StCirq

Getting ready to park a fair bit of money in a French bank. I don't think I want to do it at the Crédit Commerciale du Sudouest, the bank I've dealt with over the past 20+ years. My head is starting to spin reading about various other banks. Can anyone who lives/banks in France make a recommendation? I suppose location could be important, but you all know where I'll be based.

Merci d'avance!

Michael

I have been using the Crédit Agricole but I can't compare its services to any other French bank. Proceeds from the sale of our house has just been deposited into the account, but I still do not know how easy it will be to transfer that money to the U.S. Depositing money to the Crédit Agricole via electronic transfer using xe.com has been painless, with no fee charged by either of my banks.

StCirq

Thanks, Michael. That's good to know about no fees. One of the thinks I dislike about the Crédit Commerciale is that it charges me something like 20 euros to make a deposit, and often that's been a fair percentage of what I was depositing. I do't foresee having to send money from France back to the USA, but you never know...

ribeirasacra

Take the west bank of the La Seine in Paris. ;-)

StCirq

There's a west bank of the Seine?

Bertrandfr

Stcirq,

Je vous conseil 2 banques BNP Paribas ou Société Générale, un petit conseil mieux vaut pour vous de faire échanger vos Dollars en Euros dans votre pays, et ensuite déposer vos euros dans une banque Française à votre arrivée.

Cela diminuera vos frais de change en France qui sont très élevés, et vous n'aurez pas de frais de transaction duent aux virements entre votre compte aux USA, et votre compte en France.

Cathinjoetown

We've used Crédit Agricole since we've lived here, including the transfer of funds to purchase the house. Everything went smoothly.

I also can't compare them to other French banks although friends using other banks report similar experiences. Compared to US banks CA's practices are different and took getting used to. We've sometimes been frustrated and bemused.

You may have experienced some of these with your current bank--low limits on ATM cash withdrawals unless you pay to upgrade your debit card, limited access to withdraw cash from a branch (including from your own) without 48 hours' notice. I'm not talking huge amounts, we were called out for wanting to withdraw more than 1000€.

They also won't reprint our checks to fix an error (they are labeled "non resident euro account") until we've used up those which are already printed--which they dole out one book at a time. At the rate we write checks we'll never get corrected ones.

The smaller branches recently changed to service centres, common across the industry. This isn't a huge problem as we rarely go in the branch and there's a full service branch not too far from us.

You're probably wondering why we don't change but every bank here seems to charge more fees than the US and has its own set of quirks.

Cathinjoetown

Forgot to add, all banks in France, as far as I know, do not charge fees to deposit social security or pension direct deposits. The exchange rates, in our experience, are the inter-bank rates on the day, so as favorable as it gets. No charge on ATM withdrawals from any bank's ATMs.

StCirq

Merci, Bertrand. Il me faut faire des recherches - je sais que nous avons des Sociétés Générales dans le Périgord, mais je n'ai jamais vu un Paribas - peut-être à Périgueux.

Thanks, Cathinjoetown. I have neighbors in the Dordogne who left CA, citing all manner of niggling issues, but I know you're right that they exist in pretty much every bank in France. I still have a Crédit Commerciale checkbook, and I haven't written a check for 7+ years!

StCirq

Good to know, cath, as my husband gets a SS check, and I may also by the time we're over there.

sandralist

Even Italians use Credit Agricole, but no ex-pat I know "park a fair bit of money" in a European bank for any length time every since Cyprus. Transfers are done at last possible moments on an as-needed basis and otherwise balances are no more than adequate for routine expenditures.

Michael

BNP Paribas is in Périgueux. I used to withdraw money from its ATM when BofA had free withdrawals from partner banks.

Bertrandfr's comments are somewhat misleading. Changing dollars to euros in the States involves fees also. As far as I know, electronic transfers are just about the cheapest way to transfer money, and even then there is a fee through a differential in the exchange rate. Xe.com will charge 2% on $10,000, presumably less on higher amounts.

I should add that I used the Crédit Agricole account only to pay standard bills such as water and electricity via direct withdrawals, and to write checks for things like taxes, insurance or paying for work on the house. I never had an ATM card from the bank, which I believe implies a monthly fee. Checking has been, until now, free. It has been cheaper for me to withdraw cash from my American credit union account which charges only the 1% Visa conversion fee.

Even if considering a permanent move to France, it may be worthwhile to use a U.S. based ATM card and Visa card.

dugi_otok

I happen to use Bank of the West in California (Encino Branch).They have on-line banking. Bank of the West is owned by the French giant BNP Paribas. You may want to find out if there is any advantage to having accounts in these two banks, bank-to-bank transfers, etc. Branch Managers at Bank of the West are empowered to waive fees when asked.

StCirq

Thanks, all. Michael, I know about the cheapest way to transfer funds - been doing it for years, most recently through my credit union.

Will look into Bank of the West, dugi_otok. Thank you.

We may just stick with our World Bank and Andrews Credit Unions for most transactions. I will have to have a substantial amount of euros in a French bank, though, at some point, for various reasons.

Carlux

Well, I have never had great experience with the Credit Agricole in Sarlat, and the Societe Generale in Souillac was a disaster.

On the recommendation of French friends we went with Societe Generale, and have been happy. What convinced us was that they gave us a client rep. who knows us, rather than just having to deal with whoever you come across.

Jeff801

Hi St. Cirq,

I'm sorry for my disappearance for a year or so, but I never knew how much work retirement could be. And, some of my assignments in the states lingered for far more than I expected.

But, in answer to your question, I have had great service from the Barclays Bank in Bergerac. They do not have any particular fees,are open on Mondays, a rarity in France, and are more than helpful if I have any question, including a recommendation for an international accountant. They have branches throughout France as well.

Cathinjoetown

Think we may have a look at Société Generale! We have so many direct debits going through our account that I dread switching.

Michael, you are correct, CA charges a monthly fee for an ATM card in our case 5.10€--unlimited use except only 350€ cash withdrawal per rolling week, bit more if you're out of the country. We inquired about a higher cash withdrawal amount, no problem but higher monthly fee.

Perhaps other banks do as well. I do know many people around here pay with checks in the supermarkets and stores, which you hardly ever see anymore in the UK or US. But, we live in a very rural, traditional and frugal area.

I do like putting everything on monthly budget payments--EDF, Orange, house and car insurance, tax foncière and habitation and even estimated income tax. Some are on 10-month schedules, we feel positively rich in November and December.

We also maintain a US checking account and $ credit and debit cards. Could not do without those. We had a blip with Fidelity this year--received a notice that as we lived overseas we could keep our account but no longer trade shares. That turned out to be easily resolved by using my brother's US address. So far, our bank, credit card, etc. are fine with the French address although the bank recently requested more detailed info--tighter US money laundering regulations. What a joke, I only wish hundreds of thousands of $ were flowing through our accounts!

St Cirq, when are you coming over?

bilboburgler

"Even Italians use Credit Agricole, but no ex-pat I know "park a fair bit of money" in a European bank for any length time every since Cyprus. Transfers are done at last possible moments on an as-needed basis and otherwise balances are no more than adequate for routine expenditures."

Interesting, just about all the ex-pats I know keep money all over but mainly in North Western European Banking community. So UK, Netherlands, Germany all seen as solid.

Possibly true then in Italy.

sandralist

I was just reading an article in the FT about capital controls in Iceland, which have yet to be removed, and which paralyzed the deposits of foreigners. Fine if all you've deposited is going to be spent in the local currency. Not so fine if you suddenly need to take your money back into a different currency.

Sudden bank collapses that hurt depositors obviously hit the very largest depositors first and most people are not in that league -- although the smaller players who got hurt in Cyprus were in no position to take the blow. More than one story was people who had deposited funds as part of a property purchase.

There would be no such thing as bank collapses if banks that were "all seen as solid" didn't surprisingly turn out to be insolvent. And there are bank collapses.

There is no way of avoiding occasional large transfers of money into foreign bank accounts. Good financial managers and advisers can provide a lot of protection to assets.

Asking on the internet about what to do with considerable amounts of money is not what I would do with considerable amounts of money.

sandralist

bilboburger,

I just realized that the way I wrote my original comment caused you to (understandably) not get my meaning.

Italians have rather unique attitudes about banks in general, but like everybody else, they appreciate lower transaction fees and bank efficiency, etc, so many of them use Credit Agricole as their everyday bank for everyday transactions instead of local Italian-based banks.

That is an entirely different issue from where to park large amounts of euros for some length of time. It might not be a good idea to park substantial sums in the bank with the lowest transactions fees and the friendliest smile. Nothing against Credit Agricole, but that is not the test.

The present day European banking system is not run for the benefit and protect the assets of French-bank depositors, foreign depositors, Italian-bank depositors, or the taxpayers of those countries. Today's European banking system is run to benefit of German bond holders, depositors and taxpayers. It is a two-tier system. In a hierarchy of "who gets tapped first" to pay the bills when the euro system is threatened, foreign depositors in non-German owned banks aren't the first to get hit. Surely nobody at this point is expecting Hollande to hold the line for them should push comes to shove. (I'd sooner count on Matteo Renzi -- although I am sure he has no illusions about the limits of his power). I don't know if anyone would disagree, but my view is that Francois Hollande is the least influential politician in Europe today.

German policymakers are not answerable to anybody but German citizens and German bankers. Not everybody thinks they are doing a good job of solving the euro's problems. So it might not be a good idea to park large sums of cash you might not be able to afford to lose without first consulting a professional who specializes in this. I would guess that anybody contemplating a move to Europe would already be paying for the advice of such a professional . If not, it would be prudent, I think, to do so, before moving money.