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Our company offers introduction services for opening corporate bank accounts with the Barclays Bank. We introduce our clients to the bank's offshore branch located in Isle of Man.

About the Bank

Barclays is one of the world's largest bank. Its headquarter is located in London, UK. The bank offers a full range of banking and financial services to its customers all over the world.

Barclays has been established over 300 years ago. Currently, the bank operates in more than 50 countries and employs approximately 155,000 people.

The bank has 1.63 trillion British Pounds in assets. Its profit in 2008 was 6.1 billion British Pounds despite the tough market conditions.

Banking Secrecy and Tax Treaties

Isle of Man is an UK dependency territory, which enjoys a high degree of domestic legislative and political autonomy.

UK authorities has no direct access to bank information. Court order is required to get such access.

Isle of Man has double tax treaties with 14 countries including UK, US and France. The treaties create valuable opportunities for international tax planning.

Isle of Man is not a member of the EU. Therefore, EU Savings Tax Directive has no power here. The Directive requires EU financial institutions to report to their national tax authorities about interest earned by individuals, who are residents of other EU countries. That information is passed to the tax authorities of those countries.

Isle of Man have been forced to adopt some elements of the Directive. However, Isle of Man has no obligations and does not report on interest earned by individuals, who are residents of EU countries. Instead, it opted to apply withholding/retention tax on such interest, as follow:

• 15% from July 1, 2005

• 20% from July 1, 2008

• 35% from July 11, 2011.

The above tax is not applicable to individual residents of non-EU countries.

EU Savings Tax Directive is not applicable to the interest paid to legal entities, such as corporations, limited liability companies, trusts and foundations. Thus the withholding/retention tax is not deducted from interest earned by legal entities.

Required Corporate Documents

Our company prepares all required corporate documents in accordance with the bank requirements.

Required Personal Documents

The bank requires the following personal documents from each Shareholder, Beneficial Owner, Director and Authorized Signatory:

• Evidence of Identity – a certified copy of a current passport or European Union country national identity card

• Evidence of residential address - original bank statement or credit card statement issued in a FATF member country. The statement must be less than 3 months old

• Second evidence of residential address - original bank statement or credit card statement issued in a FATF member country. The statement must be less than 3 months old.

Certification must be done by a recognized bank, North American or European Union notary or a lawyer, who is a member of a recognized official association.

Personal Visit

Our clients, who use the bank introduction services are not required to visit the bank in person.

Initial Deposit

The minimum amount required for the establishment of a current account is GBP 5,000.

When the account is opened, a client receives a welcome package from the bank with all details of his new account. The bank allows 28 days from the opening of the account for funds to be transferred. Failure to remit funds may result in closure of the account.

Upon receiving the initial deposit the bank makes the account active and ready for business transactions.

Minimum Balance

No minimum balance is required. The bank does not require to keep the initial deposit on the account.

Online Banking

The bank offers advanced online banking International Corporate e-Banking, which includes:

• Access to account balances and account transactions

• Transfer money between accounts in the same bank

• International wire transfer payments.

Clients have access to their accounts 24/7.

Debit and Credit Cards

The bank offers debit cards Visa. Debit cards are linked to the clients bank accounts. As a result, clients have the following advantages:

• 24/7 access to funds in any place of the world

• worldwide acceptance for any online or in store purchases

• worldwide cash withdraw.

There are no credit limit and security deposit for debit cards. As soon as a client has a positive balance on his corporate account, he may use the card.

Credit cards are not available for international business companies.

Time Required

The bank usually opens a corporate account in one to two week after receiving completed application forms, corporate and personal documents and verification of clients personal documents and business information.

Currencies

The bank opens accounts in USD, EUR, GBP and CAD.

Bank Fees

Bank Account Fees:

• Maintenance fee payable quarterly: GBP 40

• International wire transfer fee:

  • Inward payments: GBP 6

  • Outward payments: GBP 20

• Fee for the issue of a bank draft: GBP 45 per draft

• Cheque book: free of charge

• International Corporate e-Banking (Internet banking): free of charge

• Bank's fee for opening a current account: GBP 250.

Debit Card Fees:

• Issue fee: free of charge

• Annual fee: free of charge

• Cash withdrawal: 2 %, min GBP 3.

Feedback of Our Clients

Our company introduces its clients to the bank and constantly monitors clients experience with the bank's services.

The bank's new client acceptance rate is around 75%. About 25% of applications are declined due to inability clients to provide required personal documents and detailed business description or nature and current condition of clients businesses.

The bank does not accept applications from clients, who just started their businesses. If a business has its annual account turnover (total amount of all incoming payments for one year) less that GBP 100,000, such business has little or no chances to be accepted. Our company recommends such clients to consider opening a bank account with the Bank of Cyprus.

Our clients, who use this bank have extremely high level of satisfaction with the bank's services.