Postbank has reached the record number of four million current accounts in the private customer sector. The bank registered net growth of over 200,000 private current accounts last year and now has a market share of more than five percent. The financial institution is thus one of the largest service providers for private payment transactions. The number of private current accounts at Postbank has risen steadily since the introduction of free accounts. Postbank customers hold 1.3 million online current accounts, while 2.2 million customers take advantage of telephone banking.

As a retail bank, Postbank consistently passes on its cost advantages from retail banking to its customers. The bank has been offering a free account for private customers known as the “Postbank Giro plus” since April 1998, which offers free account keeping and numerous other free additional benefits for accounts with inpayments of EUR 1,000 or more per month. In 1998, Postbank was one of the first German banks to offer its customers free current accounts. While some institutes discontinued their account models after only a few years’ time, the free current account from Postbank attracted an ever growing number of customers. Since its introduction, the number of private current accounts has risen from 3.6 to 4 million. “We remain convinced that there is a demand for simple, reasonably priced banking services in Germany,” said Dr Wolfgang Klein, Board Member for Private Customer Services at Postbank. “The success enjoyed by our current account model demonstrates that we were correct in our assessment of our customers’ needs,” stated Klein.

The number of accounts which meet the criteria for waiving of the account maintenance charge has risen steadily since 1998. When the account model was first introduced, only half of all accounts qualified. Now that figure is more than two-thirds. The number of entrants into the workforce and young people under 26 who have opened a free Postbank account has also increased, doubling to more than 400,000 since 1998. Today, an average of 8,000 accounts per month are opened for this customer group. That is four times as many as in 1998!

Of special interest is the free Postbank current account for members of the age group between 30 and 50. A total of 42 percent of the new customers attracted last year, the largest share, were members of this age category. They are thus an average of ten years younger than the typical Postbank customer.

As a specialist for bulk payments, Postbank ensures its private customers the prompt implementation of the EU regulation on cross-border payments starting on 1st July. Postbank is even going beyond the EU stipulations: For private customers, money transfers to countries in which the euro is not the official currency will also be free of charge. In future, Postbank will process transfers exceeding EUR 12,500 or in a currency other than the euro free of charge in all EU countries. The IBAN and BIC must be indicated on the transfer slip, however, thus making possible the automatic processing of the transfer.