I suppose most of their customers don’t need a bank app they have enough funds to not have to check 
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Good to know. It’s not set in stone where the BIN is. Fineco EUR was originally UK but is now Italian (their sterling card is still UK).
It would be nice to have an alternative to Bankera although that’s what I’ll be using in the absence of Fineco.
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Interesting, I didn’t know that!
I only have a GBP card with them, as that’s what I picked during sign-up and didn’t feel it was worth paying for a second card. Now they are winding down anyway, I will have to rely on bunq (existing pre-Brexit account) as a fully licensed, EU IBAN bank for receiving and sending SEPA payments without extra fees & Bankera for an EU BIN card (although they are only e-money).
So what I gather from reading the posts above, they’re not asking for your income details?
When you think private bank, you think a minimum income of £250k.
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That’s really interesting to know, and I’m guessing it’s a hard credit search?
There has been a free “normal” account since the old Sterling Current Account dropped its requirement for a £5,000 minimum balance. I think that was quite a few years ago. Scrapping that account and merging it into the Private Current Account, while removing all qualification criteria for that account, is the recent change. But it appears to be nothing more than product range simplification, given that the two accounts were very similar anyway. It’s still a bank where most customers are referred via a financial advisor, so it’s still somewhat exclusive even though they do allow direct applications.
My application appeared on my Equifax report as a “Cater Allen Private Bank (I)” and appeared on TransUnion as “Santander”. I am not sure about Experian.
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Yes, it was a hard search for a current account.
I first applied around this time last year, for the Sterling current account, but at the time their applications processing was massively delayed. They emailed me weeks later to ask for some clarification but I missed the message as it went into Spam. By the time I’d noticed, my application had expired.
I then left it for a while because I didn’t want to reapply during a period when I’d had loads of hard searches for other accounts recently, in case I was declined. So I left it until early this year, reapplied for the new Private current account, and was accepted.
Yes, not that recently.
Before this thread started anyway!
I don’t have the card with me at the moment, sorry.
Without revealing too much about myself, yes I am a normal person but I do have a pretty good history with Santander (if that helps), so I have had Santander Select status for a while.
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I think the most helpful information for people will be from those applied what their salary/monthly pay in is.
Then you gauge success rates based on that; but understandably I get people wouldn’t or might not want to share that information
Although I’m excited to see above who gets accepted
I like the look of the card but there’s no app nor Apple Pay. Apple Pay I can do without but how does one do anything without the app?
Sorry if this is up thread but I don’t fancy scrolling through to find out
EDIT: I did, and found @SebH answered this, so thanks. But how do you do anything. Is it really all online?
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You have an online messaging service which you can use to do anything you like. You can also make transfers and do other basic stuff online yourself, just like with any major bank.
If you want to speak to someone instead of using the messaging service, you can call them (freephone) during business hours.
If your card is lost or stolen and it’s an emergency, you can report that any time 24/7 on a special number.
As I said above, there is a “mobile” version of the website which allows you to make transfers and view your account (and also send/view messages) along with a few other basic things. I have used an iOS shortcut to package this into a web-clip with it’s own icon and app-style view, so it works close to an app, but with no support for Face ID login is manual which is pretty basic.
Long ago, there did used to be branch access for cash and cheques at RBS branches, but that ended at some point and you can’t use Santander branches for that now. However, the ATM limit is £2,005 per day (so probably enough for any situation) and cheques can be posted in with postage-paid pre-prepared envelopes that they will give you. Unusually, there is also no agreement with the Post Office.
I don’t ever contact support at any bank, personally, unless something has gone wrong. So I don’t mind the seemingly problematic lack of access too much.
TL;DR
Yes, it’s all online (and phone)!
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I agree with you!
No Apple Pay is a shame, but you can/could use Curve, of course.
I also forgot to say that they additionally allow you to put requests into writing (posting a letter) if you want to go really old-school.
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Interesting but I’m not sure now that I could do without one, having of course living for many years where that wasn’t even an option.
I do like the card though….
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My “not-actually-an-app”, app works just as well as the apps for limited banks such as Triodos or Co-op!
Other than no Face ID, but Co-op didn’t have that until about 5 years ago.
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It will be this (with the carter allen weblink of course)
Did not know they offer a full/true USD current account out of the UK - hard to come by these days after Citigold pulled out of the UK.
I am tempted to try it, but based on previous experience – mass affluent semi-private bank operations are generally incapable of handling KYC for HNW/UHNW clients (either compliance maze or borderline criminal AML hazards).
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It’s the following shortcut with the URL below & the image below used as the icon.
https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/362c6e0e76a248cdb1d72dccf16e655c
Shortcut URL
https://digital.caterallenonline.co.uk/iportalweb/#
Yes, probably.
They do seem to have a different team on it to Santander though, so perhaps they can manage better than some?
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I am skeptical - I once was told by someone leading a large bank’s PWM division their medium upfront onboarding cost is 5 digits.
Core banking makes very little money so I don’t think Cater Allen have nearly the same budget. Even small wealth manager (who actually makes AUM based fees) struggles.
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