In the long term, the proportion of customers with premium accounts is to increase from 30 to 50 percent; the Vienna location is being expanded further.
The smartphone bank N26, founded by Austrians and based in Berlin, is expanding its range of fee-based accounts. Around 70 percent of N26 customers currently have a free current account. “In the long term, we want to increase the proportion of customers with premium accounts to 50 percent,” said N26 boss and co-founder Valentin Stalf about the APA.
With “N26 Smart”, the online bank is now offering an account for private customers and the self-employed for 4.90 euros per month. There is also the free basic account and other account models for 9.90 euros and 16.90 euros per month. With “N26 Smart” you now have an account for the daily main account user without travel insurance issues, according to the company boss.
The corona crisis has also caused the savings rate of customers to increase significantly at N26. You have “one billion euros more in customer deposits,” said the N26 boss. The European Central Bank (ECB) charges commercial banks negative deposit interest. N26 goes further and has introduced a “custody fee” from November for new customers with a current account balance of more than 50,000 euros. From December, N26 will also be offering daily money accounts in cooperation with other banks. Customers can then use it to transfer money from the current account to the daily allowance account in order not to have to pay a “custody fee”.
N26 was founded in 2013 by the two Viennese Valentin Stalf and Maximilian Tayenthal and has been active in Germany and Austria since 2015. The online bank has over 5 million customers (as of January 2020) in 25 countries. Current customer numbers are to be published soon. In addition to Austria and Germany, the core markets also include France, Spain, Italy and the USA. N26 currently employs over 1,500 people in Berlin, Barcelona, Vienna, São Paulo and New York. The start in Brazil has been postponed. “The corona crisis has centered us more on the core markets,” said the N26 boss.
Last October, N26 opened a technology and innovation location in Vienna. There are currently almost 30 employees working in Vienna; 15 vacancies are currently advertised. Stalf announced that there will be 60 employees by mid-2021. In the coming years, N26 wants to gradually expand the workforce in Vienna to up to 300 employees.
In the summer there was excitement at N26 about the establishment of a works council. The management had initially reacted skeptically to the works council plans, but then gave in. In mid-November, the employees of the German N26 Operations GmbH elected a works council. “I think employee participation is very important,” said the N26 boss. At the other locations around the world, they want to introduce digital employee identification. The plans will be presented “in the next few weeks”.
