Hi everyone!
I would like to know if anyone here is using Credit Agricole as their dedicated bank account mainly for business? How much do they charge for service and conversion rate in general for money sent or paid from the UK? How is your experience with CA so far?
Thanks in advance 
I’ve used CA for my business activity for 10 years plus and never had a problem at all, but I have no idea what their conversion/charges are for non euro transactions. If I had significant non euro clients and/or needed to make regular payments to non euro countries I don’t think I would choose CA, I would probably go for Transferwise Borderless or similar, that is designed to handle multi-currencies.
You should be able to download a list of their fees and charges from their website.
Thanks Anna 
Yeah I have a personal account with CA for about a year and I have no problem so far and I just recently opened another one for business and I was just wondering about the charges and rates.
Not relating to the topic but to your comment - should i just go ahead with Transferwise Borderless then? Invoice the UK client with the Transferwise sterling account details and after I got paid, i’ll convert the amount into the euro account within Transferwise Borderless. So when I need to show records - I can present both Transferwise GBP and EUROS account statements.
This seems better than using CA?
Hi Cindy - I’m with CA on a personal basis.
I have always found them very helpful with loads of information I am surprised that they did not tell you what a Business Account would attract by way of Charges and Rates.
Perhaps they did not understand that the 2nd account was going to be used for Business with International Clients and Currency??
Or do you actually have the details of their Charges and Rates and are simply looking for a better Offer?
Do what you need to do.
But in general, I never convert currency this way and that just for the sake of it. I only convert it if I need to, or if exchange rate movements make it seem like a no brainer. Conversion is a service. There is always a cost, even if it’s a low cost, and on ME you can’t offset costs, so unless there is a benefit to me in using the service I don’t use it. You don’t have to physically convert £1,000 into euros in order to record it on your accounting system as 1 130€ or whatever.
Most MEs don’t set up a business account as such, business accounts are expensive to run and as an ME you will never use most of the bells and whistles that you pay for. You can set up a second personal account. I think Cindy just wants to know what CA takes off you for handling muti-currency transactions through a normal account, and whether or not they give you a good exchange rate, which maybe you know?
Fair enough Anna.
From the replies/info she has received on her previous Thread, about Invoices and Currencies - she is possibly more aware of how she wishes to run her ME/2nd Personal Account.
Thus she will be able to have an informed discussion with CA.
True.
But I doubt that CA will ever say to her “Actually, you would be better off with eg a Borderless account, it would work out more convenient and more cost effective”. Even if they know that that is the case.
Ha ha Anna… I meant they would discuss exchange rates etc and special circumstances.
They did with us, years ago, when we first arrived - but I cannot remember the details.
It’s difficult to compare one Bank with another if information on both is not available. 
The reason to convert the sterling into euros within the Transferwise Borderless account is to have a record that shows the actual amount paid to me in euros [ to declare and update this amount on the invoice for book keeping - supported by a bank statement in euros ] I don’t think there is any service charge on the conversion within Transferwise Borderless account and regarding the conversion rate - I hope Transferwise is slightly better than local banks - I have to check that out.
At the moment, this is the only way I can think of that makes Transferwise workable 1] UK client pays to a sterling account 2] I receive the payment in euros easily by converting the money within Transferwise without paying extra service charge to a local bank 3] lastly i’ll have both GBP and EUROS statements from Transferwise to show as records.
Or alternatively - I can just stick to CA 
Hi Stella and Anna,
Yes, I’ve read that a micro entrepreneur could just open a 2nd personal bank account for business use rather than an actual business bank account.
Since 1981 when I first banked in France with Société Générale I’ve had a horror of French banks. They seem to be staffed with overly well dressed incompetents. I use HSBC and they are excellent.
Ahh… correct me if I’m wrong - so you are saying I could just convert and update the amount from sterling to euros on the invoice based on the rate [eg. from bank of france] on the day I received the payment in the TW sterling account without actually transferring/converting the payment into the TW euros account. And when I need to show transaction records, I could just show the TW sterling bank account statement which doesn’t have to be in euros.
Anna will chime in, I am sure.
but I have a question…
Why can’t your clients simply pay you in Euro? When we buy from US we are charged an amount of Dollars (ie the price of the article). The Invoice is in dollars $$$ and that is what the Seller receives $$$.
Our French account is debited €€€ at whatever is the rate dollar/euro when the transaction hits.
The client is UK based and when I freelanced for them while living in London, Singapore or in Taiwan, I have always invoiced in sterling. Now living in France and starting out with Micro entrepreneur - I could ask them if they are comfortable to pay me in euros or they could just pay to my Credit Agricole account in sterling in which I will be paid in euros after the conversion and deduction of commission fee. I saw this link that could be used as a reference - Credit Agricole’s GBP to EUR rate is 1.05 and commission fee is probably between 15 to 30 gbp… not sure how accurate this is though [ Transferwise’s rate is 1.1 with no commission fee ]
However you work gets paid - I would have thought that you’ll need to make sure that all your Audit Trail is clearly in Euro.
Keeps it simple for you and everyone, including the French Tax folk.
Thanks Stella
I know using CA would be much more straightforward for everyone with a bit of price to pay on my side.
I’m not saying you must use CA - but you should be paid in euro.
Payment received should surely match the Quote/Invoice for work done and your Invoicing should be in Euro.
One idea… why not go to your local French Tax Office and ask their advice ???
Hi Stella,
Yeah, I will included both GBP and EUR amounts on my invoice [ if I go ahead to invoice my client in sterling - that is what I would do ]
For example on the invoice we see:
TOTAL HT: ÂŁ600
TOTAL HT EN EUROS: €668
Taux de change - Transferwise - 1 EUR = 0.89 GBP
or with CA:
TOTAL HT EN EUROS: €630
Taux de change - Credit Agricole - 1 EUR = 0.95 GBP
Even if the final amount I receive with CA is lesser after the commission fee which is lets say eg. 20 euros and I get €610 in the end, I should still declare €630 right?
I would love to ask someone from the local French Tax Office but my French is so bad and my husband is too busy during the week to go there with me.