Bank account outside Spain

[Optomist]

We had the same problem Elgin but what a lo of people dont realize is that bank and financial institutions do have discretion to vary the requirements or for long standing clients wishing to open another account with them to not ask for any , they can use your history and make a judgement call as to weather or not there has been any suspicious activity n your accounts while you have been with them . They have a legal requirement only to confirm to their satisfaction but any comeback will be on them so they each intemperate and make their own rules as to what they ask for .

It might be helpful to some to know that the internet service even if Wireless from a internet supplier is classed with many institutions as a utility bill , we have had that accepted for a bank account and Car hire company's in the UK also . The other thing that we noticed and took advantage of with Nationwide International is that banks dont say they want a current account statement only that its a Bank statement . We have private pensions with Cajamar and receive quarterly statements , Nationwide international at first returned our Pension statements saying it was not a bank statement but when we pointed out it was a statement from the Cajamar Bank and less than 3 months old they replied apologizing and saying they thought Cajamar was a pension company and once it was made clear it was a bank they accepted it .

Hopefully the above might be of use to someone .

[Elgin]

The question I ask as why do you want to open a euro account outside Spain.  If you are resident in Spain then you may well have difficulty satisfying the ID and anti-money laundering requirements when trying to open an account else where (e.g. most UK banks will not open accounts for non residents).  Also, if you do succeed in opening a bank account in another country that bank will be required to provide details of your account etc to the Spanish Tax Office any way (and if you put more than €50,000 in that account and fail to declare it to the Spanish Tax authorities you could be hit with a massive fine!).

There are other advantages to having a Euro account outside Spain . Nothing to do with Tax evasion . The €50k i think your referring to is a total amount in all your bank accounts wherever in the world they are and we did the 720 years ago and a couple of times since . The Hasienda here and the UK tax man has all our details , like a lot of people banking across borders using their Spanish address we provided them when the accounts were opened and our tax reference numbers  more recently .

As for opening an account i think you will find the rules have changed and you can open an account quite easily with a bank outside the EU country your resident .

https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-products-and-services/bank-accounts-eu/index_en.htm

This looks like very recent stuff. SO I stand corrected.  It wasn't that long a go that I saw that Barclays were forcing Non UK residents to close their accounts and NatWest wouldn't open new account to non UK residents.  However, I see that both are now openly offering  "Basic Bank Accounts" to EU residents.  That said looking at the ID & proof of address rules I can see that I would struggle.  We have no water or gas bills, electricity and phone is online billing only and I haven't had a printed bank statement in about 7 years.

[Optomist]

The question I ask as why do you want to open a euro account outside Spain.  If you are resident in Spain then you may well have difficulty satisfying the ID and anti-money laundering requirements when trying to open an account else where (e.g. most UK banks will not open accounts for non residents).  Also, if you do succeed in opening a bank account in another country that bank will be required to provide details of your account etc to the Spanish Tax Office any way (and if you put more than €50,000 in that account and fail to declare it to the Spanish Tax authorities you could be hit with a massive fine!).

There are other advantages to having a Euro account outside Spain . Nothing to do with Tax evasion . The €50k i think your referring to is a total amount in all your bank accounts wherever in the world they are and we did the 720 years ago and a couple of times since . The Hasienda here and the UK tax man has all our details , like a lot of people banking across borders using their Spanish address we provided them when the accounts were opened and our tax reference numbers  more recently .

As for opening an account i think you will find the rules have changed and you can open an account quite easily with a bank outside the EU country your resident .

https://europa.eu/youreurope/citizens/consumers/financial-products-and-services/bank-accounts-eu/index_en.htm

[Elgin]

There are online bank accounts available that are commission free (e.g. ING.es) but although ING is a Dutch Group I think you still end up banking with a Spanish entity.

The question I ask as why do you want to open a euro account outside Spain.  If you are resident in Spain then you may well have difficulty satisfying the ID and anti-money laundering requirements when trying to open an account else where (e.g. most UK banks will not open accounts for non residents).  Also, if you do succeed in opening a bank account in another country that bank will be required to provide details of your account etc to the Spanish Tax Office any way (and if you put more than €50,000 in that account and fail to declare it to the Spanish Tax authorities you could be hit with a massive fine!).

[guest4538]

Has anyone opened an online Euro bank account outside Spain with free banking and if so how do you access the funds other then through an ATM which is limited to small withdraws .

I would be interested in such a product, without the need for cash withdrawals.

But is there really such a thing as a € bank account without charges, or equivalent costs of some sort?

Cash withdrawals are probably cheapest through Santander, using a UK Santander 123 select account debit card, if you have one.

[Optomist]

Has anyone opened an online Euro bank account outside Spain with free banking and if so how do you access the funds other then through an ATM which is limited to small withdraws .