bank accounts for South Africans living overseas

Opening a bank account in a different legal jurisdiction to your own is a complicated and often drawn out process primarily because of the different financial regulations which prevail. At cashkows.com we understand and recognise the difficulties you face and have introduced a service which will assist you through the process to open the following accounts:

• standard account: if you live outside South Africa and have not, or do not wish to formally emigrate you will require an account with a South African bank in order to move funds into or out of the country. International transfers out of South Africa are subject to exchange control, however you can make application to the South African authorities to utilise the individual personal allowances that are available. If you do not currently retain the essential, active and up-to-date tax record with SARS which enables you to utilise these allowances our dedicated tax services team will be pleased to assist you in addressing this requirement
  
  
• blocked rand account: this is the vehicle via which all capital transfers out of South Africa must flow for exchange control purposes, once your emigrant status has been recorded with the South African Reserve Bank. Acquiring such status will allow you to utilise emigration allowances which are currently R4 000 000 for an individual and R8 000 000 for a family unit. As an emigrant you may also surrender retirement annuities and transfer the proceeds to your local bank account, via the blocked rand account, using the said allowance. Exchange control does place restrictions upon the purposes for which funds held in a blocked rand account may be used. For further details of permissible transactions please click here
  
  
• offshore account: if you wish to transfer funds to an international financial services centre, perhaps for currency diversification purposes or to take advantage of the many offshore investments that are available you will require an offshore bank account. Such an account can also be a useful facility in effective tax planning although we would recommend that you seek advice from a local tax specialist in this regard. cashkows.com has a formal allegiance with the offshore division of one of South Africa’s major banks and it is through this relationship that we can accommodate your offshore banking requirements

• we will consult with you and advise the appropriate route to move your funds: by definition this process will determine the specific type of account required
• we understand the regulatory requirements which banks in South Africa and offshore are obligated to comply with
• we provide you with a pack of account opening documents already populated with your personal details and requiring just your signature
• we provide a detailed guide to obtaining the essential supporting documents in the specific format required
• the strategic alliances that we have with the major banks in South Africa and our preferred provider offshore allows us to manage the account opening process and ensure your application receives priority: this positioning also enables us to assist you with ad hoc issues that may arise once your account is active
• the opening of a blocked rand account is an integral part of the service we provide to extract and repatriate the proceeds of retirement annuities held with insurance companies in South Africa
• we can arrange the re-opening of blocked Rand accounts if you have previously emigrated from South Africa and the facility has been closed