Sabadell Bank - After the changeover!

Hi,

I have put this as an answer in another topic but thought it would help to make it a separate topic too;
We went to Sabadell bank in Quesada today and the lady we spoke to was very helpful. She spoke good English and explained things to us and cleared up a few misunderstandings.

Apparently, she said, the 'Sepa' direct Debit, which we thought was to pay for the Non-Residence tax form was not to do with that, it was the last direct debit sent out during the changeover by the previous bank, in our case it was an Iberdrola payment, for others it may be something else.

We asked about charges on the account and she confirmed that there is only the quarterly maintenance charge and the one off annual charge for our debit cards and the Non Residents declaration form charge of 25 euro per person every two years.

She also confirmed the minimum balance to keep in the account, to not incur any other charges, is 150 euros.

Even though our main branch is in Torrevieja, she also confirmed that it's not worth changing branches as we can use any branch for most things. For any queries on the actual account or for getting money out over the counter you need to show your password though. For general questions, as we had today, they don't need a passport but we showed our debit cards.

The bank has a 'take a ticket' to be seen system, like most banks have here, and it worked well today even though there was a big queue when we went in. They had four desks to go to be seen.

All in all we were very impressed with the service at the counter. The ATM is easy to use and understand too and English can be selected with no problem.

As the maintenance fees are all we will be paying (currently on our joint account we are paying 3.33 euros per month) plus the every two year charge for the non - residents tax declaration, above what we were paying with our previous bank, I think we will stay with Sabadell. They do appear to be a long standing trusted bank and hopefully not so liable to have problems like the other banks in Spain have had.

Hope this helps anyone wondering what to do after this changeover.

Jan

Edited by Jan on the 29/04/2014 at 13.26

I'm with you Jan. Everything ticking over on our account still.

Hi Jan

Thanks for you info. I spoke with Sabadell yesterday from the UK and they explained the SEPA charge for 149 euros on our account being from Iberdrola, a little high so will take that up with Iberdrola when over in Quesada.

Enjoy the forum.
Jennifer

Am happy with Sabadell since they took over from CAM. Also, seeing as we transfer over more than Euro 700 each month and have an insurance policy with them I am in the process of changing our account to the Cuenta Expansion which does not have the quarterly charges and also gives a 2.5% rebate on direct debits for utility bills.

I'm not actually sure of the maintenance fees per quarter but I think it is 12.50 a quarter but as far as I can see on our first statement, it was 3.33 euro maintenance fees for the month.

If it is 12.50 a quarter then that doesn't seem too bad as they don't charge for anything else on the account*, except the bank card charge each year (€9.50 a card) and most banks charge for that in Spain (Lloyds did too!)

*They do charge every two years for the arranging the Non-residence tax declaration but that's another thing that many banks make a charge for.


Jan

I have just checked and our quarterly charges with Sabadell are Euro 12.50 making Euro 50 per year.

Guapa wrote:

JeremyB wrote:I have just checked and our quarterly charges with Sabadell are Euro 12.50 making Euro 50 per year.

Different to what we were told. I suggest they've had so many opt out after having to leave Lloyd's that they have reduced the charge as it definitely was going to be 60€, we had notification of that.

We have been charged this since they took over our account from CAM in December 2012.

Also, seeing as we transfer more than Euro 700 each month to the account we are in the process of changing our account to the Cuenta Expansion which does not have any charges, in fact we will get cash back on any direct debits for utility bill payments.

I do appreciate that not everyone will transfer Euro 700 a month but we do as we have a mortgage to pay. Worth thinking about.

Just had this letter from Halifax, saying they are going to start charging for international payments to Sabadell in Spain from the 1st August 2014, when it will be £9.50 per transaction for on-line transfers. Thought this may be of interest to those of us who were with Lloyds/Halifax in Spain before being transferred to Sabadell:

Sabadell offering a regular payment plan with no charges Jan. I'll just change my DD to them.

Glyn wrote:Sabadell offering a regular payment plan with no charges Jan. I'll just change my DD to them.

Hi Glyn,
Yes that's good if you have regular payments to make, as if you transfer a lump sum every month apparently you won't incur any charges by Sabadell for maintenance. We were told about that by Sabadel in the branch but there is a minimum amount, if I remember correctly, and we don't need that much put into our account every month. We only do about three payments a year to top up our Spanish account.

You will still have the transfer charge of £9.50 with Halifax won't you (12 times a year!) or is there something I'm missing?


Jan