Experiences with BNF bank (former Banif bank)?

JuliaAbroad wrote:

Hey all,

I need to open a Maltese bank account, but as I'm also still using my German account I'm looking for a bank which doesn't take a fee for a simple online money transfer. Turns out that this is quite difficult to find.

Anyway, I found that BNF bank apparently doesn't charge for transactions to other banks in Malta and EU. Can anyone confirm that it's true?

Are there any issues with this bank? I found complains which are already some years old, and I found that some people apparently have a problem with being forced into a saving account. Anything else I should consider? What are your experiences?

Thanks a lot!

Julia

We have used BNF ( Banif) for 5 years without any problems.
We do several transfers a month and our son occasionally transfers from Deutsche Bank and we have no charges and nor does he.
We did not have to open a savings account but we have read on this forum that some people have had to.


Regards

Ray

Hey Ray, Thanks for your reply! I'm glad to hear a positive feedback   I'm aware that here are discrepancies between how it should be and how it really is, that's why I asked for experiences. Let's hope that I will be lucky when I'll try my luck...

They may ask for a minimum deposit each month, as is our case with a salary account, but did not ask us to open a savings account. The amount was about €750 pcm. We've not come across any unexpected charges yet.

I'm looking at my BNF statement right now. No charge to receive funds (my salary), but a 1 euro charge to send funds to another Maltese account (rent).

They charged another 3 euro on TOP of the 1 euro in December for a high value transfer to another Maltese bank account (was sending my savings to HSBC). So 4 euros in total charge for I'm going to guess 5k or more.

In regards to the forced term deposit, I did it once upon signing up, and they were calling me weekly to redo it after it matured, and said I wouldn't get my new debit card without it. I sent him the BNF terms and conditions for a current account and asked where it states this requirement. Haven't heard from them since.

Hi,

I have an BNF bank account since 2016 and I have had no problems so far.

When I opened it, they asked me the Maltese e-residence card and a deposit for 1 year of 500 euro.

I do not know whether this procedure has changed. I chose them out of frustration caused by the

long and complicated process with the local maltese bank (BoV) or HSBC.

BNF deducts 3.50 euro if you withdraw money from another Bank Atm machine but they refund

those 3.50 euro right after, so YES, they do not charge you in Malta. I can't confirm that when you

withdraw out of the island though, since I did not do it abroad. Hope this helps.


Greetings

Thank you. You're the third person who has now recommended BNF bank and there is one not far from me so I'll give it a go. Many thanks for sharing your experience. And continued that to the Expat.com team for the work you do. You're helping us! Besten Dank!

I opened bnf basic account on Moday.
so today i received my 1st  salary on the account.
Since it takes 2-3 weeks for me to receive password, and card i had to go to cash regoster to withdraw cash.
on my unpleasant surprise, i've been told that it takes 3 working days from bov to bnf transfer to take place.  3 working days!!!!!! OMG  .
3 days it took from bov to transfer money to my home country (NON EU account).
What is the issue here????
Is it only because its my 1st transfer for salary? or is it like this every month???

No it’s standard SEPA inter bank times. 1 to 3 days. BOV to HSBC can sometimes be next day but up to 3 as well

OMG OMG OMG.....
I went today again to cash just in hope salary is there.... and NO...
I asked to speak with manager but the girl at cashh register told me she will tell you the same thing....
then, she said its with bov....not with them, i told her i have it on bov company statement today...she said no its bov issue...wtf?????
then i said there is no point for me then to open salary account in bnf in the 1st place if i have to wait every month for 3 days...she said, you can close and open in bov.
i said...if i could open in bov i wouldnt come here....
usless country.....

I would stay clear of this bank in 2022. This is from someone who used to be a regular customer and had a bank account there. They take ages to update credit card amounts, and their system refuses to read certain BIC/SWIFT codes. They are also recently and randomly auditing and harassing business owners and customers over cash deposits, withdrawals, loans etc. They demand proof of why you want to deposit or withdraw anything and make a huge fuss about it. Something shady is going on. Maybe they are being audited themselves for money laundering. Maybe they on the verge of closing down. Maybe they just currently have a bad management system. Either way I personally think that this probably isn't the best bank to trust to safeguard your money currently.

I would stay clear of this bank in 2022. This is from someone who used to be a regular customer and had a bank account there. They take ages to update credit card amounts, and their system refuses to read certain BIC/SWIFT codes. They are also recently and randomly auditing and harassing business owners and customers over cash deposits, withdrawals, loans etc. They demand proof of why you want to deposit or withdraw anything and make a huge fuss about it. Something shady is going on. Maybe they are being audited themselves for money laundering. Maybe they on the verge of closing down. Maybe they just currently have a bad management system. Either way I personally think that this probably isn't the best bank to trust to safeguard your money currently.
-@Gerald123

I doubt they are closing down, nothing in the news, and they are just on the Malta Stock Market. They have also just recently donated a load of books to Malta Libraries as part of its strategy to give back to the community where it operates.

We have never had any problems with BNF, the original question was four years ago.

I would stay clear of this bank in 2022. This is from someone who used to be a regular customer and had a bank account there. They take ages to update credit card amounts, and their system refuses to read certain BIC/SWIFT codes. They are also recently and randomly auditing and harassing business owners and customers over cash deposits, withdrawals, loans etc. They demand proof of why you want to deposit or withdraw anything and make a huge fuss about it. Something shady is going on. Maybe they are being audited themselves for money laundering. Maybe they on the verge of closing down. Maybe they just currently have a bad management system. Either way I personally think that this probably isn't the best bank to trust to safeguard your money currently.
-@Gerald123

Rather too many maybe's in your comment about BNF. Guesswork of that nature is simply injuring the banks reputation with no justification.

In the original post, 3 years ago, the complaint was about it taking 3 days to move money from BOV to BNF, a perfectly normal time span for such transfers between banks.

Using comments such as 'shady' and 'money laundering' without justification is not helpful when the bank has a perfectly good reputation.

I would stay clear of this bank in 2022. This is from someone who used to be a regular customer and had a bank account there. They take ages to update credit card amounts, and their system refuses to read certain BIC/SWIFT codes. They are also recently and randomly auditing and harassing business owners and customers over cash deposits, withdrawals, loans etc. They demand proof of why you want to deposit or withdraw anything and make a huge fuss about it. Something shady is going on. Maybe they are being audited themselves for money laundering. Maybe they on the verge of closing down. Maybe they just currently have a bad management system. Either way I personally think that this probably isn't the best bank to trust to safeguard your money currently.
-@Gerald123

It's not "random" at all, it's the law that all banks do this now, if they dont then they will get fined and shut down.  Sata bank, to name one example, failed to implement these checks correctly got shut down and owners dragged to court for years.

This is standard process EU wide now I am afraid.

But yes, BNF bank is not a very good bank, they don't accept certain cards and a bunch of other things, but for basic services they are fine.