Fidor Bank Corporate Mastercard

This translation was generated automatically.

Starting a limited liability company in Germany brings an unsuspecting founder a mountain of paperwork. On top of the notary’s penalty fees, the accounting requirements force aspiring entrepreneurs into the hands of more or less incompetent tax advisers who can’t tell CSV files from punch cards. The last thing you need is your own bank putting every possible obstacle in the way when you try to open a business account.

In my case, in 2008/2009, that was HypoVereinsbank, where I’d been a customer since the early 1980s. I’d been there so long that the bank used to be called Bayerische Hypotheken- und Wechsel-Bank. With raised eyebrows, my adviser told me that a business account wasn’t so simple, especially for a GmbH, where there might be nothing to collect in the worst case. A credit card was practically impossible. I suggested setting it up as a debit card so I could pay my Amazon S3 bills. That wasn’t possible. After consulting the boss, the only option they found was to set up a fixed-term deposit as security. To keep the bank’s risk low, they capped the limit at €500. That covers modest AWS bills, but would never be enough to buy hardware from Apple. When I complained, the “customer dialogue” department sent me a bar of Milka chocolate, naturally without changing this embarrassing policy.

Some time ago I came across Fidor Bank. I don’t really understand its social ambitions, but its business account for digital companies covers most needs. And now it also has a credit card that gets almost everything right—things every other bank has slept on for 20 years.

Activation: online, in two steps, using CVC2 and mTAN.

The PIN: it doesn’t arrive in a separate letter. You can request it online again and again (!) using an mTAN. The mTAN system is apparently vulnerable to malware, especially on Android phones, but it’s good enough for this use case and avoids paper.

The key point is that Fidor lets you edit online the information that at other banks is available only by calling the hotline—or can be changed only after a lot of begging:

• Reserved transactions are shown, with email notifications!
• The card draws on your account balance, and you can change the limits online at any time.

I find the card design a little strange, but the bank told me via its Twitter (!) account on a Sunday (!) that no other designs are planned. Unlike typical credit cards, the card isn’t embossed; it’s milled from several layers of plastic, like a doorbell nameplate. That makes it completely unsuitable for old-fashioned carbon-copy transactions. Good. HypoVereinsbank can happily close its branches; I can get rid of the card and, hopefully soon, the current account too.

@timohetzel We’re glad the card arrived safely. For now, though, we don’t have any other designs planned. Have a nice rest of your Sunday! :)

— Fidor Community Bank, August 3, 2014