Originally Posted by
caspritz78
I have a DKB account just for traveling. I preload the credit card and use it to withdraw money while traveling (make sure you check that the country you travel to has ATMs that accept VISA credit cards)
Most every country accepts Visa indeed. However I read on some German site that a German MasterCard is a better choice for travel than the German Visa? I can't find the link now but found it strange.
Originally Posted by
caspritz78
Yes and yes. The interest rate of the Credit Card account is higher.
Just to confirm: you earn high interest if you
Prelaod a credit card account in Germany? Not just DKB, other banks as well.
Originally Posted by
caspritz78
The initial credit card limit is 500€ (don't know if this is for everybody or if your credit report has something to do with it) If you want to increase the limit you have to regular deposit on you DKB checking account for example your wage.
I heard nonresidents can get as low as 100 or 50? Maybe they 50 was with another bank, I don't know, but the 100 sure by DKB as Oliver said previously in this very thread. It doesn't matter as long as you preload your card limit. I mean even if you have a limit of 100, you can preload with 1000 and can spend 1100 on it, do I understand correctly?
Originally Posted by
caspritz78
I can only speculate how exactly it works but in Germany there is a 25% tax on interests. The bank will automaticaly withhold 25% of your interets and transfers the tax directly to the state. The amount of the tax is in your bank statement. A general description of how interest are calcualted can be found here
Interest
The tricky part is how do you calculate it when you preload your monthly wage, the use it by the end of the month... Sure, you can easily calculate with half your wage if you consider spending it all, but then it's only a rough estimate.
At the end of
this post he says tax is deducted even from nonresident accounts which means you don't have to hassle with it. Sure, the bank have a computer system to calculate them correctly and you could make only a rough estimate.
German Tax
After DKB credits you interest (Habenzinsen) you will noticed that you are charged Abgeltungsteuer and Solidaritätszuschlag.
Abgeltungsteuer is the German variant of DIRT and Solidaritätszuschlag is a special german tax introduced after the re-unification to support building up the eastern parts of Germany again and it's still paid. Abgeltungsteuer is 25% and the Solidaritätszuschlag is 5.5% of the Abgeltungsteuer.
How is the online banks working with DKB? I heard it's an old disposable TAN system: you get a list of numbers and you can use all only once.
And how do customer service may compare to say, Netbank.de, Norsibank and Comdirect?