Revolut has me hostage

[Renox]

I was one of the first to signup for Revolut for Business. After months of eagerly waiting, I finally got onboarded onto Revolut. I had a free trial month that went in right after being onboarded.

Shortly after, my account got locked down without my knowledge. When I found out was was wrong, I was told that Revolut works with a third party bank and that that other bank did NOT accept my details. My “Know Your Costumer” process failed.
After me sending elaborate details about my business (which I have had for over 7 years without any issues), I was able to get onboarded again but with my account being severely restricted.
I got 1 EUR IBAN that can only be used for SEPA transfers, and got pooling accounts for USD and non-EU transfers.

Shortly after I started using the Revolut bank account. Immediately I found out that I couldn’t link my IBAN to PayPal (to receive payments from PayPal). I even set up a UK PayPal account to link it to the GBP Revolut for Business account that I got myself, but that didn’t work either.

I have used the Revolut account for about a month, and I had to stop using it because it wasn’t worth the hassle. I can’t make some of my clients pay me via a pooling account, nor use PayPal which is 50% of my business.

I have proof that I only used the account about a month (see my bank statements). I have asked… hell… I have even begged Revolut to cancel my account to not pay the monthly €25 fee for an account that I can’t use. It’s true that I asked a few weeks after I stopped using the account, but it took me weeks to realize that the bank account has huge limitations that other bank accounts don’t have. They denied my request through the support chat inside my account because the trial had already expired. (Sigh)

I want to warn everyone for Revolut for Business.

Don’t accept a crippled account for the same price as a normal account. And if you do, be warned, your free trial starts right after they activate your account (even if you don’t have your card, and payments don’t come in till next month).

Revolut lost a lot of karma points IMHO. I was a happy Revolut customer with both personal (Premium) and business accounts, but now I’m starting to see the dark side of Revolut: things don’t work and you don’t like it? There is no escape now, cos you signed up for €25/m (€300/yr).

[Juliopp]

@Renox… complain, quéjate

[Renox]

I just did, but I guess the same people will look at it that refused my account-closure.

This was the message in the support chat:

Dear xxxxx, could you clarify what do you find limiting on your account, please? Please note, that your EUR account is not a pooled account. We provide you with the unique EUR IBAN. Also, please note that due to the company’s policies, you can’t close the account after the trial period as your contract has a 12-month duration. You exceeded the acceptable date. I’m sorry, there’s nothing I can do about the charges. Your obligation to pay fees continues until the end of your contract.

Just look at these screenshots of my pooled EUR account:

The non-pooled EURO account below is for SEPA TRANSFERS ONLY, so all non-EU clients of mine must pay me through the pooled account from above!

[Juliopp]

Hey @Renox

What’s up with this issue? Any update?

[Renox]

Nope… Unfortunately nobody seems to care.

[Juliopp]

Did you receive an answer for the formal complaint?

[Renox]

Nope. You will be the first to hear when I get a reply if any.
I even complained on Twitter but no replies.

I wish Revolut had a special person that we can contact, that could take a new fresh look at our problems and protect our (and their) interests. Kinda like a fair neutral person working for Revolut to help us.

[jgw2001]

To my knowledge, you can only use the SWIFT details for transfer from accounts under your own name but not for recieving payment from third parties.

However, while this maybe an issue, also notice other non-license banking providers do the same may be down to money laundering regulations.

Even the transferwise borderless account which provides you with an EU, US and UK account will not allow SWIFT payment in.

For non-banks, for SWIFT transfers they have to use other third-party banks which come with restrictions. In the above example Revolut is using Lloyds, as Revolut now have a EU banking license this may change over the coming months.

Keep an eye on starling, who is about to offer business banking, at the moment their current account will allow SWIFT but not SEPA. So using Starling business account once available in conjunction with revolut may be your best bet.

Revolut do offer a 30 daystrial, and as with every product you need to read the small print and make sure the product is fit for purpose. So in Revolut defence, they did provide you with a 30day trial so you had every opportunity to review their product.

If I was you, cancel the account on 12 months and accept your losses. You could refuse to pay them, and they are unlikely to take you to court but the impact on your credit rating will cost you a lot more than the £300+.

In the long term with Revolut new banking license service, in theory, services should start to imporve, but let this thread be a warning to those who are considering revolut as their main business account.

[Renox]

Thanks for your answer @jgw2001 but I want to explain a few important things.

SWIFT can be used to receive transfers from third parties. I have done it for years with many banks in Europe, North America and Africa. I only know of Carribean banks that use pooled accounts.
I don’t think it has anything to do with money laundering regulations, because I have bank accounts all over Europe and can receive money from my non-EU clients by just giving them my IBANs.

Remember that even Revolut offers this too for EUR and USD accounts, but I specifically was put on a side track because Revolut’s partner-bank refused me as a client. I was asked if I wanted to keep this handicapped account, and I wanted to still give it a try. I had been waiting for months to be onboarded and hoped that I could show (by using the account) that my company is legit.
I believe the third party bank refused me because the suspected I might have been doing online casino activities. (I believe that, because Revolut specficially asked if that was the case, which it isn’t. I have a normal IT company where I make websites for clients and help them with SEO, advertising, and so on.)

Starling is for UK residents only. My company is from Spain.

About the trial. To my defense, during the first 2 weeks of my trial I was off-boarded and had to reverify my company and then get onboarded again. Once I got back in, I didn’t have access to my IBANs. The site was a mess, and didn’t show the right information, and I had to ask all my data via the chat. My debit card had also been on its way for a week or 2. The monthly fee was taken of somewhere in the 3rd week. (The trial had thus already ended while I hadn’t even started using the account.) I complained, cos I hadn’t even started and my month hadn’t even passed and my account was already on -25. They reverted that to zero.
Then I got my first payment in, and for some unknown reason, it wasn’t credited into my account. I had to manually ASK for it in chat, and send Revolut SWIFT copies so they could find the bank wire transfer and manually credit my account (which they did).
I then finally used it for a month, and noticed more inconviniences. Like for example that the debit cards have no free limit (even though we pay more than premium accounts). Nor can we set up PayPal with our IBANs. PayPal refuses them. I have been trying in hundred different ways to get PayPal set up (via chat, via UK paypal accounts, via email, via phone), but it was impossible.

I then used the account for about a month and gave up. It’s just not working for me. A bit later I asked for them to cancel my account, but nope it was already too late.
I feel like they didn’t consider all the extra time it took for me to get on board with a crippled account. Also I feel like they didn’t consider that a 1 month trial for a business is rather short. I used the account for 1 month, but it takes time to get short clients to pay you via a new IBAN. You gotta contact your clients, and then wait a week for a transfer to come in etc etc…

Also, since the day I asked to leave, I stopped paying the monthly fee. Seeing how they handle the personal accounts, twitter and community forums, I had hoped some leniency. (The same leniency I gave them when I accepted a crippled account for the full price and accepted all these startup problems.)
I’m currently refusing to pay, because I feel cheated. I feel like I gave it a fair try, and have legit reasons to not continue with the account.
I know Spain has no credit ratings and Revolut likely won’t take me to court, but I REALLY like Revolut and don’t want to play hard ball. I have the hope that someone at Revolut reads this and thinks “this client has been fair with us and really can’t use the account at this point, so lets let him leave”. I’m even open to returning to Revolut at a later time when the business accounts start behaving more like normal EU bank accounts.

[Renox]

I got an amazing message today from Revolut.

They explained to me today that they have looked into my case and have decided to close my account.
I’m happy that they have been willing to let me go. I really love Revolut and the whole idea of “global banking without borders” and that’s why I have been one of the first to get a business account, a phone insurance, the Revolut VISA card, the premium account and even bitcoin through the app.

I understand that with every startup company there are hiccups and I’m glad they took the time to take a closer look at my account and then let me close it, because they too understood that it wasn’t for me (at this time).

Hey @Juliopp : Menos mal que todo ha salido bien, amigo! I knew Revolut wouldn’t be as stubborn as our Spanish banks, and thus that they would take a fair look at this. Thank you for pointing me to the “complaint form”, because that was ultimately what made them look at my case again.

[Juliopp]

Fenomenal, @Renox, I’m glad everything got sorted out finally

[Evianwater]

Hello, I’m still in the trial period - how do I cancel my account?

In settings, I’m only able to move to change to the £100/£1000 plan, unable to cancel my current £25. The chat system is ‘too busy to handle my request’

Can you help?

[rafael_revolut]

Hey @Evianwater.
Indeed, chat have been pretty busy lately but we respond to all of the outstanding queries.
If not raised via business chat already, please drop us a message there and we will proceed with your request. Sorry to see you going.

[xzy4qm]

HI Rafael.

Something unrelated to this thread.
Revolut has stopped working on my smart phone so I’ve been unable to communicate with anyone from revolut - that’s why I signed into this community forum. Can you assist?

Regards,

Paul Buckley

[JeffRevolut]

Hello @xzy4qm

Thanks for bringing this issue to our attention. Assuming you’re having trouble using the Revolut app, I would suggest going to the app store in your phone and checking which versions of the mobile operating system are supported for Revolut.
Running Revolut on outdated operating systems may cause the app to work sub-optimally and cause any number of issues.

Regards,

Jeff