibs on the assets, which left IOM savers further back in the queue.  I'm not up to date on the current position, but as far as I know there is still a substantial proportion still to pay back if there remains any cash left to pay. 

Guernsey didn't have a guarantee at the time, so Heritable (Landsbanki Guernsey) went under without that protection.  I'm not familiar with what happened (KSF IOM had a lot more savers, so made a bigger media splash).

All three (with Jersey) have beefed up their protection, but fundamentally how much cash does a small island have if the institution goes under?  The UK won't bail them out.


I don't have any experience of 'proof of funds', but sometimes they want two sorts of proof: one being a bank statement showing where the funds are now, and another showing how you generated it.  I imagine a pile of P60s (that's end of year earnings, same as in UK, right?) would suffice for savings from employment income.  If you inherited, or sold a house, or whatever, then proof of that (even if it was a long time ago) should be sufficient.  I don't think they're that bothered with the interest you've earned in the meantime.


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