Best Ltd company bank account?

[Lee]

Hello all!

Needing to open a Ltd company bank account for a new project but I am finding that some of the big banks are facing delays with opening accounts.

We currently use Natwest for my day job Ltd company but they have reported delays of over 30 days to open a new account and I need it sooner!

Anyone got any recommendations or ones to avoid.

It needs to be able to accept both CHAPs as well as BACs both in and out. Some accounts, such as Mettle, do not allow CHAPs payments!

Cheers!

 

[GreyWing]

Tide have been very good for me on the business side. No excessive hoops to jump through. Fees are a pain put nothing excessive either.

Decent app, decent interface.

Maybe apply with Tide and let it get you through until the mainstream account with Natwest is ready?

 

[ben]

Can vouch for tide, however, a friend of mine who turns pver considerably more than any company I have ever setup, had them withhold 45 thousand pounds in VAT money from him for 12 months.

Starling is great, Monzo is great.

 

[astutiumRob]

Starling seem to randomly decide they want you to leave if you do too many transactions.
Tide ( unless changed recentky ) aren't a bank as such and couldnt have cheques paid in, but otherwise were ok for 1 brand.
Metro have gone downhill - excessive fees, delays in payments, branch hours cut - and obv getting caught with their financial irregularities - sub 1% of hsbcs irregulatities but more widely reported on.
FIRE have been great but no branch network, so no to cash/cheques in and several years on still no FP service.
Monzo said no to a business doing ~1M/year as a credit risk, so no direct experience.
Anna is on my radar to look at next time as been impressed ( despite hating cloud/subs based software ) by their small company accounts stuff - again, not a bank as such though.

 

[astutiumRob]

* all of the above can open an account within days if not minutes

 

[baldidiot]

Don't go anywhere near Metro, literally the worst bank I've ever dealt with. Everything takes 10 times longer than it should and they're constantly making you go into the bank. For example, I had to reset my password once and had to go into the bank to do it. The business managers also never leave you alone, they always want something.

Tide are a great option for a quick account. We have one for a side project and we had it set up in minutes. It is a little limited compared to the banks (as it's not a bank) but for sending / receiving money and doing it quickly it's been decent.

Revolut are also pretty good. When we set out account up it was quite quick, but I've heard they're upped the KYC since becoming a full bank so I'm not sure if that's changed at all.

 

[ben]

Don't go anywhere near Metro, literally the worst bank I've ever dealt with. Everything takes 10 times longer than it should and they're constantly making you go into the bank. For example, I had to reset my password once and had to go into the bank to do it. The business managers also never leave you alone, they always want something.

Reminds me of IONOS. Wanna register a domain? Sure, let me get an actual human to do that for you. But we're closed right now, so you will have to wait until Monday, but we have kept your money.

I have business, freelancer (pro) and personal with Revolut, they have been quite good and I believe they are now officially a bank in the UK or something, but I initially only did this only as a stop gap between opening a Monzo account which was the long term plan.

 

[baldidiot]

Reminds me of IONOS. Wanna register a domain? Sure, let me get an actual human to do that for you. But we're closed right now, so you will have to wait until Monday, but we have kept your money.

Oh yeah, that's the other thing - because they make you go into the bank to do everything, the wait times are horrific. So when you do go down you're normally waiting for 30+ minutes.

Don't even get me started on the time that they made me go down to the bank to do a chaps transfer, only to muck it up by not having their manager authorise it, so they made me come back again to watch it be authorised (I'm not even joking about this, literally wasted the whole afternoon).

 

[ben]

They're closer to a "real" bank than some of these app only banks, but certainly sound much worse.

 

[astutiumRob]

the time that they made me go down to the bank to do a chaps transfer, only to muck it up by not having their manager authorise it, so they made me come back again to watch it be authorised (I'm not even joking about this, literally wasted the whole afternoon).

Needed to update the address they send statements to - go to your branch not a branch and fill out a form with a 'business account manager' - 45m there, 20 min wait, 65 min back ...

2 months later they're still posting them to old address, get told have to go to branch as there are other checks needed. Different body as that BM doesnt work there now, and almost an hour later all oik needed to actually do is compare my handwritten address to an internet result on companies house to see if same.

Next statement still wrong, after collecting it, wrote a slightly less than polite encouragement to do their job in red sharpie on the front and hand-delivered it to the branch.

Got a phone call that afternoon asking if I wanted to go to paperless statements - missing the actual point.

 

[baldidiot]

Needed to update the address they send statements to - go to your branch not a branch and fill out a form with a 'business account manager' - 45m there, 20 min wait, 65 min back ...

2 months later they're still posting them to old address, get told have to go to branch as there are other checks needed. Different body as that BM doesnt work there now, and almost an hour later all oik needed to actually do is compare my handwritten address to an internet result on companies house to see if same.

Next statement still wrong, after collecting it, wrote a slightly less than polite encouragement to do their job in red sharpie on the front and hand-delivered it to the branch.

Got a phone call that afternoon asking if I wanted to go to paperless statements - missing the actual point.

Yeah that sounds about right. Tbh I'd forgotten about the whole "home branch" element!

 

[Lee]

Cheers guys for all the replies.

I've got a solution sorted now.

This is a good thread for others looking for a business account in the future too.