New French customers of the German nobank N26 now benefit from IBANs in FR, in other words French account numbers. A novelty that will eliminate certain daily frictions.
State-of-the-art applications, moderate prices, varied ranges: nobanks, i.e. these banks natively designed for mobile, have many advantages for those looking for a 100% digital banking experience. They also have a limit: when they come from another European Union country, they have long been unable to offer their customers French account numbers. Or to put it another way, an IBAN starting with FR.
This was the case for N26. Born in Germany, the nobank has so far offered IBANs in DE. The pass, however, is in order. The new French customers of the nobanque will, in fact, benefit from today from IBAN in FR. The official announcement has not yet taken place, but the nobank website has already been updated.
The approximately 2.5 million customers claimed by the nobank in France will have to wait a little – a few weeks, announces journalist Alexandre Loukil on Twitter – before obtaining their new account number.
Objective: to build loyalty
This change of IBAN is obviously a way of anchoring N26 in the French landscape. It is not just symbolic. In theory, having a German or French IBAN should not change anything. European regulations force creditors and payers to treat all accounts originating from a country in the SEPA zone indiscriminately. (1).
In fact, however, friction persists. In two years of existence, the Accept My IBAN platform, launched by a coalition of around thirty players in the financial sector, has registered in France more than 1000 reports of discrimination the IBANor refusal of account numbers from other countries in the SEPA zone, in particular from public institutions (26%) or financial services (24.5%).
But the stakes are high for N26. The vast majority of its users in France use it occasionally, as a secondary account, and therefore deposit very little money there. If the nobank wants to retain them, and therefore increase the income they generate through their activity, it must ensure that they can easily domicile their salaries, their social benefits, their invoices, etc.
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(1) The Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) includes the member countries of the European Union, the member countries of the European Economic Area, as well as Switzerland, Andorra, Monaco, San Marino and the Vatican.