
Banking in Berlin - pelle
http://blog.holvi.com/2012/11/29/banking-in-berlin/
======
derda
A few things:

\- Opening a bank account isn't pain and its free. If you do it locally at
your bank, you can start using you account right away, you may have to wait a
week or so for you credit/debit card and your online-banking pin, since they
are send via mail. If you open an account with an online bank. You fill out
the form, print it out, sign it, go to the post office with your ID, the post-
person will check if your ID matches the form and send it to the bank. Few
days later you will get your cards and passwords and are ready to go.

\- Yes there are delays between banks. But there are some EU directives on the
way, which seek to minimize the delay between banks in all of europe.

\- I have no idea what your app is supposed to do. Is it some kind of fancy
online-banking interface? With integrated accounting? For multiple accounts?
The main-site (holvi.com) doesn't really help me with that.

~~~
Setok
On Holvi: we completely replace traditional banks. So we do not just interface
with your existing bank, we actually offer you a whole new type of current
account. It is thus not merely an app, but a new banking service. One with,
yes, integrated accounting and other things.

"You fill out the form, print it out, sign it, go to the post office with your
ID, the post-person will check if your ID matches the form and send it to the
bank.Few days later you will get your cards and passwords and are ready to
go." — I'm not exactly sure I'd call that a nice process :-)

~~~
derda
Well because of anti money laundering laws they still need an ID-check before
they can open the account.

The good news is that germany started issuing ID-cards with RFID, that can be
loaded with a certificate, that will enable you to digitally sign contracts
and identify yourself, so the trip to the post-office will no longer be
necessary.

On your Project: With upcoming SEPA payments it will not matter anymore where
your bank is registered, since transaction times and fees will be the same for
all transactions within europe. So just register yourself as/partner with a
bank in a european country that offers the most favorable banking-laws/
banking infrastructure/ whatever. In regard of germans, they really want to
know that their money is "safe". Especially now in the euro-crisis, so make
sure that the depot insurance of the country of your choice is of a comparable
quality to the german system. (And maybe dont settle for a PIIGS state, as
germans have a strong distrust in banks and politicians in those countries)

~~~
Setok
Yes, in different countries there are different mechanisms to do this. Some
places you can manage completely online. There are things you can do before
the ID check, but at some point it needs to be done, yes.

------
Xylakant
There's certainly no need to sign off on your bank statements. However, the
bank must ensure that you get them - so if you don't pick them up yourself,
you get them sent every couple of month.

------
Narretz
If you have a company blog, please put two things at the top: a short
description of what you are doing and a link to your home page. Coming from HN
with no previous knowledge of your company, I have no context at all.

~~~
joshka
Same here. For the benefit of those that don't like to type:
<https://holvi.com/> but I'm still not sure what's different.

