Suggestions for Banks

[StyleVersatile]

Hi all,

As a relative newbie to this side of the tracks, i'm looking for a little advice. I've a strong career in sales, marketing, business development etc, working for large companies, but have now decided to do it solo.

I'm soon to be starting a small business in a partnership in an online webshop in the next few months & we are currently going through the setup now.

I'll probably have a number of questions over time, but my first one is what banks (or bank) should be the first choice for a small business starting out to do their finance with?

Thanks for any suggestions!
Shane.

[Robert Gerrish]

Originally Posted by StyleVersatile

Hi all,

... what banks (or bank) should be the first choice for a small business starting out to do their finance with?

Hi Shane - welcome to soloville. Your question is somewhat tricky to answer as it depends a whole lot on what you really want from a bank. In general all the main banks have similar offerings. I would suggest you practice being something of a visionary and look 3-5 years hence. Where do you envisage your business being? How will you want a bank to serve and support you? Armed with some thinking around this I would make contact with 'the usual suspects' and invite responses.

I suspect one or two would immediately stand out for you. Bear in mind that the bank you start out with may not be your bank for life. Find the best fit you can and get your mind back to your business.

[StyleVersatile]

Hi Robert - thanks, that's a good piece of advice.

What research we've done so far has given us a few solid options so we'll explore those shortly.

[ray_223]

I started a small business a couple of years ago and had now idea how it would go.
For banking purposes I choose BankWest.

They had a no fee business account (that didn't pay interest!) but it worked out perfectly.
I then setup another (web only) investment account with them that I transfer money into to gain interest.

I went this path because initially I didn't want to pay the $10 / month bank fees for a business account because I didn't know if I was going to be making money or not! (yes I'm stingy!).

BankWest doesn't offer full banking services where I live so I assume I will be moving to one of the big 4 in the next 12 months and pay my $10 or so per month but get a few extra services.

I don't see it being a big problem to change banks at any time you find out you chose the wrong one.

[Burgo]

When I started my solo business I banked with the Commonwealth, then a few years later i chnged it to Advance ( St George), then many years later I changed to Westpac where I ran a cheque account for day to day and a directsaver account which earned 7% and it was internet linked to my cheque account. This allowed me to put all my income into the direct saver account and when I needed to pay any bills I just drew it down and either payed direct debit or sent a cheque. Worked very well for me at the time.

[@HeatherSmithAU]

I stay with ANZ because my local bank manager at Carindale remembers me - I can walk in and not have seen her for 6 months & she remembers me, and if something is not working out, I email her, and she gets it sorted.

It is a very personal service!

My suggestion would be to interview the bank managers, and then send them a follow up query, and see how they respond.

Even though I am a tightwad, and don't like bank charges, I am very happy with this sort of services.

[Tina]

Just wondering if anyone has had any good/bad experiences with banks and eftpos machines? I'm researching it at the moment but the banks have been really really slow to get back to me, which is a little annoying...

[Marcus]

Tina, I have found that it can take a while because the quoting generally is not done in the branches, its done by a dedicated central team offsite.

(Not sure if Im breaking any forums rules here so let me know) I work for one of the big four banks (the one that won small business bank of the year by Cannex) specialising in small business. If you like I can get a quote together for you that I will have tommorrow.

Tina (and all those interested) the following information is needed so that a quote can be generated.
1) Estimated number of sales per week/fortnight or month
2) Estimated value of those sales
3) Estimated % of credit cards to savings account transactions
4) And the last bit which is important, do you provide a service that is paid for in advance?

PM with details if you like (as I said if this has broken rules let me know and I'll delete the post), you can use the quote to shop around and its obligation free - hopefully we might even be the cheapest.

[Burgo]

I have recently changed to BENDIGO

Check them out.

[Adam Randall]

Im in banking purgatory at the moment, half a foot in NAB, credit card with Adelaide bank and Merchant facilities and the other foot of business banking with BankSA.

All to do with changing over to a Pty Ltd company.

I will probably consolidate to Bank SA (St George) because the merchant facility is the hardest to get setup and Bank SA are pretty good.

NAB who I recently changed too because I thought I could integrate my quickbooks directly with the NAB, which I find out later you actually cannot, you still have to connect and download a csv. Bugger their tricky wording and "yes we can do everything you want" advertising.

I will say as far as internet banking is concerned NAB have it down pretty good, best I have come across.

I have heard some mixed reports about ANZ online banking, such as debits/credits not even being close to real time and a lot of very slow periods, this may of been fixed, they were pushing their Iphone service a while back so maybe things have changed.
The good thing about ANZ is that they do seem to be very active in the small business community which is nice.

The only bad experience I have had with an ATM is when I cant remember my pin number