Hello,
Did you manage to fix your bank issues?
If you don’t want to use corporations, Banque de la Poste (so managed by a public service) is available
this post was submitted on 11 Nov 2023
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Belgique
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Thanks for the tip. The bank issues persist. I think it’s important to not be dependent on banks for the most essential things (food, water, shelter). So people should be protesting against Vivaqua.
Banque de la Poste is used by old people, so they should be able to provide services without use of smartphones.
I guess most people are just used to the banking system and do not really care.
Theoretically someone could enter Brussels for a semi-short-term (e.g. 90 days) and need water service but as a non-resident I think all banks would refuse them an account. So Vivaqua should really comply with the law¹ and accept cash.
- caveat: The most recent terms of service actually state that payments must be made by bank, so it’s unclear if they are breaking the law. I’ve heard that contracts can override law in Belgium which is strange. It would seem any merchant could simply make customers agree to pay electronically to circumvent the cash acceptance obligation.… or vice-versa.
Theoretically someone could enter Brussels for a semi-short-term (e.g. 90 days) and need water service but as a non-resident I think all banks would refuse them an account. So Vivaqua should really comply with the law¹ and accept cash.
I guess in that case they could use a foreign bank account to pay the bills?
I guess in that case they could use a foreign bank account to pay the bills?
There are a few pitfalls with that (assuming they have an account at their origin):
- if you make a foreign bank transaction that does not resemble the kind of purchase that’s typical of a vacationer, some bank’s AI algorithms will treat the transaction as fraudulent
- some small non-European banks simply do not offer international transfer services which limits customers to using a card to pull cash out of the wall
- foreign networks are not necessarily compatible with the payment machines. E.g. the US has Discover card and Asia has JPN and UnionPay. ATMs tend to support more networks than point-of-sale terminals
- banks often fleece customers on foreign exchange rates. You will usually get screwed if you do a mixed-currency transfer (on top of getting fleeced on the transfer fee which can cost more than a month or even 3 months of water). There are some special cards which get decent rates at the ATM but not in other situations. Some travelers avoid the high fees by exchanging cash in advance before they leave. Often you can get a better exchange rate when buying the foreign currency than when buying local currency using foreign currency because consumers are less desperate when planning in advance.
All of this is true, but how many people would go for a 90 days stay in Belgium without making sure to have a bank account that would avoid those caveats? There are bank accounts for foreigners: https://fififinance.com/banking/bank-account-belgium
I appreciate the link. I didn’t know of some of those options (and a temporary visitor likely would not know either).
Proof of income is listed. Probably not many people carry that around assuming they’re working. I personally tend to take long 90—180 day vacations when I’m between jobs because that’s the best time to do it as it does not require any request or justification to an employer. Minimum deposit could be a problem as well (banks are becoming cashless which triggers the same problem that the account is supposed to solve). Proof of work permit is obviously a non-starter for those not coming to work. And indeed when I was looking for an account one of the banks I approached demanded that.
So ultimately it’s a really bad idea for a distributor of something as essential as water to refuse cash. There are countless pitfalls which can cause a real nightmare for people. If we were talking about a burger shop, no problem.. burgers are not essential & there are always other vendors so exclusion is not tragic.
Those documents are not always needed. There are students coming to Belgium all the time, they manage it.
Are you opposed to the banking system as a whole, or are you looking for a bank that would accept opening a bank account for a foreigner? https://wise.com/ allows to open bank accounts without proof or income, minimum deposit or work permit.
How would you deposit cash on the wise.com account? I didn’t look too closely at it but I’ve noticed in general the more modern & online a bank is, the more crippled and helpless it is. I see that the app for wise is limited to Google playstore or apple, so that’s another vector for exclusion unless their web access is fully featured. (edit: #Wise is a Cloudflare site, so I would indeed run away from that as it gives a US tech giant a clear view of all traffic, usernames, passwords, etc.. i'm not that trusting)
I’m opposed to forced banking. It’s good to have a banking system in place as a convenient option, but a disaster to be wholly dependent on banks and entirely helpless when there are technical problems (which have dozens of points of failure both on your side of the transaction as well as the merchants). I was in the grocery store and a customer’s bank card failed. Long line of people had to wait through many reattempts before in the end she had no choice but to walk out empty handed and leave all her groceries at the cashier, who then had to haul them out of the way.
Banks are gradually becoming less and less competent overall.. some even forcing customers to blindly trust & execute closed-source software.
I think if I arrived in a foreign country for a 90 day vacation I would be outraged if I had to spend however many days researching and fiddling with banks just to pay for running water.. time that could be better spent. Refugees will likely be harmed by the loss of cash option as well. Though it’d perhaps be poetic justice if in the end such a mess were simply left without bill payment. Hopefully Vivaqua’s move leaves them with some delinquent accounts they can’t collect on.
How would you deposit cash on the wise.com account? I didn’t look too closely at it but I’ve noticed in general the more modern & online a bank is, the more crippled and helpless it is.
You indeed would need to send money to the Wise account from another bank account, but that's following the logic that you have a bank account in your country of origin.
I think if I arrived in a foreign country for a 90 day vacation I would be outraged if I had to spend however many days researching and fiddling with banks just to pay for running water… time that could be better spent.
People coming to a country for 90 days usually have contracts were bills are included. Student housing in Belgium includes electricity and water in the vast majority of cases. Short-living rentals usually account for it as well. But to be honest, both student and short-rental housing would also prefer you to make a bank transfer rather than to pay them in cash.
Refugees will likely be harmed by the loss of cash option as well.
I know people who helped refugees arriving in Belgium, one of the first procedures the refugees want to do is to open a bank account.
Though it’d perhaps be poetic justice if in the end such a mess were simply left without bill payment. Hopefully Vivaqua’s move leaves them with some delinquent accounts they can’t collect on.
Vivaqua's money comes from the population taxes. Please pay them rather than leaving a public institution with debt.
At the demonstration against forced digital public services a few weeks ago I spoke to a charity group there that assists refugees & they said bank accounts are a serious problem for them. They have to find someone who will be officially hired in their place, who then withdraws cash and pays them as subcontractors because they are excluded from the banking system. Then the workers have to trust that the middle man will actually pay them. The energy suppliers have always been anti-cash which is a problem for refugees.
Seems strange to me:
Les demandeurs d'asile et les réfugiés ont-ils droit au service bancaire de base ?
Oui, le service bancaire de base est également ouvert aux demandeurs d'asile et aux réfugiés reconnus. Ces derniers ne doivent pas nécessairement avoir une adresse permanente, une adresse temporaire suffit.
Are asylum seekers and refugees entitled to basic banking services?
Yes, the basic banking service is also open to asylum seekers and recognized refugees. The latter do not necessarily have to have a permanent address, a temporary address is sufficient.
https://febelfin.be/fr/services/service-bancaire-de-base-pour-les-particuliers
I mentioned the basic bank account to the charity workers. I don’t recall now what their response was.
But undocumented immigrants come in different varieties and the keyword in that faq you quoted is “recognized” refugees. Perhaps they don’t all reach a level of recognition that they need. Or perhaps they simply fear it. Forcing a bank account on them obviously adds complexity to their already overly complex and difficult situation.
Being recognized is indeed a struggle, but even without a bank account, if they are not recognized, they wouldn't be able to work, to find accommodation, etc.
Ukrainian refugees opened 11k basic accounts: https://febelfin.be/fr/presse/banque-et-societe/11-292-comptes-bancaires-ouverts-par-des-refugie-e-s-ukrainien-ne-s-en-belgique
Banking is a part of society, that's not specifically Belgian. It can be accessed using BPost bank, for free if you receive at least 500 euros on your account monthly: https://www.bpostbanque.be/comptes-et-cartes/comptes-a-vue. Otherwise it's 1,5 euro.
I don't even think employers would agree to pay you in cash today, for security reasons.
Being recognized is indeed a struggle, but even without a bank account, if they are not recognized, they wouldn’t be able to work, to find accommodation, etc.
They do. As I said, they work for a middleman and that middleman is where the paper trail stops. The middle man takes a cut & they get exploited. It’s a hard life but they survive.
Ukrainian refugees opened 11k basic accounts
Glad to hear there are success stories. But those do not obviate the horror stories. The horrors are facilitated by a system of forced banking while the success stories do not require forced banking.
Banking is a part of society, that’s not specifically Belgian.
Optional banking is part of society. Forced banking creates a crippled society that’s gradually and quietly becoming a reality in Belgium. It’s not an acceptable society to create. So far it’s unlawful. Belgian law still requires a cash option but it’s going unenforced. If you report Manhattan Burger for refusing cash, your report will be ignored.
Banks decide who you’re allowed to pay. E.g. ~10 or so years ago banks in collusion decided if you wanted to donate money to Wikileaks they would not support it. Donors were blocked. Luckily cash enables people to escape from that nannying. When the cash option is gone banks will be able to abuse their power much more rampantly. They can collude to cancel any org they want.
Banks can also block your account spontaneously for trivial reasons such as the copy of your ID card on their records expiring. Indeed this is how some banks inform you that you need to help them update their records- they just block access to your money. Luckily when that happened cash enabled me to eat until the bank opened again on Monday morning (although this was a time that I was expected to be present at work).
Banks inherently collect data which is then vulnerable to breaches. The best defense against data breaches is to not arbitrarily create the data to begin with. I.e. pay in cash. Outside of the GDPR region, banks would gladly sell records on how much you spend on McDonalds food, tobacco, and cigarettes. Health insurance companies would love to have that data. Within the GDPR, I think they can still do that but they have to put it in their terms of service you must agree to. So it’s important to have the option to disagree.
Is it possible to pay water bills with cash where you come from?
Yes. I did not test it but the legal tender law there is that all debts can be paid in cash. Point of sale is different. If you try to buy a product the merchant can dictate form of payment. If the two parties do not agree, no one loses.. consumer keeps their money and the merchant keeps their product. But debts are different because debtors must have a way to pay. I suppose a malicious water supplier could make a requirement that you make a deposit from a bank account before water is turned on, then unbanked people would be unable to accumulate a debt. But I’ve not heard of any such scenario. Water suppliers have never asked me for an advance deposit that I recall.
There’s a European Commission recommendation that member states make all debts payable in cash. Belgium does not distinguish debt payments from points of sale. Belgium requires cash to be accepted in both varieties of transactions. But now that Belgium is not enforcing cash acceptance it’s a problem. Some articles imply that the law only applies to retail transactions. So I’m unclear on what the law says about cash payments to public services. Communes have started violating the law if they are bound by the same law.
I did not try it but the legal tender law there is that all debts can be paid in cash.
Interesting.
Communes have started violating the law if they are bound by the same law.
You mentioned some groups advocating for no banking dependency, do they plan to start any legal action?
Anyway, seems like you are in a stuck situation. I realistically don't see Vivaqua bringing the ATM back, they are known to have bad management since years
You mentioned some groups advocating for no banking dependency, do they plan to start any legal action?
I only mentioned the group who opposes forced digitization of public services and the removal of over-the-counter service. This is largely comprised of elderly people who are excluded by technology but also some tech people who realize the importance of an analog option because tech is fallible and often incompetently administered. Cash defenders are also somewhat encapsulated by that movement to keep analog options on the table, but I do not know of a group that is focused on the war on cash. I would be interested in finding such a group if there is one.
There is a rumor that a group of people entered a cashless cafe with cash, ordered food and drinks, then insisted on paying in cash. The cafe threatened to call the police. The activists said “please go ahead, we will wait”. When the police arrived, the customers explained that they are happy to pay in cash which the law entitles them to do. The police said there’s nothing for them to do and the group was free to go.
I appreciate the links. I could only read the 1st paragraph in the 2nd article but the others I could access in full. The last one is interesting indeed because it actually showcases the problem of forced banking. That is, the invoices need to be generated with structured codes or the whole system falls apart. Whereas paying cash does not require a working structured code. One can probably make a deposit at any time which would would then be a credit on their account.
With cash consumers can pay in advance as much as they want which can sit on the account until the invoicing problems get resolved. You could have previously paid a couple years worth of water and not have to deal with bills, if you want. With structured codes the amount must match the invoice amount. When there’s a mismatch, payment systems are often designed to treat it as a mistake and send the money back. So if you are poor and want to pay a partial amount, you can’t.. it’s all or nothing and not a penny more.
That is, the invoices need to be generated with structured codes or the whole system falls apart.
This is to match it automatically with the account number. In the cash version, you need desk people doing that matching for every individual. Otherwise, without those desk people, the whole system falls apart. You could replace it with ATM-like machines where people would be able to deposit the cash and authenticating with a username/password on the terminal, but having those machines everywhere to cover the whole country would have a significant cost.
Strictly speaking it’s the invoice number that’s encoded into the structured code, which then maps to an account. That’s how the expected amount is known. It’s a good system so long as there is also an analog option if bugs happen, the grid goes down, or if a cyber attack brings down the bank or invoicing system and the tech fails. You can’t fix those things in a day. Bug hunts can take weeks to find and more weeks to resolve and recover the data. And the engineers are not cheap. When there is an analog option you can always add unskilled workers cheaply and even train them on-the-fly if needed. You can’t just throw more people in to accelerate work on a software problem. But with analog systems you can. You can scale them up quickly with temporary contractors. Even if all the info systems are down you can accept cash and make paper records until the info system is recovered. When a software dev is hired, they actually cost the employer money for training and the time it takes them to understand the complex code and quality systems. Some say it takes 3 months before a developer becomes productive enough to offset their own cost. Some say that crossover point is closer to a year. If a software dev CV shows that they left a job short of working 3 years in a position, employers will often reject them because that’s not enough time to have made the company a worthwhile profit.
you can always add unskilled workers cheaply and even train them on-the-fly if needed.
Not in Belgium, I can tell you ha ha ha
UberEats and Deliveroo seem to be getting away with it. Those workers have been made into independent contractors (something they protest because of the lack of job security it gives them).
Yes, but a public organism such as Vivaqua would not use this kind of structure.
I don’t even think employers would agree to pay you in cash today, for security reasons.
It depends on your career. And strangely enough, the law makes career type a factor. Cash wages are legal in industries where that norm is established such as domestic work. It would be unusual for a white collar worker to be paid in cash and because it’s unusual, it’s illegal. There’s also an unusual law in Belgium, France, and Spain that prohibits B2P cash transactions over €3k. So even if all workers had an equal right to receive cash those whose paychecks exceed €3k would still have a problem.
(I had to break my reply into 3 parts because the lemmy form just goes to lunch if there’s too much text)
domestic work
Domestic work in Belgium is used with the Titres-Services systems, which prevents cash transactions (the whole system was designed to make it more appealing than cash). https://www.belgium.be/fr/famille/aide_sociale/titres_services
That’s just an example where I heard cash wages were normal. The law is strange because it just says cash wages are acceptable if it’s the norm in an industry. The law does not list industries where that’s a norm, so if someone is prosecuted someone would have to convince a court whether or not cash is normal for the line of work.
Bank transfer are just more convenient.
Cash wages are used when people (sometimes on both sides of the transaction) are trying to avoid the law: off-the-grid constructions, waiters, etc.