Best Business Accounts and some advice

Irishorangutan

Hello all,

I'm in the middle of attempting a major money fix - trying to clean up everything, and as i'm sure most of you have gone through, I have realised (after reading martin's book and now the forum) that I am paying massively over the odds for both my current and savings accounts.

These are currently both with RBS, however I have just applied for a ICICI Saving account and I'm looking at the A & L Current account. I'd like to know if this is the right move? They both look good - but is there anything negative about both of these in your experience?

I intend to use the ICICI bank solely for my TAX account - (25% of my profit) as I am self employed and determined to be ultra disciplined.

As I am self-employed, I need a good business account. I have been self employed for 3 years and have always used the RBS Business account. The first year had no fees, but the fees now are in my opinion quite high. It is handy however, as I have a branch near by and I have always found RBS phone banking and Internet banking to be brilliant.

Has anyone any experience switching Business account? IF so, any advice?

I am determined to get my finances in order - I have some debt so won't be saving (apart from TAX money) until that is paid off - and I will be posting on the debt page soon for some help with that.

Any help greatly appreciated!

:oD

gordon74

I have no specific recommendations as to choice of account, just my own experience recently with HSBC.
I wouldn't recommend them for customer service, :rotfl: although they did give me a good rate on the mortgage etc. I am about to commit to £130,000 commercial mortgage over 15years at 1.5% over base with a £1000 arrangement fee, £200 valuation fee (which they negotiated for me locally) 6months free banking and the overdraft rate at 3.5% over base I believe. Not sure about that 1 off the top of my head. I only opened the business account in June last with them, intending to move from the Ulster Bank. I agreed a £25,000 overdraft limit on the account, but the commercial manager applied a £5000 temporary limit before going to the full limit of £25000. I went overdrawn for 3 days unbeknown to me. A £16 charge appeared on my on line statement. When I queried the amount and what it was for, he said it was a system generated charge for going overdrawn and could not be refunded. I thought about it for a few days, then sent him back a reply pointing out that along with the business account, I had opened a personal current account,(which I am/was in the process of moving transactions to from First Trust), a Flex saver account, an on line saver account and a credit card account. I also pointed out that HSBC had announced record profits and that business was hard enough without them applying punitive charges of a measly £16 quid. Here is his reply....lifted straight from the body of the mail.


"I will only on a complete one off basis refund this charge and i mean one off, i do not know who was in the wrong here it could have been you or it
could have been me for instance you thought it was the fault of Hsbc when the security forms had not arrived at your solicitors and you discovered
you had made a simple mistake. Have given you an extremely competitive
deal however due to the level of e mails going back and forward between us
it seems you are not completely convinced, i am sorry if i appear brisk
xxx xxx however i do not have the time to constantly respond to e mails and
if you are not happy with the service you feel we will provide i will have
absolutely no hard feelings if you decide to stay with your current bank.
Whilst HSBC did announce record profits so did many other banks and we aim
to provide the best possible service to our customers.

xxix xxx xxx
Commercial Banking Manager...."

S..t, he couldn't even be bothered to hit F and do a spell check. The constant e-mails he refers to were queries about the account and general setting up etc. Nothing major; in my eyes anyway. I had no other contact to go to in the branch.

I replied
" Thanks. I am fully aware its a good deal by the way!. If I didn't think so I
wouldn't have moved!. I don't like charges being applied without knowing
what they are for, and I make no apologies for it. If you don't have the
time to respond to my questions you only had to tell me. I was under the
impression you were my account manager, but if you don't have the time to
explain or answer queries I might have on the account from time to time,
then please send me the e-mail address/phone number of someone who does.
Thanks again for the refund.
Regards xxxxxx "

I am now in the process of trying to find a new personal current account and will probably close all those other accounts with them. Credit card was a 0% deal for 6months so it was going anyway. Thats how the whole snowball developed, from that one application. I have decided to go for A&L Premier Current Account same as you and have applied this morning, but may cancel and wait until the 1st September as the interest rate looks set to go up to 6%. Also there is a recommend a friend scheme http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=239580 Also am in the process of claiming £38.00 off the First Trust bank who bounced a Direct Debit to ING on line savings, then clobbered me with a charge. (Claim sent off Friday 4th). First time over since I opened the account in Feb 2004. Ulster Banks business account charges are my next target. :mad: See penalty charges site http://www.penaltycharges.co.uk/ which I found very helpful.

Also, as mentioned elsewhere on this site, if and when you do change accounts, leave some funds in the old one until you are sure that all direct debits, standing orders etc are all transferred. HSBC were supposed to have done that for me, but I see this morning on line, my house mortgage payment to the Ulster Bank from my Ulster Bank business account has been taken out thus putting me back into the red by £574.00 on the old account. One more thing to do in the morning. Hope this helps.

PS FYI I have been running an engineering business for the last 6 years with 3 employees. Turnover in the last 3 or 4 years has been around £250,000 - £275,000 per annum, just to give you some sort of a yardstick as to how much use the account would be getting for them.


Sorry if I ranted on a bit there. Just looking at the size of the post. :-)

elliebean_2

Irishorangutan wrote:

As I am self-employed, I need a good business account. I have been self employed for 3 years and have always used the RBS Business account. The first year had no fees, but the fees now are in my opinion quite high. It is handy however, as I have a branch near by and I have always found RBS phone banking and Internet banking to be brilliant.

We have been using the Abbey for our business account for over a year now without problem. They offer free business banking for life within certain constraints:
100 cheque deposits per month
100 cash and cheque withdrawals per month
£3,000 in cash deposited per month
Direct Debits, Standing Orders, Bill payments and Debit Card payments
BACS payments
All the above are free. If you exceed the above or use any other service, you pay.

However, all banking has to be done (at present anyway, although I understand this may be changing) via post, internet or cash-machine - you can't pay in or withdraw from your Abbey business account at the counter.

I guess it depends on the type of business you have as to whether it would be free for you. It's worked well for us and we've never paid a penny in charges yet.

gordon74

elliebean wrote:

We have been using the Abbey for our business account for over a year now without problem. They offer free business banking for life within certain constraints:
100 cheque deposits per month
100 cash and cheque withdrawals per month
£3,000 in cash deposited per month
Direct Debits, Standing Orders, Bill payments and Debit Card payments
BACS payments
All the above are free. If you exceed the above or use any other service, you pay.

If you stray outside the conditions do you get them back the next month?. When you say cash I take it thats turnover, not profit and its cheques or cash?.

elliebean_2

gordon74 wrote:

If you stray outside the conditions do you get them back the next month?. When you say cash I take it thats turnover, not profit and its cheques or cash?.

As far as I know, if you exceed the limits for the month you pay for those and then start again the following month.

You can find more detailed info here: http://www.anbusiness.com/

tigerman

Hi dont know if it helps i am with Abbey Business and find them very good .Dont go to A&L THEY ARE TOTALLY USELESS

Irishorangutan

thanks to all of you for advice. I think the savings could be around 200 - 300 a year with RBS's extremely high rates that i'm currently using as my biz account.

powerbase

I agree about the abbey business banking. It's great and I've yet to pay fees. If you do go over the fees are similar to most other banking. If your business is online, and you transfer money online, fees will never be a consideration.

Problem with abbey is there is no branch (which suits me fine) it's all online. Also I hear at the minute they are quite swamped because so many people want accounts so it takes a bit longer to set it up.

One other thing about being self-employed, if you are a sole-trader a new personal current account would be sufficient. You can get another current account (there are some great ones out there) and use it. Problem with a normal bank account it will be in your name and not a business name and you cannot get associated merchant services. If this is not a problem go for normal current account. The reason I say get a new current account to keep it all clear cut say the tax man comes knocking. A lot easier if you keep personal and business finances separate.

Another option if you could be bothered is go for banks like the bank of ireland, A&L who all offer a year or 18 months free or whatever you can get from them. Near the end threaten to leave and see if you can get more time free if not be prepared to move accounts every so often.

I hope this helps.

Abbey or separate new personal account gets my vote.

powerbase

I agree about the abbey business banking. It's great and I've yet to pay fees. If you do go over the fees are similar to most other banking. If your business is online, and you transfer money online, fees will never be a consideration.

Problem with abbey is there is no branch (which suits me fine) it's all online. Also I hear at the minute they are quite swamped because so many people want accounts so it takes a bit longer to set it up.

One other thing about being self-employed, if you are a sole-trader a new personal current account would be sufficient. You can get another current account (there are some great ones out there) and use it. Problem with a normal bank account it will be in your name and not a business name and you cannot get associated merchant services. If this is not a problem go for normal current account. The reason I say get a new current account to keep it all clear cut say the tax man comes knocking. A lot easier if you keep personal and business finances separate.

Another option if you could be bothered is go for banks like the bank of ireland, A&L who all offer a year or 18 months free or whatever you can get from them. Near the end threaten to leave and see if you can get more time free if not be prepared to move accounts every so often.

I hope this helps.

Abbey or separate new personal account gets my vote.