The charges for small volume personal banking are ridiculously high. We had an account with Banque Courtois that handled maybe €3-4,000 per year. We were charged monthly fees just for having a card to take money out, quarterly fees just to have an account, fees for every foreign transaction, and despite having had a balance of €62 when we closed the account, the costs for closing were more than the balance! I know European bank charges are notorious, but it would have been cheaper to rent a security box and store cash there! Fortunately the challenger banks are coming on the market and we now have a euro account that charges NO FEES with Starling. read more