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I was extremely upset over my financial situation last year…read more until I contacted the Accounts Advice Centre. With their help I have my life back in control, and the relief has been incredible. I would recommend particularly Claire McNamara for her clear sound advice and nonjudgmental handling of my situation, which was very welcome during such a stressful time. Mary M, Dublin 18.

I cannot rate this firm of accountants highly enough…read more Like the gentleman above I too was in an awkward situation and badly needed help sorting out my tax affairs. I contacted the Accounts Advice Centre mainly because they were first on the I.T.I. website but also because I really liked the website. They were as good as their word and I did stop worrying once they had sorted out my arrears. I knew after my first consultation that they would sort out my tax affairs and my trust was not misplaced. Again, a very professional firm who do exactly what they say they will.

Officially the credit union for telecoms workers but I think anyone can join…read more Always helpful, always accommodating. They give a service that you used to get from banks. Not a bad word to say about them.

I travel a lot and I'm a real tightass. As a result, Ive shopped all over town for the best…read moreexchange rates! Time and time again I come back to First Rate on Westmoreland Street. I've seen some places match their rates but I've never actually found lower than here. There's the added benefit of an under-used cash point across the road - handy for withdrawing Euro to exchange. Plus First Rate has an actual shop front with the rates in the window and holds a good range of obscure currencies on site (so you can leave it to the last minute to get your Kopecks or Ringgit or Rupiah). I like the fact that the staff wear uniform and there are security cameras. This is a pleasant change from places where you go up the back to a pokey desk and feel like you're doing some sort of shady narcotics related transaction.

I must say, I was very very impressed with these guys…read more Even though they had nothing to gain financially from assisting me (they didn't have what I needed), they went out of their way to help how they could. So I was looking for Indian rupees. I called every single bank I could think of. Answers ranged from "Eh, I'm not sure - check our website?" (Bank of Ireland), to "No. We don't have them. I don't know where you'd get them. Can I put you on hold? Hi I'm back, what did you want? No, I don't think we have that. I have no idea." (AIB) to "Ehmm, I'll take your number and get someone to call you back that'll know (beeeeeppppp)" (Ulster) So it turns out that Indian rupees are a restricted currency, meaning you can't actually buy them outside of India. You can if you order them quite far in advance, but generally speaking, the advice is to take cash with you to change and your ATM card to withdraw money once you're there. The dude also directed me to O2 where you can get a money card which is useable all over the world. All in all, extremely helpful, in fact way above and beyond. And very very much appreciated.

HSBC is my favourite bank. I have a saving account with hsbc and its a great account. The bank…read moreitself is nice, like every other bank, but the service here is fast and efficient. The staff are very customer focused and are very helpful. They also provide good advice and when you want to order a card or anything you just use the phone in the bank and it'll get done. The queues aren't too long either, depending on what time you go it can get busy at times but overall the service is pretty fast and great! The manager is very friendly as well, always around the bank asking if everyone is okay, or if they need any help. Overall, excellent!

I probably shouldn't admit to this for fear that one day someone might recognise me at the…read morePermanent TSB ATM and try and mug me. It's not worth it if you're planning on it because normally I'm upset if I can't take a tenner out. However, there is the odd time when I need to handle larger sums of money, say when I'm paying the rent. At times like this you either have to plan your ATM withdrawals very cleverly for several days, i.e., Bank of Ireland only lets you take out €300 at a time, and then most times that's your last withdrawal for a day. That's where Permanent TSB comes in, it lets you take out larger sums sometimes up to €750 if you're really lucky! So the next time you're thinking of laying all your money on the dogs, skip Bank of Ireland and go straight to Permanent!

Normally I don't take the time to write Reviews, but this has been getting on my nerves so much I…read morejust have to let it loose. After having moved to Ireland I started off with AIB. This was a horrible experience in terms of Fees. AIB just charges ridiculous fees for every thing. Simply put you pay fees on almost every transaction... So I Switched to Permanent TSB. Which was said to be FEEless. However.. as it turns out... Permanent TSB charges you 10 euros for Every transaction that can not be completed. So if you have just 1 cent too little on your account, rather than going to a negative balance and being charged interest over that (of normally around 10 to 15% abroad) you get a 10 euro charge.. which is amounts to ridiculous amounts if, like me, you're a person that doesn't keep big amounts of money on his current account (which I'm not forced to do) But worst of all.... WORST of all is the HORRIBLE Online experience. Open24. They call it Internet banking, but it's simply the most outdated ONline banking experience I've ever had. In Netherlands we had better online banking than this 10 years ago... You cannot see your own bank account number. You can't see your pending transactions. You cannot search in your statements without having to request them first and get some kind of Code... Basically you can't do anything except see your balance and the last 10 completed transactions. It's got an overly complicated Login system that is unrelated to your bankaccount number, resulting in me having to remember 4 different numbers to be able to use the online banking. There is no security Token involved... and worst of all... this is all done to make things save, however if you are logged in you can basically do whatever you like without further verification. Irish banking isn't very good, but this is just the worst. I don't understand how people accept this ridiculous level of service. Only reason I didn't give it the lowest score is because all Irish banks are pretty bad in terms of Fees and Online banking.

If it had not been for the past almost month of Banking delays at Ulster Bank I would have given it…read morea 5*. It is the bank in Ireland that gives you the best deals and options by far for their costumers. The rates are great compared to other banks, the service is better as you can go on Saturday so you do not have to take off work to actually go into your bank (a very strange thing that they are open only during business hours) and you do not have to constantly have 2000+ Euros account without getting penalized with fees and interests. I went here as the first bank when I moved to Dublin and I have been happy with them ever since. even when they were busy (which they always are on Saturdays because of obvious reasons) they managed to fit me in for a time for me to start up a new bank account in the country. I had gone here a few days before and they had been so kind to give me all the information I needed to bring in all of the relevant papers so that I could start an account, though they failed to mention that I needed to show a utility bill within the next three months. As I needed to transfer money back to Denmark frequently it was very convenient for me to come in on Saturdays to make the transfer. Once I asked them if it would ever be possible to do online and one of the workers there told me that in the beginning of the new year that would be a new option on their website. And to my surprise when I looked in February it was an option. I did not have to go into the bank anymore to make my transfers. Unfortunately when it then was time for me to make the transfer the system had failed them and I had to go in to make the transfer but it went through without a glitch. At this specific location they are always very helpful to both me and my boyfriend and I love their little water thingy they have in the corner. Always nice with cold water when I have been walking 3 miles from home to get there. You can expect some waiting especially on Saturdays but the lines are usually very fast.

The people are pleasant…read more That's the only good thing I have to say. Their policies are awful. If you haven't gotten your debit card yet, this branch is even more useless because they don't handle any cash. of course, I didn't find that out until Monday morning and had to wait that long because I was not given the account data until 3:45 PM on Friday, two days after the application was submitted, and 15 minutes before they close. Therefore, there was no way I could deposit cash into the account anyway, and so spent a few days without services, all because this bank can't get anything done quickly. I will be leaving the moment my AIB account is open.

I use this bank quite often as it's closest to where I live, very spacious inside with tables and…read morechairs to sit and work. They offer free coffee and tea, and also provide all the usual services of BOI like accounts, loans, mortgages etc. but with a focus on new business start ups. It's probably the most modern and new looking BOI branch I've been too, and there are always a few people working on their computers. The staff are very attentive and helpful and they process everything in an efficient manner. The great thing about this branch is the opening hours; it's open from 8am to 6pm on weekdays except Thursdays where it's open until 8pm. On Saturday they are open from 9am to 1pm which is also handy. Overall, a modern trendy looking branch that caters well for the 9-5 work shift!