Banking in a new country
Having lived in India slowly building up financial security after the student life, with different payment instruments having been offered easily without even asking, and having experimented with many of these methods with the multiple launch of multiple fintech companies and working in the fintech and payments space, and dissecting and learning the systems and behind-the-scenes of how money moves, I was ignorant about why the US and other countries regularly had startups that claimed to bring easier banking to the unbanked. Now I know I guess.
Moving to Germany with a forex card loaded with funds and imagining there are enough ways to have access to my funds whenever required did not really go as I expected, rife with painful and interesting experiences that need some penning down to understand what’s going on. It’s a mix of building identity in a new country as an alien, which is a pre-requisite to banking and
What did I land in Germany with? A job contract, an EU Blue Card visa, a forex card and some loose Euro cash. Next important step was to get identified as a valid resident of the country, for which Germany requires the address to be registered first. Solidifying identity in Germany requires that one is a part of the social security system, which requires the address registration and health insurance registration, both of which are enforced by the employer. The payroll requires the Tax ID and the health insurance ID of every individual. The final one is the Residence Card (Aufenthalstitel) which shows the status of the residence for the individual, which is required by most banks and sometimes home owners. It’s also a looong process with long appointment waiting times and a long form to be filled out.
The first challenge was getting a bank account. With the identity part of the puzzle not fully solved yet, getting entry into the financial system is hard. Simple Germany has a (good resource)[https://www.simplegermany.com/banking-in-germany/] on the options available. After eliminating traditional banks and others who need a residence card and Revolut who doesn’t support Indian passports any more, I was left with Bunq and Wise. Wise does not have a German IBAN, which left me with Bunq. Bunq doesn’t ‘feel serious’ but like a MVP application, but I love it because I’m able to finally have a savings and a checking account, generate a virtual debit/credit card and tokenize that on my Google Wallet for in-store purchases. Relief as I finally have the ability to spend.
The next problem was the lack of funds for putting down the deposit for the new rental home and other immediate spends until my salary arrived at the end of the month. BookMyForex also spooked me with asking for a disclaimer saying “I wasn’t transferring money to myself”, but I was! Hello, what’s wrong with transferring my own money for personal spends in another country? Both BookMyForex and HDFC Bank RemitNow couldn’t pass the beneficiary validation stating vague “Invalid IBAN” errors. Oh well, I assumed Bunq being an EU neobank may not be connected to the SWIFT network, so I decided to try Wise. Wise gave me an EU bank account after validating with a 20 EUR initial transfer. All set - or so I thought. BookMyForex and HDFC still thew the same errors at me for my Wise IBAN. Disheartened, I wanted to know if I can open a INR wallet in the same Wise account, but apparently not. My ICICI bank account being my dearest until I left it behind with HDFC, I went back there and voila! What a smooth experience it was! My transfer was complete in about 1 to 2 hours. I finally had access to funds tearsofjoy.