Going bankless

talkto

Any tips for going bankless?

e.g. how to receive your salary; paying for things with card; etc

Yggr of Asgard

Why would you go bankless?

With the ever growing restrictions on cash?

talkto

Yggr of Asgard wrote: »

Why would you go bankless?

With the ever growing restrictions on cash?

I don't want to discuss my personal reasons, I'm just looking for any potential advice on executing it.

Mrs OBumble

Credit union. Not every employer is able to pay to them, though. Worst case, you may have to appoint someone as your agent, and have your salary paid to their bank account instead.



NB Some people may be surprise by just how many people don't actually have bank accounts. It's more common than you think.

Delta2113

Once you can get your salary it's very easy after that to go bankless provided you don't need to set up a direct debit as a requirement e.g. maybe mortgage or gym membership and you are happy to do without direct debit discounts from utility companies.

Hollister11

Would it not make life harder, not having a bank account ?

Yggr of Asgard

If you don't want to pay extra to pay certain bills, pay deposits for things like electricity or gas than it's very hard to go without a bank account.

In fact it's so hard, that the EU has introduced legislation which guarantees access to a bank account including a debit card that can be used online.

As to the OP without knowing the exact reason why you want to go bank less it's hard to give you options.

Income
So here will be your biggest challenge, if you have a small employer they might be able to pay you cash, but if you got the job for the multinational company they might only do bank transfer. Your workaround could be to use a prepaid card that has it's own IBAN (Swirlcard for example) but those are usually expensive. You also could have the Salary paid to trusted friend because with SEPA it's the IBAN that counts not the name on the account, so if your employer sends it to you with your friends IBAN there should not be trouble. But it might raise questions with your employer if you ask them for something else than bank transfer. And it's dangerous if your friend does not give you the funds.

Future Credit
Once you have repaired your credit it's going to be harder for you to gain access to further credit (credit cards, mortgage) as responsible lenders would like to see your bank account statements for a certain period of time. So it might be hard for you to get credit in future.

New Suppliers Bills
You might see that some companies like Electricity/GAS providers won't set up a post pay account for you if you don't pay by direct debit or only allow you post pay if you pay a deposit. Workaround is the deposit or using a pre-pay service for those, however those are usually considerable more expensive.

Existing Bills
You might find that companies allow you to pay their invoices at the post office but a lot of companies have started charging extra for those transactions. You also could pay those with a postal order, but again that will generate significant more cost. So the payment options will drive your choice for who you purchase stuff from.

Credit Cards
If you don't have a credit card currently, without a bank account you might need to resort to prepaid cards (like swirl, 3money) to have access to a "credit" card you can use online where other payment options are not available. However that will generate significant cost (as there often is cost for both paying cash into the card and using the card). You won't be able to use prepaid cards which can not be loaded cashless because usually those require that loads are coming from your own bank account.

Rent
Your landlord might not be happy to get the money in cash or paid into his bank account at a bank branch because it might generate problems for him with revenue in case he get's audited. But it would depend on your landlord.

It's not going to be easy to go on without a bank account if you have bills to pay but it's possible, however you will look at increased cost to deal with cash only.

_Brian

talkto wrote: »

Any tips for going bankless?

e.g. how to receive your salary; paying for things with card; etc

Is that you again Bertie ??

talkto

Yggr of Asgard wrote: »

If you don't want to pay extra to pay certain bills, pay deposits for things like electricity or gas than it's very hard to go without a bank account.

In fact it's so hard, that the EU has introduced legislation which guarantees access to a bank account including a debit card that can be used online.

As to the OP without knowing the exact reason why you want to go bank less it's hard to give you options.

Income
So here will be your biggest challenge, if you have a small employer they might be able to pay you cash, but if you got the job for the multinational company they might only do bank transfer. Your workaround could be to use a prepaid card that has it's own IBAN (Swirlcard for example) but those are usually expensive. You also could have the Salary paid to trusted friend because with SEPA it's the IBAN that counts not the name on the account, so if your employer sends it to you with your friends IBAN there should not be trouble. But it might raise questions with your employer if you ask them for something else than bank transfer. And it's dangerous if your friend does not give you the funds.

Future Credit
Once you have repaired your credit it's going to be harder for you to gain access to further credit (credit cards, mortgage) as responsible lenders would like to see your bank account statements for a certain period of time. So it might be hard for you to get credit in future.

New Suppliers Bills
You might see that some companies like Electricity/GAS providers won't set up a post pay account for you if you don't pay by direct debit or only allow you post pay if you pay a deposit. Workaround is the deposit or using a pre-pay service for those, however those are usually considerable more expensive.

Existing Bills
You might find that companies allow you to pay their invoices at the post office but a lot of companies have started charging extra for those transactions. You also could pay those with a postal order, but again that will generate significant more cost. So the payment options will drive your choice for who you purchase stuff from.

Credit Cards
If you don't have a credit card currently, without a bank account you might need to resort to prepaid cards (like swirl, 3money) to have access to a "credit" card you can use online where other payment options are not available. However that will generate significant cost (as there often is cost for both paying cash into the card and using the card). You won't be able to use prepaid cards which can not be loaded cashless because usually those require that loads are coming from your own bank account.

Rent
Your landlord might not be happy to get the money in cash or paid into his bank account at a bank branch because it might generate problems for him with revenue in case he get's audited. But it would depend on your landlord.

It's not going to be easy to go on without a bank account if you have bills to pay but it's possible, however you will look at increased cost to deal with cash only.

Very detailed response! Thanks!

Fred Swanson

This post has been deleted.

seamus

Worth noting that you have no legal right to demand that an employer pay your salary in a specific way.

Most employers will make reasonable accommodation for a month or two and write a cheque, but not long term. So if you change job and point blank refuse to accept a bank transfer as payment, you'll quickly find yourself out of a job again.

Looking at things like Swirlcard above, there are still limitations - Swirlcard will only allow you to deposit €15k in a calendar year. Which is not going to be enough. You could buy a new card every couple of months and change your payment details with your employer though. It also works out expensive in the long run - you can't withdraw more than €1,000 in cash in any year and you will pay 3% on every purchase.

The limits on Swirlcard above are partially to combat money laundering and fraud, so you may find that if you are constantly getting new cards and registering them, that you will appear on more government radars than if you just used a normal bank account.

If you're concerned about being traceable then by far the wisest thing to do is open a standard bank account without a debit card, make large cash withdrawals and pay for everything in cash. Any scenario where you have a card for making purchases will leave a big trail.

talkto

Some of these questions may sound stupid but I'm not 100% sure what options are out there so bear with me...

Lets say you need an account of some sort for the sole purposes of

(1) having your salary lodged to an account using IBAN & BIC functions
(2) paying direct debits
(3) ATM machine / paying for things by debit card,

so, NO credit EVER, NO loans EVER, NO overdrafts ever, NO frills, no junk, no stupid ads promising to give you 10c back on each debit card purchase, just absolutely no nonsense.

Is a standard bank account the only option for having access to the three functions I listed above, and/or what is the nearest alternative? I'm not familiar with Credit Unions, Post Office banking, Building Societies, those German banks like Revolut, etc etc etc.

Besides simply not applying for credit in the first place, how can one stay as far away from bank (i.e. credit) culture as possible, whilst retaining access to those three functions I listed above ?

seamus

Your nearest alternative may be a large credit union. But you'd need to speak to them to see if they have everything you need. They may not be able to supply an IBAN, or may not be able to do large withdrawals (over €500) at zero notice.

Post bank, building societies are basically just banks at this stage, very little in the difference. "New" technologies like Revolut etc are just different ways of moving money around, but no matter what will always have to be underpinned or funded by a bank account, which in turn has to be underpinned by a legal bank.

The days of being able to keep cash under your mattress are almost gone. Partially because it's cheaper for everyone that way, but also because money laundering laws are designed to make it difficult to stay under the radar.

Bubbaclaus

1. Purchase a larger mattress to ensure you can stuff it all in.
2. Don't leave it on the roof of a car as you drive off.

Delta2113

The EBS Money Manager is a best buy for Current Accounts - no cheque book, no overdraft,no contactless,no mobile app. AIB own EBS but technically it's a building society -might be an option.


http://www.ebs.ie/daily-banking/ebs-moneymanager-account-a-debit-card.html

petethedrummer

talkto wrote: »

so, NO credit EVER, NO loans EVER, NO overdrafts ever, NO frills, no junk, no stupid ads promising to give you 10c back on each debit card purchase, just absolutely no nonsense.

Get a regular current account:

• Don't apply for an overdraft.
• Don't apply for a loan.
• Don't apply for a credit card. (though they are handy for travel and internet shopping and you don't HAVE to use it, but yes there is the annual govt levy).
• Get paperless statements (if you have online banking).
• I've had current accounts with 3 different banks and none of them ever called or emailed to sell more services.
• Online banking is good as it saves you the hassle of going to branches.
• Ulsterbank current account is free if you maintain 3000 balance.
• AIB is free if you maintain 2500 minimum balance AFAIK.
• I'm trialling KBC current account at the moment. Free if 2500 is lodged to your account every month.

I think the potential hassle of the things you listed would not be as great as the hassle of not having a bank account. Most of them are in your control anyway, apart from the ads. Throw your TV out the window?