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N26 raises $160M from Tencent and Allianz
- wslh 9y agoIt would be great to create a new bank from scratch solving basic issues current banks have. The difficult part is the regulatory aspect if they want to operate in different states beyound EU.
- CalRobert 9y agoI think they aim to expand to the US. I'm an N26 customer and US citizen and they asked me to chat with them (paid) about whether I'd use them in the US, etc. (I quite like them, tbf)
- snovv_crash 9y agoAs a US citizen using N26 in the EU, my main complaint is that I can't have any savings accounts (FATCA blah blah blah), so my entire balance is in the checking account that is flashed on the screen when I log in, and linked to my cards. I don't want something with a high interest rate, or stock picker, just a way of putting a firewall between the cards and my cash.
- CalRobert 9y agoHuh, FATCA means you can't have a savings account? I'm also a US citizen using N26 in the EU and hadn't realized that - thought it was because I wasn't in Germany. I haven't pursued savings mostly because the rates are pathetic.
- WordSkill 9y agoTechnically, you _can_ have a savings account, but the paperwork burden for the foreign bank is so high that it breaks that product's financial model, so, they don't make it available to Americans. Living and working in Asia for many years, I always sympathized with the difficulties my American expat friends had in trying to open any sort of local bank account at all, even a current account. Most banks say no the minute they hear you're a US citizen. Not being able to open a bank account in the country in which you live has serious knock-on effects in terms of getting paid, or renting a home. I am eternally amazed that American citizens, who supposedly value personal freedom, put up with having one of the world's most aggressive tax regimes.
- CalRobert 9y agoIt's not fun, but it only affects a small percentage of voters so likely nothing will happen. The fee to renounce is ridiculous too.
- Rjevski 9y agoMonzo (a successful UK challenger bank) has plans to expand in the US so hopefully they'll succeed!
- scrollaway 9y agoI'm a huge fan of N26. Been using them as my primary bank for 2 years. My main wishlist for them: - Allow access to more "raw" data (eg. log of failed payment attempts and why they failed, etc) - Move support back into the mobile app. It used to be there, now it's a pain to find a phone/email to contact. (The web UI still has live chat) - Don't expire fingerprint auth after 30 days if I'm actively using it. - Clarify the differences between the business and personal accounts. It's in a weird state right now. - More default categories, better tagging, etc. The aspect of tagging your transactions is super cool, it's just a bit hard to use right now. I'm a huge fan though and 100% recommend it to anyone living in Europe. If someone wants an affiliate invite, shoot me an email (profile).
- gabrielizaias 9y agoI've been using them for the past 4 months and haven't had to renew the fingerprint auth. Perhaps they solved it recently?
- Numberwang 9y agoI'll switch to them as soon as they support Sweden or Malta. HSBC is pure evil.
- avh02 9y agooh jeez I was with HSBC in the UK, what a train wreck of a banking experience.
- ekzy 9y agoI recently moved to the UK and I now use HSBC personal + business, it is the worst banking experience. The problem is that there is no real alternative yet...
- dharma1 9y agoMonzo for personal and Tide for (small) business. Though I probably would only use Tide as a business expenses account, as they're not FCSC protected
- brunosutic 9y agoI'm Croatia based I've been using revolut for a year now. My only complaint with all these "new banks" is: none of them supports Apple Pay. Maybe now that N26 is going to become a real bank supporting Apple Pay will become a possibility?
- spatzle 9y agoApple Pay is already supported by N26, in countries where Apple Pay is available.
- lloeki 9y agoConfirmed: using it all the time because banks in France (except Banque Populaire) are hell-bent on not supporting Apple Pay, pushing their weight around for the local clusterfuck that is PayLib.
- Rjevski 9y agoReminds me of CurrentC, an equivalent and equally stupid attempt by US supermarket chains.
- WordSkill 9y agoNot true of all N26 countries.
- mnembrini 9y agoThere was an interesting CCC talk about N26 security in 2016 https://disruptive.asia/researcher-n26-security-gaps/ https://disruptive.asia/researcher-n26-security-gaps/ Their security seemed a bit lax back then
- lloeki 9y agoThe talk has been mentioned in a nearby thread, and includes a specific section about N26 response to the incident, which was deemed quite professional. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16627730 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16627730
- StavrosK 9y agoI use N26 as my main bank, but there have been some annoyances/stupid bugs. For example, when I tried to make a transfer and used Greek in the description, the app got in a very weird crashy loop. The website's login screen looked weird on Firefox, the UX is odd (it requires you to confirm a transfer four times), and it takes them forever to fix these things. Other than that, I really like them, and they're very innovative for a bank, but that's a very low bar. Hopefully they'll step up their game with this funding. Revolut, by comparison, is much more usable, although there are things I don't like there as well.
- sajithdilshan 9y agoI think a lot of expats in Germany uses N26 because it used to be easy to open an account without a registered address. But unfortunately, the e-postident doesn't work amymore for most of the South Asian passports (https://www.facebook.com/deutschepost/posts/1805883209423283 https://www.facebook.com/deutschepost/posts/1805883209423283). Hope N26 will introduce more ways of identification.
- avh02 9y agoYeah I didn't have the smoothest onboarding experience with the identity checking (I'm not from a first world country) - however it eventually worked (Feb 2018). I originally couldn't even request postident (verification by Deutsche Post at a local post office for those not familiar) - after an app update the option magically appeared to request postident. What disappointed me was that I was on the phone with their customer support and apparently even if you have a residence ID (I'm assuming this should be considered a legal document proving your identity to the host nation since it's issued by them) that it would not allow me open an account. I really do hope they accept this legal form of identification for those with less luck. I wouldn't say it's a racist thing, but it's certainly feels extremely personal when you can't open an account with an organization because of your nationality (or your national documents to be precise).
- germanier 9y agoThe electronic residence permit is legally not an ID card (even though it looks like one) and they are not allowed to use that as identification as required by banking laws.
- avh02 9y agoI suspected something like this, I'm new here so wasn't definite on that one - in other countries residence cards are (for day to day except at the border) more or less ID proper.
- cosmic_ape 9y agoCan someone list the advantages of using this instead of a regular bank+credit card? 1) Monitoring spending in real time or on a weekly basis is useful, and this seems to make it easier. But just a tool for downloading, viewing and analyzing the data from a regular credit card site would suffice, and can be self made. 2) It creates competition for the regular banks, so they potentially would stop being hogs about some of the fees. But what else?
- purerandomness 9y ago3) It's much quicker to get an account. There is absolutely no paperwork involved. 4) Concentrating only on one thing, they tend to get UI and UX much better than old-fashioned banks, who have to still serve clients who are skeptical about online banking and fill in paper-form money transfers and bring them to the bank in person.
- deleted 9y ago[deleted]
- Rjevski 9y agoUX and the fact that everything runs on a modern platform instead of legacy, COBOL-based rust.
- rkachowski 9y agoThis is true, transactions are entered very quickly compared to most other banks in Germany, and the push notification on a transaction has saved me more than once (being immediatedly notified that Easyjet double charged an airfare, for example). Having said that, the limited monthly access to ATMs and their bad history (closing multiple peoples accounts with no warning) makes me hesitant to recommend them. I use them as a tool for online purchases and little more.
- coinerone 9y agoTransfers are faster, at least in Germany. Compared to the Deutsche Bank (my Main Account). Also the notifications are nearly Realtime. But the biggest selling point to me was the convenience of switching online- and foreign payments on and off wihin the app. I Use N26 heavily for travel and online payments.
- shaqbert 9y agoThe key issue with N26 is their poor unit economics. Right now, they are losing money on most of the checking accounts, as they foot the ATM wholesale fee (though they limit it to 3 "free" ATM withdrawals per months). The issue is that they don't have enough premium services to compensate for the "loss leader" like regular banks do. The hope from Tencent and Allianz is that they will add these now, and then move to great unit economics, but for now they are bleeding red ink.
- 215163831328308 9y agoTheir website[1] front page seems to state up to 5 'free' ATM withdrawals per month. [1]: https://next.n26.com/en-eu/ https://next.n26.com/en-eu/
- coinerone 9y agoOnly 5 free withdrawals if you use your N26 Account as your Main Banking Account (more than 500€ per Month in incoming transfers or so i think).
- h4m24 9y ago"(more than 500€ per Month in incoming transfers or so i think)" it amazes me how ppl make stuff up all the time
- tgsovlerkhgsel 9y agohttps://support.n26.com/read/000001324?locale=en https://support.n26.com/read/000001324?locale=en Salary etc. or 1000 EUR per month, with some other exceptions. Possibly country-specific.
- hocuspocus 9y agoWell, the business strategy for a bank isn't really rocket science. Right now they focus on grabbing market share, which isn't too hard in countries like Germany. They've also introduced a few products (savings, investment, insurance) as a broker, which allows them to gauge the demand among their customer base and develop popular products in-house in the future. While I don't expect them to sell mortgages anytime soon, they have many other ways to make profits. And if they manage to keep their footprint low compared to the way big traditional banks are moving online, I'm sure they'll be fine. Or they could end up being acquired. (I hope they're big enough not to, but consolidation is a real issue in retail banking).
- dawhizkid 9y agoMaybe banks outside the US are terrible, but honestly in the US I find most "big banks" to be completely fine. JPM Chase, Amex, and Cap 1 started heavily investing in their digital units years ago and IMO it shows. Would not say the experience is perfect but I don't need perfect UX...I need reliability and stability. One reason I would never move my primary banking to a startup is customer service. There's absolutely no way that a startup is going to have 24/7 online/phone support like the big banks do.
- tome 9y agoHow do you pay your friend $100? Can you do it direct to their account simply knowing their name and some numbers?
- dawhizkid 9y agoVenmo
- dangrossman 9y agoYou just need an email address or phone number, and the money arrives in minutes. https://www.zellepay.com/participating-banks-and-credit-unions https://www.zellepay.com/participating-banks-and-credit-unio... Which is the US banks' answer to Venmo, Square Cash, PayPal, etc that have offered such a thing nearly worldwide for 20 years.
- mindslight 9y agoYes, and even better, you can make your friend pay you $100 with only knowing their name and account number!
- kuschku 9y agoOne major advantage of N26 is that they’re the only bank in Germany offering a free credit or debit card without conditions. All other banks require either > 30€/year fee for the card, or > X€/month income, or > X€/month spending. Even the Amazon credit card has a 60€/year fee. EDIT: Regarding the comments suggesting dozens of banks – they all have some conditions. You can’t open an account that only holds a balance for a few days per year, and is only ever used to pay e.g. Namecheap or the Google Play developer fee. Most people don’t want or need a CC in daily life, only to interact with shitty startups or US companies that assume everyone has a CC.
- stadeschuldt 9y agoI looked into N26 but their lack of HBCI support was a deal breaker for me.
- hawski 9y agoI live in Germany for almost 3 years now and for the first half I just used EUR account of my Polish bank. I only needed an account here, because I moved to a new apartment. And to sign up for Internet connection available provider needed German bank account number. It's prevalent to pay for all recurring costs with Lastschriftmandat. That's totally alien to me. I prefer just to manually pay it myself with bank transfer. Generally it's a form to fill out, sign and send - then they go to your bank and get paid. Anyways I tried with two other banks first. One did not answer at all. A second one after 4 weeks or so just answered that they will not open an account for me, with no reason why. With N26 it was really fast and pleasant. From my Polish bank I have Visa card and at least in Berlin it's not widely accepted. N26 gives Maestro card that is accepted a bit wider. However German EC card is a standard one that will be accepted everywhere where cards are accepted, while it's not the same with Maestro. However there are many many places that require cash. N26 gives 3 free withdrawals. My Polish bank gives me free withdrawals everywhere. That's why I still use it. Even more, in Poland cards are very widely accepted. Lately I could get by with just a phone in my pocket - Android pay is supported. N26 has quite nice application, but it does not even begin to compare to my Polish bank. In Polish bank when I want to setup a transfer it gives ability to fill out everything based on history. In N26 I have to copy the amount and the message, it's tiresome. Now I think about account in more traditional bank to get EC card and set up join account with my wife, that's also not possible in N26.
- jazzyk 9y agoWould you be willing to name the Polish bank? Are there any other banks providing similar services/support?
- hawski 9y agomBank. Funny thing is that mBank started as purely as an internet bank. Nowadays it has also stationary branches. I think that most banks in Poland had to up their game, because of mBank. And you can have cheap transfers in EU between EUR accounts, even when the country does not use euro as the currency. It's around 1.something EUR.
- nraynaud 9y agoI mainly use my N26 card here in the US, because I believe the conversion rate is cheaper (I never actually checked). If you are in the US, the instant notification of credit card swiping is mostly useless in restaurants, since it doesn't show the tip until the transaction is actually processed a long time later. A few restaurants ask you to go in the back with them to type your pin, because they have a chip reader, but they don't yet have the wireless "gameboy" (it just occurred to me that pin+tip might be a tall order, the pin protects the amount too).
- atomwaffel 9y ago> (it just occurred to me that pin+tip might be a tall order, the pin protects the amount too) Where I live, the card machines show you the total and ask you to type in the final amount (including tip) before you enter your pin.
- twooclock 9y agoUsing N26 for last 6+ months. Love no fee on transfers, realtime notifications, their masterkey works worldwide (had no problems in eu, us and canada), easy to block/enable internet or abroad payments and daily limits. I don't do atm withdrawals though. Overall great deal for me sofar. Would recommend.
- domenukk 9y agoA paper about N26 Security https://www1.cs.fau.de/filepool/projects/n26/n26-roots.pdf https://www1.cs.fau.de/filepool/projects/n26/n26-roots.pdf
- mlamat 9y agoI have had N26 for more than a year. I use it for shopping, as a secondary account. I don't use cash anymore. I've had no problems. But why do they have the "Statistics" button on their website if I couldn't use it since I registered???
- homakov 9y agoA year ago I had $100 balance and my $50 payment to some cafe turned it into $150. They added money instead of deducting it. That was fixed soon but that's how I still feel about N26.