How did you open your child’s bank account- Is it really this hard to open a bank account for a child?

[Hottubby]

My 15 year old wants a bank account. We don’t live anywhere near an actual real life open bank as they all shut down. We have a mobile bank that comes to our town once a fortnight for a whole 90 mins during working hours. Unless I take leave I can’t get there and more to the point she has to be with me to prove her ID and will be at school.
It is proving impossible to open an account without resorting to taking a days annual leave and travelling 30 miles to an actual branch. I can not find a bank that will let me open an account online. The only one I’ve found (Santander) needs proof of my child’s address via a utility bill- we literally have NOTHING with her address on.
so tell me- how did you open your child’s bank account? What am I missing?

If you can hang on til he’s 16 then can do Monzo.

Couldn't find this thread when searching before, having similar pains for an account for my 12m old DS. Started another thread where someone suggested Metrobank so planning to try them.
Will try some of the suggestions on here too.

HyperJar online account

For Santander you can use parents proof of address not the child's I think.

We failed that check, though, as my surname is different from my son's 🙄

Had a nightmare with Lloyds though I bank with them. Took several hours and consecutive Saturdays to open two accounts, ridiculous.

Nationwide. Did it online

Another one for Halifax here - I opened one for my 11 year old online, I do have a Halifax account already so it was really easy. It’s his account and he has a card and online banking plus I can see what’s happening in his account on my online banking too. No monthly charges!

Have you looked on money saving expert advice on children's pre paid cards and bank accounts

Nationwide is easy, you just need their passport.

People saying they did it online....

I had to go in to go to Santander despite being an existing customer. Halifax also needed us to have a face to face which took 6 weeks for an appointment.

Nat West and some others was a flat no as I didnt bank with them.

Doesn't seem to be much consistency.

I could never line up my availability, DS’s and a video appointment but last week I found you could do most of an application on line for Lloyds and then just call into a branch with him and the passport. That part didn’t need an appointment it was just with the person on reception. It took just a few minutes

I opened an account for me with HSBC, then you can open the kids account via your account without having to go into a branch. Then when it was up and running, I shut the current account I’d set up for me. A faff - but all online, and I’ll only do it once.

she and GoHenry for years, and the monthly fee was ridiculous so as soon as she turned 11 I got her a bank account.

With some banks you can open an account online for your child/ teen if you bank with them. That’s what I did.

@Willyoujustbequiet when was this, I wonder if rules have changed. We did ours with Halifax a year ago and you couldn’t actually open an account for an 11 year old in a branch, it had to be online.

I sympathise! I had a nightmare with this; eventually got a video banking appointment with Barclays. They said they needed 45 minutes per child! (The chap who did it was very good, to be fair, and managed to do both of them in an hour. But it was a faff - he had to ask them loads of questions, see their passports etc.). Seems ridiculously complicated, especially when every other dodgy oligarch manages to have an account in his mum’s name and suddenly my kids are some massive money laundering risk. But there we are!

As your DD is under 18, it is your address that you are proving, do you not have any documents with your address on? Council tax is usually a good one to use? it also says you can use driving licence, bank statements. There are a lot of options so you must have one of them with your address on it.

It is all on this list - https://www.santander.co.uk/assets/s3fs-public/documents/misc1869apr23h_landscape_lr.pdf

I opened DD's bank account with Santander because I could do it all online. My existing bank wanted me to take ID to branch despite her savings already being with them.

For savings, I have just opened an account with Yorkshire Building Society as it is paying great interest, and that was all done online, it was so easy to do.

I did hsbc online for both my 11 and 15 year old
They had to send a photo of passport and then facial recognition software but it was easy enough.

I did it online with Starling. At 15 it’s the kite account which DC have. I applied for me online first and then opened DD’s.

No need to go to a branch.

It was earlier this year. It might have been been because my current account wasn't with them I suppose. Took about 2 hours for 2 kids in branch. Got there in the end lol.

It took much longer for my DC to close 2 unused bank accounts (metro) recently than it did for 12yo to open an account (nationwide).

Metro took forever, had to take photos, proof of id etc to close accounts with £200 in them.

This was my original thread and I am surprised to see I started it a year ago. My children still don’t have bank accounts ….

Have you tried Nationwide?

Revolut <18 ?

I've had no problems opening savings accounts with Natwest and Halifax online, I just uploaded a scan of their birth certificates. Presume I'll be able to open a current account without further ID when they're older (both under 6 now). But we are London based and can walk to at least 5 bank branches in 10 mins anyway.

I did my daughters at 15 with Santander. We had to choose a bank that we bank with though. I’m sure we just used her passport.