Free banking - Page 3

If you have Sabadell already, you just need to go in, take one of their investment products then ask for the fee-free account.  Nothing changes with regards the app - you just pay less money!

Ok I will try it🤞

You have my sympathies JT47. Cajamar have been a huge mistake for us. Now we’ve retired, we really are the perfect customer for any bank, and it’s a pity Spanish banks don’t recognise that. That must be the case for a lot of us around here. I suspect they just see us as cash cows.

Are Santander giving you free banking?

I tried to put money on deposit with Solbank Sabadell. No assistance. I tried to put money on deposit with Cajamar. No assistance. I discovered with some surprise that Cajamar have separate websites for expats and native Spaniards. The Spaniards get a fully featured website…

Our worst experience was a possible fraud we suspected. I emailed them all the details including the company name. They were (as always) slow to answer. Then eventually an apparently sensible person phoned me and arranged a new card for me, which was quickly despatched. I was surprised.

I was more surprised to see them subsequently pay the fraudsters money from my account. And also, charge me €8 for the replacement card. ffs.

I could list more and more Cajamar problems we’ve experienced but what’s the point? We’ve met people who highly recommend them (we’ve been with them forever and they’re wonderful!) and I wonder how that can be. I feel that maybe the wealthy expats just don’t spot the constant drip drip of charges. It’s reached the point for us now where Cajamar are deducting yearly, an amount equivalent to my month’s (pathetic) pension. There’s no way that’s going to continue.

Recently I was invited to an appointment to discuss my problems with them. They seemed sincere. The young lady was emotional after a while (which is no use to anybody) and then she said she could arrange free banking for us. Yay! But a minute later she said “of course there will be some charges…”

Arrrrggh!

Thank you so much DarioMartin for your time in answering. I can see that you’ve spent a lot of time assisting people here. Unfortunately my local forum has rotted away into a tedious ‘chatroom’ where any intelligent threads are resisted and derailed.

For the moment I’m going on to explore BBVA (on here) and see (if possible) whether their customers find them okay. There is a thread on here somewhere…

I’m not too sure about Sabadell, as last year (trying to move back to them) they wasted a lot of our time with branch visits.

Taking one of their investment products is fine with me and putting €700 a month in (and out?) is not too much inconvenience, but on branch visits (Vera) we found the young lady hard work as regards “just tell us about your facilities”. It seems like they aren’t very motivated to help pull the funds in, which is odd. They seem to get through a lot of staff too.

Also I’ve heard in the past that customers started off with free banking and then they moved the goalposts, but to be fair that was a while ago. I just don’t want the faff of having to move accounts again after this…

But most definitely thanks again, you’re clearly a devoted poster here.

Thanks for that.  Make no mistake, some posts here can get derailed as well and I will put my hand up as a culprit!!

HOWEVER - I do try to help.  With regards Sabadell Vera, the young lady at the cashier point is far more comfortable in Spanish than English and if you were speaking with her in English, that may be why you felt they weren’t keen to help.  My advice would be to make an appointment with Andrea Silic at Vera branch who is fluent in English.  She is also incredibly helpful and will sort out all your needs quickly and professionally.  She may come across as a bit abrupt, but that’s just Andrea - she is very very efficient and helpful … unless (as I have witnessed) someone raises their voice at her and starts getting testy - then all helpfulness vanishes and it is strict compliance with bank rules and regs.

However I would certainly recommend making an appointment and seeing her - don’t go in on the off-chance that she’s not busy - that doesn’t go down well …

And Maria Louisa also speaks excellent Engl

With regards banking, I'd also like to add my recent personal experience with both Wise and Revolut.  I use them both; be warned, if they are not happy that the amount of money going through your account tallies with whatever proof of income you have given them, they (and here I speak specifically of Wise) will first restrict, then without warning deactivate your account, leaving you to either appeal the decision to deactivate or apply to get any funds held there back.

I originally thought it was a great way to keep money safe and out of Spanish banks which others have noted can embargo your account and simply take money for non payment of fines / council taxes etcetera.  Not so much now.

Wise, when you do regular transfers, may ask for proof of income - but they are very very specific about what they will accept and will very quickly say "not accepted" if it doesn't conform strictly to their requirements and then deactivate the account.

Revolut will also query your source of income if reasonable amounts go through it, but are far saner and much more flexible with what they will accept as proof.

I had my Wise account deactivated with a sum of money sitting in it; thankfully my appeal was successful and my account was reactivated - HOWEVER, I will no longer leave any largeish sums of money in Wise (nor Revolut - once bitten and all that) no matter how much interest they pay - my deactivation and retention of funds occurred shortly after Wise started paying decent interest / cashback on my account.  Make of that what you will.  They are NOT a bank - they neither of them have a banking licence but are regulated as "Financial Institutions"

Wise has Customer Service but they have very very limited access to your account.  They cannot "verify" you - that has to go to a "Verification Team" and if your account is deactivated, all they can do is offer platitudes and tell you to appeal and wait between 21 and 30 days, which then goes to an "Appeal Team" (Incidentally it becomes clear that the "Appeal Team" and "Verification Team" do not talk to each other - after I offered proof of income they were satisfied with and my account was reactivated, it was immediately suspended on trying to do a transfer until sufficient "Proof of Income" had been uploaded. Again.)

All I would say is be very very wary.  I'm now opening up a Spanish bank savings account (with Sabadell)  which pays similar interest to Wise, leaves the funds accessible and more importantly puts them in my reach and ability to talk to a human should anything happen.  Both Wise and Revolut are superb (each have their strengths and weaknesses) for bringing money in, converting it and then moving to an account out of their control - just so long as you keep sufficient proof of income ready as you WILL eventually be asked to provide it.

I’m so surprised to hear this about Sabadell! I’ve had my account with them for over 4 years and have been paying 40€ a quarter for the privilege. To add insult to injury, last week they deducted 30€ for “card management fee”. There is approximately €16/17 hundred euros going into the account every month. I’ve had enough now and ready to change.

Unless you go for a purely online account like Wefferent, you’ll have the same with any bank you use here.  Sabadell now apparently offer a fee-free online only account - May be worth your while checking that before changing banks

Thank you Dario. I will try that. I avoid going to a branch and do my banking online anyway.