Sole trader bank account

Hailhail1967

Sorry if this has been covered I will get straight to the point.

I am a sole trader (registered business name also) do I have to have a business bank account?

dbran

Not necessarily but it would be considered best practice.

lucky john

your bank will most likley make you as they will have different T&C and charges for personal acc v business acc. Anyway it makes more sence to seperate them. If you use the same bank all you need is the CRO cert and the application form.

Hailhail1967

lucky john wrote: »

your bank will most likley make you as they will have different T&C and charges for personal acc v business acc. Anyway it makes more sence to seperate them. If you use the same bank all you need is the CRO cert and the application form.

Exactly why i didn't want one :-)

My business is cash based but will have cheques etc on occasion.

lucky john

Any cheques will need to be made out to a name on the account or to cash. If its in the businness name you most likely wont be able to cash it.

Hailhail1967

lucky john wrote: »

Any cheques will need to be made out to a name on the account or to cash. If its in the businness name you most likely wont be able to cash it.

Ya the cheques could easily be made out to me personally. But if its best practice to have a bank account maybe I should just open one.

It just seems a waste to be paying fees on two accounts when they are essentially both for the same thing. I wont have large sums going in or out of a business account and I dont sell equipment.

kennyb3

Hailhail1967 wrote: »

Ya the cheques could easily be made out to me personally. But if its best practice to have a bank account maybe I should just open one.

It just seems a waste to be paying fees on two accounts when they are essentially both for the same thing. I wont have large sums going in or out of a business account and I dont sell equipment.

I would say you'll save a lot more than you spend in terms of your accountancy fee when your accountant doesn't have to thrawl through all your personal payments to reconcile your business bank account.

Hailhail1967

kennyb3 wrote: »

I would say you'll save a lot more than you spend in terms of your accountancy fee when your accountant doesn't have to thrawl through all your personal payments to reconcile your business bank account.

No accountant for me :-)

Gloomtastic!

Hailhail1967 wrote: »

No accountant for me :-)

I'd go for a separate account simply to make it easier to look after your business money.

As a sole trader, you can bank cheques in your name and your trading name to your business account.

It's also nice occasionally to treat yourself/your family from the business account - sufficient funds available of course

TheWaterboy

When I registered as a sole trader I setup a business bank account with BOI - I closed it last year because its a disaster. All my business is online and their online facilities for business customers are a disaster. They also expect you to pay 15 euro a month for this disaster that only works in Internet Explorer (I'm on Mac).

So I opened a separate personal account (which they were not too happy about) and explained that I simply cannot use their business account. Everything is setup with 365online now and everything is great.

But yes it is definitely better to have a separate account.

Peterdalkey

Using a personal account is fine for the time being, but remember the banks are planning to eliminate cheques for all personal accounts in the relatively near future. This may or may not be a problem in your specific case.

Hailhail1967

Ya none of this is leading me to think I should have a seperate business account.

I sell a service so all I essentially have is cash coming in and the very seldom consumables/equipment I need that constitutes out out goings.

Hmm, I don't want to pay for something just because it is seen as what you are meant to do, we do far to much of that in this country.

The Pontiac

I'm also in the process of setting up a Business bank account. I had a look at the AIB application form and it's asking for directors, secretary names and a whole other things. I'm a sole-trader, so do I just put down n/a in the boxes?

Or is their a more simple bank account out there? I'm with AIB for personnel banking so thought it's just as easy to stick with them.

Thanks in advance.

srsly78

OP just use a second personal bank account for your trading. As said above do not mix personal and business transactions, gives everyone a headache.

There is no "business bank account" suitable for small businesses or sole traders, all the business offerings attract loads of fees (ballpark e500/year). Even worse in some cases (BOI) the business online systems are much much worse than the personal systems!

Just like the poster above I had a BoI business account, it was such a ripoff I closed it. BoI would NOT let me open a second personal account for the company, so I went with another bank. It's not ok to use a personal account for a ltd company, however it is ok for you to operate your business expenses through a "personal expense account" - hint hint

jimmii

The Pontiac wrote: »

I'm also in the process of setting up a Business bank account. I had a look at the AIB application form and it's asking for directors, secretary names and a whole other things. I'm a sole-trader, so do I just put down n/a in the boxes?

Or is their a more simple bank account out there? I'm with AIB for personnel banking so thought it's just as easy to stick with them.

Thanks in advance.

I went to AIB and they suggested I set up a second regular account in the business name instead which is what I have now and works fine. When I filled out the paperwork I seem to remember there being notes explaining what to do if you are a sole trader.

The Pontiac

Thanks for the advice.

A second personal/regular account seems to be the best option.

johnpaulirsh

no you dont, my freind set one up before, all he needed was hes adress and details, no bank account needed. but saying that you might as well get one if your going into buisiness.

Eoin

TheWaterboy wrote: »

When I registered as a sole trader I setup a business bank account with BOI - I closed it last year because its a disaster. All my business is online and their online facilities for business customers are a disaster. They also expect you to pay 15 euro a month for this disaster that only works in Internet Explorer (I'm on Mac).

So I opened a separate personal account (which they were not too happy about) and explained that I simply cannot use their business account. Everything is setup with 365online now and everything is great. .

You can use 365online with a sole trader business account, I think it depends who you speak to on the phone.

The Pontiac

My new business is an eCommerce website, where I'll be using solely Paypal for taking payments.

I've read to avoid the paypal account being frozen, I'm better off with a legit business account?