It has now been almost 6 months since I discovered online banking. Or should I say online banking, plural. Initially attracted by the opening and/or sponsorship bonuses that they simply made it possible to obtain (as a reminder, €1,300 in earnings through this in 2013), what is my opinion on this first period of use? What’s the verdict? This article aims to present my personal experience of these online banks, their promises and the truth behind these promises. A brief overview.
My first online bank was Boursorama, in October of last year. After spending a few minutes gathering the necessary documents to open an account, registration was child’s play: a few photos taken directly with my smartphone of these various supporting documents (identity card or passport, RIB of his current bank, proof of residence, payslips…) that can be sent directly to the site, a few clicks, an automated confirmation by telephone… And that’s it, you’re done! I then only had to wait a few weeks, between 2 and 3 on average according to my experience, and my account was opened in my first online bank.
Regardless of the online bank, the steps are almost identical: opening an account in several online banks will not be more complicated than for one : it’s really easy. Be vigilant, however, you need to pay a few hundred euros to open these accounts: €300 for HelloBank and Boursorama, €500 for Fortuneo. If these few euros are then recoverable without any problem, since I remind you that these are current accounts, think all the same that these will be immobilized for about 3 weeks, from the start of the process until your accesses are workforce. Nothing exceptional, but keep that in mind.
Once these accesses are in place, everything is again very simple: everything is done online and everything is obviously secure. Your mobile phone will be a precious ally, since sensitive operations will be accompanied by the sending of a code by SMS to ensure that you are indeed the initiator of the action: you therefore feel very quickly reassured to navigate and carry out banking transactions on the sites of an online bank.
So, what results after a semester in the company of different online banks? These are now fully included in the organization and optimization of my personal finances, at least for 2 of them. As a reminder, I have an account with HelloBank, Boursorama and Fortuneo. I will not comment on the first, since I hardly use it. I can just say that its interface is cleaner than its counterparts, but not necessarily more intuitive.
After these few months of use, here are 7 reasons to switch to online banking, and even more to stay there:
In general, the service for daily stocks is identical to a physical bank, all for zero cost. Personally, I am therefore very satisfied with the services offered and rendered by my various online banks:
I will return in a future article to the points to watch out for before switching to online banking.
And you, have you ever switched to online banking? If so, are you satisfied? If not, do you plan to take the plunge? What are your fears?