Nothing brings your day to a crashing holt quite like being asked to come back to the bank again next week because some other paperwork needs to be dealt with. If our banks are with us for the big moments – starting university, buying a house, retiring – shouldn’t they be woven into the everyday too? Without an integrated service, one that can run at our speed, they can feel like a roadblock. Apps are woven into our personal narratives and they organically feed into our everyday moments. It’s also the central hub of our day-to-day: we read emails, buy tickets for travel, check the weather, order food deliveries, and pay for shopping. It’s how we take photos, listen to music, and connect with loved ones. “It can be hard to keep track of payments.”ĭigitization has revolutionized the way we do pretty much everything and has made our phones an integral part of our lives. “It takes such a long time and isn’t easy when I want to quickly assess my balance or make any quick transactions.” Adds Rebecca. “Especially when the MobilePay app isn’t working!” “It’s also a bit arduous to transfer money to friends,” explains Lakeisha. Now they’re finally set up with accounts, both Rebecca and Lakeisha have had difficulty using their bank’s archaic digital platforms. “There were a lot of administrative hoops to jump through.” When I came back, I was then asked for my National Insurance number from my home country. Instead, “I was told my account would be open in a couple of weeks and to return to the bank on a specific date. The process was very lengthy and cost me a lot more money than necessary in the long run.”Ī streamlined process could’ve prevented Lakeisha from having to make unnecessary trips to the bank. As a foreigner trying to sort out tax and build a life for myself here, having to pay in pounds was frustrating and stressful – especially when having to pay rent. “I think I had to wait two weeks for my card to come and a further two weeks for my pin. Lakeisha, who moved from London to Copenhagen in January 2019, had a similar experience: “All the online ‘support’ I was faced with just told me to wait ‘10 working days and contact them again if nothing changes.’ Easier said than done when you can’t access your money.” “Nevertheless, two months later my card finally arrived. “I was unable to receive my first month’s paycheque due to the bank’s slow setup process,” explains Rebecca, who moved from London to Copenhagen last November. Setting up a bank account as a non-native to the country is particularly challenging: between inflexible bank opening hours and administrative nightmares, many moving to Denmark end up without a bank account for weeks, if not months. Slow processing times, charges for making payments (the actual injustice of being charged for paying bills is unbearable), and bank websites that look like they were coded using dial-up broadband are all part and parcel of our daily banking lives. Despite being 20 years into the 21st Century, banking can often feel like it’s stuck in the 1900s.
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