Italian Bank Accounts

Today has been a long day but a quite good day. I managed to do lots of things and I feel satisfied.

This morning I started to look around online to finally choose an Italian bank account.It's a big jungle and I didn't have a clue where to start. All my friends has suggested different banks but none of them looked overly good. Some where to expensive, others hardly had any branches or they didn't exist outside Milan.... big mess.

I guess you swedish and english people who reads this might wonder what the h*** I'm talking about but this is the truth. Here in Italy you pay to open an account, you pay a monthly fee to have an account, you pay to have a credit card, you pay to withdraw money from other cash machines than your own bank, you pay for the internet banking etc etc. Doesn't make sense for me.

In Sweden (I have Nordea) I pay to have my credit card but that's it. I can then withdraw for free not only at all cash machines in Sweden but also within all Euro countries. Bank transfers in europe the same. The only bad thing with my swedish account is that the interest is very low... with the same amount on my swedish savings account I get the same interest in one year that I get in one month in England.

In England it's quite hard to open a bank account but then it's possible to have everything for free, including debit and credit cards. I withdraw for free within UK, to withdraw abroad cost between £2-£5. But the interest is very good. I just have a normal savings account and it's good so image the real savings accounts.

However Italy is as with everything else a bit behind and the banks charge you instead of giving interest and I just have to accept that fact. Today I finally took the decision to open my first Italian bank account and I choose Barkley's Italia. The only bank none of my friends had recommended.. haha. They have a branch just next to my house and the account was quite cheap so I'm happy! And even happier that I finally got it, an own italian bank account, wee :)

xoxo