Banking in France

If you are used to Nordic, or even British, banking service, then you are likely to be sadly disappointed with the quality of customer service and facilities and prices in French banks.

Let me start with a simple example: A French bank customer asked his Crédit Agricole branch to pay an amount by domestic wire transfer. The bank confirmed to him by e-mail on the 11 December 2006. No payment was executed. Three reminders were e-mailed to the bank between Christmas and New Year. They did not answer. Finally, some days after New Year, they woke up and confirmed that the transfer had been done - after the client had asked them to cancel it, because he had in the meantime ordered a home banking transfer by Internet from another account. The payment was credited on the 8th of January, or 18 banking days after they confirmed they would execute the bank transfer. As you can see from this example, taking holidays, eating and drinking is very important in France. Business and clients can wait. Of course, if you owed the bank money, they would obviously have applied their most severe sanctions already after a few days.

Applying a bit of fresh air to the dusty French banking market, in 2009, the Dutch bank ING started proposing a free current account to French bank customers. It includes a free Mastercard Gold and many other free services that nearly all French banks charge for. Fortuneo also launched a free current account with free Mastercard. The following comments about fees do not apply to ING. Beware that some of ING's incident fees may be higher than in French banks.

When it comes to fees, many French banks charge you a fee to access their limited and old-fashioned home banking service, whereas it is typically free in the UK and the Nordic countries. International debit and credit cards, and even the national payment card carte bleue, are very expensive compared with other countries, costing about €40 a year and upwards for the most basic national payment card, where they are either free or cost very little in other countries. Watch out for their list of other fees, such as account closure fees meant to discourage you from moving to another French bank.

The so-called customer advisors in French banks have targets for how many additional services they must sell, so they try to make you buy more expensive services than what you need. You cannot count on getting exact information, as they will try to pretend that you can only obtain certain services, such as an authorised overdraft facility, by subscribing to a pack of bundled services, whereas it is quite clear from regulation that it must be possible to buy each service separately. Their next argument will be that the bundled pack is cheaper than buying each service separately. That may or may not be true, but most bank customers don't use all the included services. For many, it would have been cheaper to pay just the services they use. Do your arithmetics before signing up for a pack in a French bank.

The French banks' direct debit system is particularly arcane and expensive. Since the November 1st, 2009, under EU law and French law, it must be free to withdraw authorisation for an amount to be debited by direct debit or revoke a direct authorisation, unless you ask later than the end of the day preceding the scheduled debit. However, some banks continue to bill these services illegally. A rejected direct debit (for lack of funds for example) will be charged from €10 and upwards by a French bank. To withdraw (temporarily) or revoke (permanently) a direct debit authorisation, you need to write a letter to your bank (you can suspend online with ING Direct). You cannot easily access a list of current direct debit authorisations (you can access it online with ING Direct).

Do I need cheques? Yes! The French are still major cheque consumers. Because of the fee structure for card payments in shops, many shops still refuse to take cards for payments below €15. You can only pay such small amounts in cash or by cheque. There is no electronic bill payment system in France. Given that a cheque is much more costly for the bank to process than a card payment, it is fairly ridiculous that they encourage cheque use like that, but so it is. The good news is that cheques are free in almost all French banks. Many shops have printers to fill in the cheque for you, so you only have to verify and sign it.

French Banking Disputes

If a bank's internal customer service has not resolved a problem, you can complain to the ombudsman (médiateur) appointed by the bank.

Banque de France: list of médiateurs (pdf, new window).

Autorité de Contrôle Prudentiel. Authority charged with supervising French banks and insurance companies, including mutuelles. Contrary to the médiateurs, this authority doesn't intervene in individual consumer complaints. Postal address: Autorité de contrôle prudentiel, 61 rue Taitbout, 75436 Paris cedex 09.

Aacab. Association d'Aide Contre les Abus Bancaires. Association to help against abuse committed by banks.

Afub. Association Française des Usagers des Banques - association for bank users.

In the case of another European country being involved, you may also be able to find useful contact information on the European (but their list is not complete)
Financial Dispute Resolution Network FIN-NET

See also the section Consumer Information and Help.

Banks in France

List of cheapest French banks in Le Figaro (22 March 2011).

RIB to IBAN/BIC converter. If you are given a French account number in the classic national RIB format, this site will generate the IBAN and BIC for you.

Online Banks in France

ING Direct. Dutch bank operating in France. Current account with no fees for current transactions including free Mastercard. High interest from time to time on savings accounts.

Banque Accord. Low-cost bank. Owner of Oney (formerly Egg France). Auchan group. Crédit Agricole. Also knwon as CA. Owner of LCL. Barclays Bank France. British bank. BNP Paribas. Bank. Caisse d'Épargne. Bank. Caixa Bank France. Spanish bank. Banque Chaix. Regional bank for Provence. 100% owned by CCF, again part of the British HSBC group. CIC Banque Scalbert Dupont. Crédit Industriel et Commercial. Citibank France. American bank. Banque Courtois. Crédit du Nord group. Créatis. Local bank for the Nord département. Fortis Banque. Good for small businesses. HSBC. British HSBC group. Banque Kolb. Crédit du Nord group. Banque Laydernier. Crédit du Nord group. LCL. New name for Le Crédit Lyonnais to try to make people forget the scandal they were involved in. Purchased by Crédit Agricole in 2003. Crédit Maritime. Bank for the French coastal regions. Crédit Mutuel. Bank. Crédit du Nord. Bank. Banque Nuger. Crédit du Nord group. Oney. Formerly Egg France, sold to Banque Accord and renamed. Free credit cards. Auchan group. Banque Populaire. They have a reputation for being good for small businesses, but in practice, they don't seem to be very interested in new customers. Banque Postale. The French government bank formerly known as La Poste before it became a bank in January 2006. Lowest fees if compared with traditional French banks, online banks excluded. Banque Rhône-Alpes. Crédit du Nord group. Société Générale. Bank. Sofinco. Bank. Subsidiary of Crédit Agricole. Banque Tarneaud. Crédit du Nord group. Banque Transatlantique. Quickly opens accounts for foreigners.

French Credit Cards

Moneybookers. Easy-application Mastercard without credit check for 10 euros a year. You can choose your Mastercard currency. Also money transfer and online payment. 

Foreign Mastercard and Visa are usually accepted the same places where the French can use their national payment system carte bleue, often abbreviated to CB. All major shops and petrol / gas stations accept cards. Diners Card, American Express and foreign cash are not generally accepted. The French carte bleue is a chip card that needs a pin code instead of a signature as a security measure. The new chip cards from other countries generally work either by pin code or by signature. Older chip cards or cards without a chip must have their magnetic strip swiped. Most shop assistants outside tourist zones are not aware of this, and if you tell them, they don't even know that their card reader has a magnetic card reader. It's for you to tell them: C'est une carte étrangère sans puce; merci de lire la piste magnétique avec le lecteur que vous voyez à côté de votre lecteur à puce. If they still don't get it, ask for the manager: Je voudrais parler avec le responsable. When they figure out how to read the magnetic strip, the next problem is that the French centralised credit card validation computer network often has problems communicating with foreign clearing systems. When it fails, the shop won't accept your card, even by swiping it manually, and you may have to leave the shop without your goods if you have no other way to pay. They will show no mercy, even for last-minute shopping on a New Year's evening. They like tourists' money, but without the money, they couldn't care less.

There is a reverse problem in touristy regions where staff did know that they had to swipe the magnetic strip on foreign cards: even when a foregin card has a chip, some still want to swipe the magnetic strip instead of reading the chip. That won't work if the chip is compatible with the French system. You then have to tell them: cette carte a une puce; merci de lire la puce et non pas la piste magnétique.

There is a further complication: the wireless card readers only seem to work with French credit cards. If it's a foreign card, the reader is likely to instruct the shopkeeper to place it on its base.

For large amounts, the banks may impose a limit for the amount at shop level that is lower than your card limit. Sometimes, it may work to split one large amount into several smaller amounts. French credit cards usually have a rolling 30-day spending limit that your foreign card doesn't have. Don't expect to get any help from the shop's card centre, as they don't know a thing about foreign cards and foreign payment limits and they cannot understand that foreign cards don't have a 30-day limit like the French cards or maybe no limit at all.

© Copyright Finn Skovgaard 2001, 2011. All rights reserved.