<story><title>N26 will be leaving the UK</title><url>https://n26.com/en-de/blog/leaving-uk-does-not-change-our-global-vision-to-transform-retail-banking-for-the-better</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>alibarber</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve recently moved from the UK to another European country, and whilst I despise the way the politics is going back home - I&amp;#x27;m amazed at how much better banking is back in the UK. It&amp;#x27;s free to have an account and debit card, often with a modest free overdraft. And transfers are really instant. As in I can transfer from Barclays to Santander and by the time I&amp;#x27;ve double-tapped between bank apps the money will be there cleared, at any time of day.&lt;p&gt;Here it&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;transfer before 2pm and we&amp;#x27;ll send it the same _working_ day!!&amp;#x27; And that&amp;#x27;s once you&amp;#x27;ve made your appointment a week out to open an account, and maybe received everything after a few weeks (if they like you that is)...&lt;p&gt;I got the impression that N26 was mainly to challenge the latter way of working. I didn&amp;#x27;t understand what their offer was even for a free account that was better than even a &amp;#x27;legacy&amp;#x27; bank in the UK (and I&amp;#x27;m not sure they even support direct debit - which would have made it useless for any super-cheap energy&amp;#x2F;phone etc deals).&lt;p&gt;In all - yes Brexit sucks, yes they may have stayed in the UK without it (although I wouldn&amp;#x27;t have expected them to introduce anything new), but I don&amp;#x27;t think they can blame any lack of success in the UK on it.</text></item><item><author>danpalmer</author><text>Businesses pulling out of the UK based on the Brexit process is bad for the UK, and I&amp;#x27;m sure this was indeed mainly motivated by N26&amp;#x27;s need for a UK banking licence, which is a costly and difficult process to go through. However, it&amp;#x27;s worth noting that they are pretty small in the UK (~200k users).&lt;p&gt;They&amp;#x27;re very successful in Germany where banking is a very slow, difficult, manually run industry (from what I&amp;#x27;ve heard), but in the UK we have generally very good banking infrastructure – payments are normally instant and free, and there&amp;#x27;s a lot of consumer protection with things like the current account switching service guarantee.&lt;p&gt;Startups such as Monzo and Starling started in this great infrastructure and now offer relatively compelling products, while the incumbents are getting to grips with modern tech and doing better than many people realise.&lt;p&gt;N26 on the other hand just didn&amp;#x27;t have a compelling offering. They charged for most&amp;#x2F;all of their accounts (explicit charges for accounts in the UK are uncommon), they lacked features, and their marketing was unremarkable compared to the competition.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>satysin</author><text>Oh. My. God. YES!&lt;p&gt;I moved from the UK to [redacted] in 2018 (in part due to Brexit but that is a longer story) and dear god the banking systems here are utter shit.&lt;p&gt;I am with HSBC and I can&amp;#x27;t even change the PIN on my debit card! Hell I couldn&amp;#x27;t even get my card and cheque book (yes they still use cheques here!) delivered to my address as it was a temporary one so I had to collect it from my branch in person.&lt;p&gt;If I buy something on my card it takes at least &lt;i&gt;three&lt;/i&gt; days before it is listed in the HSBC mobile app or web site.&lt;p&gt;I generally use cash so it isn&amp;#x27;t a huge issue for me (check my post history for some explanation on why I mostly use cash) but god is banking frustrating here.&lt;p&gt;The only positive is that I do have an actual account manager (as in the same person) who I always deal with and he is &lt;i&gt;excellent&lt;/i&gt; at sorting my problem. I have to say I do like that consistent human content. Obviously if it is an emergency I use their emergency line (lost card, etc) but for general inquiries that don&amp;#x27;t require instant action my account manager is my go to.&lt;p&gt;&lt;i&gt;(thank you for bringing this up I feel I needed this quick rant!)&lt;/i&gt;</text></comment>
<story><title>N26 will be leaving the UK</title><url>https://n26.com/en-de/blog/leaving-uk-does-not-change-our-global-vision-to-transform-retail-banking-for-the-better</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>alibarber</author><text>I&amp;#x27;ve recently moved from the UK to another European country, and whilst I despise the way the politics is going back home - I&amp;#x27;m amazed at how much better banking is back in the UK. It&amp;#x27;s free to have an account and debit card, often with a modest free overdraft. And transfers are really instant. As in I can transfer from Barclays to Santander and by the time I&amp;#x27;ve double-tapped between bank apps the money will be there cleared, at any time of day.&lt;p&gt;Here it&amp;#x27;s &amp;#x27;transfer before 2pm and we&amp;#x27;ll send it the same _working_ day!!&amp;#x27; And that&amp;#x27;s once you&amp;#x27;ve made your appointment a week out to open an account, and maybe received everything after a few weeks (if they like you that is)...&lt;p&gt;I got the impression that N26 was mainly to challenge the latter way of working. I didn&amp;#x27;t understand what their offer was even for a free account that was better than even a &amp;#x27;legacy&amp;#x27; bank in the UK (and I&amp;#x27;m not sure they even support direct debit - which would have made it useless for any super-cheap energy&amp;#x2F;phone etc deals).&lt;p&gt;In all - yes Brexit sucks, yes they may have stayed in the UK without it (although I wouldn&amp;#x27;t have expected them to introduce anything new), but I don&amp;#x27;t think they can blame any lack of success in the UK on it.</text></item><item><author>danpalmer</author><text>Businesses pulling out of the UK based on the Brexit process is bad for the UK, and I&amp;#x27;m sure this was indeed mainly motivated by N26&amp;#x27;s need for a UK banking licence, which is a costly and difficult process to go through. However, it&amp;#x27;s worth noting that they are pretty small in the UK (~200k users).&lt;p&gt;They&amp;#x27;re very successful in Germany where banking is a very slow, difficult, manually run industry (from what I&amp;#x27;ve heard), but in the UK we have generally very good banking infrastructure – payments are normally instant and free, and there&amp;#x27;s a lot of consumer protection with things like the current account switching service guarantee.&lt;p&gt;Startups such as Monzo and Starling started in this great infrastructure and now offer relatively compelling products, while the incumbents are getting to grips with modern tech and doing better than many people realise.&lt;p&gt;N26 on the other hand just didn&amp;#x27;t have a compelling offering. They charged for most&amp;#x2F;all of their accounts (explicit charges for accounts in the UK are uncommon), they lacked features, and their marketing was unremarkable compared to the competition.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>cosmodisk</author><text>Some parts of the UK banking are good,some are bad, and some are outright fully fledged idiocy. In mainland Europe it varies a lot depending on a country, i.e. Scandinavian banks in Baltics are pure shit.I had some funny situations with banks since I moved in to the UK:
Barclays refused to open a bank account because the letter from the job centre( Confirmation of National Insurance Number application) had its logo in black and white instead of color.
Santander issued some random card that is even more limited than simple debit card.
Walked into Metro bank to pay a bill and asked how much it&amp;#x27;d cost me- the guy&amp;#x27;s jaw dropped on the floor and then he replied that it&amp;#x27;s free( then my jaw dropped on the flor because that was undheard of for me).
A guy I used to know walked into a branch of Santander with his employment contract with Starbucks asking to open a bank account.They refused.Walked out and went to the nearest branch of the same bank- they opened an account immediately. 
And the list goes on and on.</text></comment>