[poleman]

Found it 

http://www.cleanitup.co.uk/smf/index.php?topic=50072.0

Andy

[Wayne Thomas]

Thanks Andy, I've just added the link to my favourites to peruse tomorrow.

[poleman]

Yes I am going to join, if only for the free banking, as I pay over a thousand pounds a year in charges

Andy

[LWC]

this sounds quite good, £170 a year and thats it?

where do you pay the money into?

sounding thick as usual, i am only a window cleaner though lol

[[GQC] Tim]

Alliance Leicester Commercial. Everything free, don't have to pay a penny for anything. Brilliant bank.

Free? For how long? No one gives you something for nothing, there's always a catch.

For always man, Alliance Leicester is 100% free for literally everything, cheque depostis everything, the lot. Not kidding. The only requirement is that you are over £1000 a month, if not, they'll charge you £5 a month.

And that's the way it should be!!! Free

[steve m]

the abbey are free, unless you pay inmore than £3000 in cheques.

[Paul Coleman]

There are some free business accounts flying around.  For a long time I used Abbey National (think is just abbey now) which was completely free as long as you stayed in credit.  There was no limit as to how many cheques and cash you could pay in at a particular time.

One slight annoyance though, you cant use the branches, you can only use the cash machines to pay stuff in.  Obviously thats no good if you have a lot of coins.  You can log on online for statements and to check balances etc.

But I found it ok.  I had some customers who like to pay by standing order and I never really liked the idea of giving them my personal bank details.

Also, when I later got commercial constracts that wanted to pay by bacs, it looks a whole lot more pro if you give them the details of your business bank account - even if it is just a free one from the abbey.

With Abbey, it's unlimited cheques for the first year, then restricted to 25 per month then I think it's 50p per cheque (after the first 25)

My business account with Abbey is different to that.  It's the first 100 cheques in a calendar month are free.  Also, all electronic transactions are free as well (BACS etc).  I do manage to keep it below 100 a month.  When I'm very busy, I sometimes need to hold a few back until the following month.  If I ever start to get a quantity of cheques left over, I would just put them into my personal account and do an electronic transfer into the business account in one transaction.  Normally I would have no problem paying bank charges on cheques but the trouble is that cheques for domestic window cleaning are generally relatively small ones so it's a big chunk in percentage terms taken out of my income.

[[GQC] Tim]

Ewan, why pay for something that you can have for free? I've access to the bankmanager at anytime too.

300 Pound a year for me is considerable. You can have a nice dinner once in a while for that amount a year.

[[GQC] Tim]

I didn't say a £300 meal, read it again.

[paul D long]

Got meeting with Alliance this wk will see what they say, have been with hsbc got exspensive, went to rbs have to keep too much in bank to get free banking.If your a new company Alliance give you 2 years free as do hsbc at mo.

[Count Phil]

I put cheques in the drop box and closed the business on. £100 a month! I could lease an ionics for that!

You could do the free period, then move to the bank down the road and ahve their free period, go around them all and then start at the beginning!!

[m b shaw]

this is one of those things that annoy me slightly.in our job were not actually buying and selling for instance,so all that goes in the bank is wages.so how come my wifes wages are nt a problem but mine are.

[TennetClean]

I put cheques in the drop box and closed the business on. £100 a month! I could lease an ionics for that!

You could do the free period, then move to the bank down the road and ahve their free period, go around them all and then start at the beginning!! Wink

yeah but who wants to keep changing banks every few months, pain in the neck.. They know that people dont want the hassle, hence mega rip off charges.

I remember seeing a thing on the news where a bank had a notice up in their branch that said "WE DONT WANT WINDOW CLEANERS, TAXI DRIVERS " and a few others.  Think the media slated them.  Quite right too, cheeky pompus scumbags.

[Ian_Giles]

I use a domestic account, have done for years as I got totally arsed off with being charged for every single thing I did at the bank, told to come in for the annual review...and have them try and sell you insurance....charged a management fee, given my own specialist business manager (like yeah, what the hell does he know about window cleaning )

Direct debits, standing orders, cash, cheques, letters, those miserable conning (multiple swearwords) screw you for everything, they make me utterly sick, I've no time for them whatsoever, and they make billions of pounds of profit every single year...they make me seethe!

Having said that, I've now set up a second account with our local halifax branch, no fees whatsoever for cheques, had it for some time now - over 12 months - and they have been great.

It isn't a business account mind...tosh also banks with them, and I don't know if he banks under his business name or his personal name, but I'm sure he has found them just as good as I have, in fact it was because of what he said that I also bank with them, and he has been with them for a few years.

shop around, if you are a sole trader, I'm sure that they cannot force you to have a business account...and then rip out your soul with disgusting bank charges...

I really, really hate the big banks  not that you'd know of course..because I am so mild mannered


Ian

[Count Phil]

I got a loan from lloyds when I went wfp.

They said it would be x a month for payment protection and like the idiot I was I took it.

In a year a saved enough to pay it off early (hate being in debt). Went in and the settlement figure was the same as I borrowed. In one year I was no close to paying it off!

Why? Well your still paying of the loan protection fee.

Yes but that's only x a month!

Yes sir, but you pay for that in its ENTIRETY first before the loan, and get no discount even if you pay the loan off early.

You *^$%£!

Thank you sir.

I paid the loan off. Closed the business account and vowed to save at least what they stole from me. I've now more than saved that by not paying their business account fees.

[Fox]

Did you know that you can claim back any payment protection fees that may have been wrongly sold to you?  So basically if you have a look at the terms and conditions and if there is anything in there that would not apply (such as self employed would be unprotected etc) you can go back to the bank and ask for a refund even if you don't bank with them anymore, worth a look.

[Ian_Giles]

I agree with Fox, go back to them and get your money back for being miss-sold insurance.
Payment protection is utterly worthless to the self employed sole trader.

And the seller of it also got commission too!

I think there are sites that tell you how to go about claiming money back of the banks, and I'm sure they have generic letters and so on that you can use and adapt to your own circumstances.

It was as a result of lloyds trying to force me to take out payment protection on a loan (supposed to be optional but I was refused the loan because I wouldn't take out the insurance...) that I eventually closed my business account with them.

I still use them, my statement when it comes is 3 pages long, loads of standing orders, direct debits and so on and all completely free.

Yet with my business account (when I had it) it was one page long with about 4 lines on it and it still cost me over a tenner a month....


Ian

[dave0123]

Alliance Leicester Commercial. Everything free, don't have to pay a penny for anything. Brilliant bank.

Well am with these and they charge me 5.00 per month so it carnt be free! but that all i get charged 5.00 a month i put put as much cash in cheques in etc as many direct debits as i want as far as i know.

It becomes free if put  in over 1000 a month

[simbag]

Alliance Leicester Commercial. Everything free, don't have to pay a penny for anything. Brilliant bank.

Well am with these and they charge me 5.00 per month so it carnt be free! but that all i get charged 5.00 a month i put put as much cash in cheques in etc as many direct debits as i want as far as i know.

It becomes free if put  in over 1000 a month

I've never had to pay anything to them. I can only assume, that I had the introductory period (which would've been 12 or 18 months), and by the time that was over I was paying in £1000. I have been with them since Feb 2005 when I first started, and I have never had to pay them a penny for anything.

I have just quickly looked up their website, and it seems that if you have just started up a business, you can have completely free banking for the first 2 years (Business Builder Account). If you're already trading you can, open their free Business Current Account, the only thing you will ever have to pay for is if you pay in more than £4000 CASH per month, after which you have to pay 35p per £100. no limit whatsoever on cheques. I've just read their guarantee which has got to be worth opening an account for in itself!

"GUARANTEE that we will beat your existing business banking deal or we'll give you £2,000 after 12 months"

Plus the best thing I personally find with this account is the accessibility, I use my local post office to pay in all my cash and cheques, and use internet banking to keep update with customer payments. Plus I also have a personal account with them, so when I come to paying myself, I make one phone call give the relevant details, transfer the money and it's in my account the very next day (even Saturday!!).

If anyone wants to check it out look here:

https://www.alliance-leicestercommercialbank.co.uk/content/HP000001.asp

PS. I don't work for them!! 

[Count Phil]

Thanks for the advice fox and ian giles. I will look into it! It just made me hate them when I trusted them before.