Rhyming slang: Bankers?

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There was an item in all the Spanish newspapers yesterday to say that the commissions charged by Spanish banks are the second highest in the European Union. The average charge for an average client to maintain a current account in Spain was given as 178€. Only the Italians charge more at 253€. If a customer isn't average and uses his or her account a lot then the estimated cost in Italy would be 1,540€ and 650€ in Spain.

For comparison, based on an average user, Bulgaria charges 27€, Holland 46€, Belgium 58€ whilst Germany comes in at 89€ and the UK at 103€ - in France the cost would be 154€.

The report also said that the four countries where the charges are most "opaque" were Austria, France, Italy and Spain. In fact the experts from the EU who were set the task of compiling this report found that in two thirds of the banks surveyed they were unable to determine what the charges would be from the published details. They had to go direct to the banks for further information.

The report looked at 224 banks across Europe 18 of them Spanish and over four fifths of the Spanish clients questioned said that they had been unable to get clear information about commissions and other charges when they opened their accounts.

If you've been reading my blogs for long you will know that I regualrly complain about the cost of maintaining an account in Spain and the impossibility of working out what I've been charged for - see here and here and here and here. It seems as though those nice people in Brussels agree with me!

Comments

  1. UnknownSeptember 29, 2009 at 1:45 AM

    Hold on, I think I actually got the inference in your title, and not being a Brit, I haven't got much experience with rhyming slang. :) But my guess is that the word in question begins with a 'W'. Am I right?

    ReplyDelete
  2. Chris ThompsonSeptember 30, 2009 at 12:51 AM

    Absolutely right. I don't know much about rhyming slang but I think that normally it's quite sophisticated - plates = plates of meat and rhymes with feet, applea = apples and pears to rhyme with stairs etc

    ReplyDelete

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