“I’m disgusted”: what will become of the thousands of customers if Ma French Bank closes?

“I'm going to have to change banks in the days to come,” laments, wearily, Philippe, 25, a customer of Ma French Bank for three years. “It was an excellent bank, I am disgusted by its upcoming closure,” he adds, without knowing what he will do with his accounts. On Wednesday, the Postal Bank announced that it was studying a “project to cease activities” for its online bank Ma French Bank. Like the vast majority of online banks, with the exception of BoursoBank (formerly Boursorama) and Fortuneo, Ma French Bank, launched in 2019, is not profitable.

For Philippe, employed in logistics, this subsidiary of the La Poste group had many advantages: “piggy banks to put money aside, easy transfers by SMS or even attractive fees and rates.” Pauline is also worried about her bank account: “When are you going to tell us? That you’re going to close?” On social networks, several Internet users even thought it was “a joke”.

The Postal Bank immediately wanted to reassure the 750,000 customers of Ma French Bank, affirming in a press release that this project “presents no risk for the assets and deposits of customers, which would remain accessible throughout the procedure”. “This project has no impact on your bank accounts or your services. You can continue to carry out all of your transactions via your application, in a completely normal manner,” indicates the bank. The public bank also committed to keeping its customers informed of “the progress of the project”.

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If it comes to an end, after a process of 12 to 18 months, two scenarios could be offered to customers of Ma French Bank: everyone will be offered to open an account in the physical network of the Postal Bank, present in 7000 post offices. But it is also possible that the establishment sells its client portfolio to another bank, like what ING France and Orange Bank have already done, which recently threw in the towel.

ING France clients were encouraged to migrate to BoursoBank (formerly Boursorama), a subsidiary of Société Générale, with which the Dutch bank had signed a memorandum of understanding to transfer part of its client portfolio. More than 300,000 of them (out of 500,000) ultimately transferred their current accounts and savings to BoursoBank, with welcome bonuses to boot. For its part, Orange Bank has entered into exclusive negotiations with BNP Paribas for the takeover of part of its 800,000 customers in France.

In all cases, Ma French Bank customers will remain free: those who wish will transfer their accounts to the acquiring establishment (which will probably pay them a welcome bonus to attract them). Others will opt for the bank of their choice.