Financial security?

by Isla MacFarlane

All internet banking security seems to do is make it harder for me to access my own money...

I read recently that the Middle East is set for a new wave of cybercrime. I feel sorry for any cybercriminal who wants to hack into my internet bank account – I can barely access it myself. The process seems to involve cracking more passwords, codes and devices than a James Bond movie.
First, I have to dig out my ‘customer relationship number’ (which I have scribbled on a scrap of paper buried at the bottom of my handbag) and key in my identity as eight soulless digits while wondering why I can’t just give my name, or a clever user name if they fear duplication – something I wouldn’t have to dredge my handbag for.
Next, I’m asked for my password, which must be eight characters with at least two numbers, so my childhood pet or mother’s name – or anything that I might have a hope of remembering – is out of the question. Naturally, I end up resetting my password nearly every time I log in. If that wasn’t bad enough, they insist I change my password on a regular basis. So if I have managed to formulate a password that I actually remember, no sooner is it etched into my memory than it’s time to start the taxing process again.
Then I have to dive back into my handbag to find my ‘secure ID’, a little box which spews out random codes I need to access my money. The numbers change every sixty seconds, meaning I have to frantically key in the code before the countdown is up. The time constraint wouldn’t matter so much if I could type out the numbers on a keyboard. Instead, I have to navigate the bank’s ‘virtual’ keyboard, which the bank insists is more secure despite the fact that anyone looking over my shoulder will have a much better view of the numbers I’m clicking than they would if I was typing.
By the time I’ve clicked in the code, which takes twice as long as using a keyboard, the numbers have almost always changed forcing me back to square one. It’s as frustrating as fumbling for your keys only to find that the locks have been changed.
While I appreciate the investment that must go into shoring up defences against cybercrime, if they spent a fraction of that on usability and customer experience I wouldn’t have to feel like a computer hacker every time I try to access my account. If Apple can invent a device even a self-confessed technophobe like me can operate without an instruction manual, surely there is an easier way of doing secure internet banking?
What’s really depressing is that after I’ve finally cracked the security and accessed my account, the effort hardly seems worth it when I see the balance… I’m pretty sure that any cybercriminal would feel the same!



For more blogs form CPI Financial, Visit our website.http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog

As the bird flies

by Sarah Owermohle
 
Portland Communications’ second How Africa Tweets study has come out right as a massive Twitterstorm rages in South Africa over the Oscar Pistorius trial.
 

I’ll admit, at the risk of sounding like I’ve been anything less than totally productive these past two weeks, that I have been obsessively following the Oscar Pistorius murder trial. It wasn’t exactly my plan, but as all of my Twitter regulars—Sky News’ Alex Crawford (@AlexCrawfordSky), The Guardian’s David Smith (@SmithinAfrica) and BBC’s Andrew Harding (@BBCAndrewH)—posted trial updates by the minute, the conversation quickly consumed my Twitter feed. By the end of day one, I had my #OscarPistorius page fixed open as I watched the conversation flow. I wouldn’t miss a thing.
So I was more than a little intrigued when I saw that Portland Communications had released new data on How Africa Tweets last week. Portland’s last report, collating and analysing tweets from the last three months of 2011, had been an interesting snapshot of twitter usage on the continent in the face of the Arab Spring.
The newest study found that in the last quarter of 2013, the top five most active cities were in South Africa (Johannesburg, Ekurhuleni and Durban) and Egypt (Cairo and Alexandria). Regionally, Nairobi, Kenya was the most active city in East Africa and the sixth most active on the continent, with 123,078 geo-tagged tweets in Q4 2013, while Accra, Ghana was the most active city in West Africa and the eighth most active on the continent, with 78,575 geo-tagged tweets in Q4 2013.
Geo-tagging means precisely what it sounds like: a tweet is embedded with the latitude/longitude location of the tweeter. If that sounds a bit terrifying, it’s because it is; a lot of people don’t use the geo-tag feature. Seeing as the Portland study was based solely off of geo-tagged tweets, I began to wonder if we weren’t getting the full picture: apparently football was talked about more than Mandela, and Johannesburg’s Orlando Pirates more than any international team. I asked Nanjira Sambuli, a Nairobi-based mathematician and researcher with iHub, her thoughts on the study.
“Now, globally, less than two per cent of tweets are geo-tagged…it follows that few Twitter users in Africa activate this feature. It has privacy implications, for instance, something that frequent users are likely to be aware of,” Sambuli said. “Geo-tagging easily creates a sampling bias issue.”
Not that geo-tags aren’ valuable, she pointed out, it’s just that they’re not used all that often in Africa.
“Geo-tagging is a useful tool, but highly unreliable, especially as a primary or sole metric for analysing tweeting activity in any context. For instance, it was super useful in analysing the Occupy Gezi protests in Turkey last year, because Twitter users consciously geo-tagged their tweets; approx. 90 per cent of 2 million tweets generated within the first 24 hours were geo-tagged. But there’s much more that should go into analysing whether tweeting activity is based in a location at any given time,” she said.
“I must say, I also find it surprising that in the two reports released by Portland Communications, none has acknowledged or disclaimed the shortcomings or limitations of geo-tagging. From an academic perspective, this is something that should accompany every mention or citation of their findings,” Sambuli added.
But when I asked Portland account manager Matt Gould about the geo-tag method, he argued it was in fact the most reliable assessment: “Using geo-location allows us to be certain about each tweet’s true location. Some studies use a tweeter’s stated location (in their bios) but this doesn’t allow any level of certainty since there are no rules or limits about stating one’s location—an individual can note a different city, country or even planet if they want.
“While tracking geo-located tweets does not enable us to capture every single tweet coming out of each city, as many users do not enable locations services, it allows us to develop an indicative picture of overall activity,” he said.
Which brings us to event-inspired tweets, like the drama-filled Oscar Pistorius trial or the harrowing Westgate Mall attack. Could these tweets give us a window into twitter usage in Africa? While the How Africa Tweets study was limited to the last three months of 2013, it did indicate some twitter behavior on incident-based conversation.
“Major local or regional events will definitely have an impact on the level of Twitter activity in any given location,” Gould said. “The death of Nelson Mandela did occur during the period of time we were tracking and we saw a great amount of related activity. The day of Mandela’s death [showed] the largest peak in activity across the continent and his passing was one of the most talked about issues overall, with hashtags like #MandelaMemorial, #Mandela and #RIPNelsonMandela appearing across the continent.”
While the Pistorius trial and the Westgate attack fall outside the scope of Portland’s study, each has proved a window into Twitter activity in Africa: this analysis of the Westgate attack by Sambuli herself found that the incident was first reported by citizens on the scene, mirroring Twitter use in other disasters such as the Boston Marathon attack. iRevolution eventually reported more than 740,000 Westgate Mall tweets during the four-day hostage situation. Tweets were not limited to geo-tags, but rather hashtags (#Westgate, #Westlands, etc.) and other metrics (iRevolution’s full regional breakdown is here).  
The Pistorius trial, playing out in real time under the hashtags #OscarPistorius and #OscarTrial, is interesting in another way. The trial—in an unprecedented decision, the first to be televised in South Africa—has generated massive debates on the guilt of Pistorius, the weakness of witnesses, and the ruthlessness of lead defense lawyer Barry Roux.  South Africa-based digital media company Fuseware reported that there had been a total of 19,809 mentions of Pistorius from 9,213 South Africans on Twitter by the second day of the trial, and that half of them had been made the first day. The company estimated that there were more than 100,000 conversations on Twitter by the end of the week, and we have about a month of trial to go. Fuseware, it appears, also did not limit themselves to geo-tags.
There is definitely huge interest in the future of Twitter, and social media in general, in Africa. As smartphones become more affordable and internet more readily accessible, Twitter usage on the continent is rising. It’s a matter of time until brands jump in on the buzz—Portland already found that Adidas, Samsung, and Mangum ice cream ranked among the top hashtags at the end of 2013.
In the meantime though, we are still scrambling to find an entirely accurate tool for analysing Twitter use in Africa. However it’s worth noting that this is an international challenge—while we can all agree that everyone uses Twitter a lot, it’s a notoriously unruly social media site, and misleading numbers (or straight-up hoaxes) abound.  Gould’s point about geo-tagging is an entirely valid one, as checking someone’s true location when analysing tweets is still a pretty big issue.
Nonetheless, geo-tags don’t give the full picture. “In the future, it would be great if other factors were considered before such findings are put out and cited widely. There’s an appetite for statistics from Africa, and even more so on social media use/number of social media users, but we have a responsibility to apply properly devised methodologies to surface these,” Sambuli concluded.



For more blogs form CPI Financial, Visit our website.http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog

The cost of an online payment gateway for an SME in the UAE

Teeny tiny business owner Tamara Pitelen is feeling her way blindly through the process of getting an online payment gateway for her website… in this blog, she is horrified to discover the fees charged by the banks… will it bring everything to a crashing halt?

I feel like such a fool. I really should have known there would be another truck-sized spanner about to hit me in the head in my ongoing mission to get an online payment gateway for my website.
Am I surprised? No. Am I bitter? I’m bitterer than a mouthful of coffee grinds laced with lemon juice.
I’ve just been slapped down by the latest obstacle in the story of my attempt to first open a business bank account and then get a payment gateway for the website of my very small magazine publishing business. To read the story so far, click here.
So, here’s the latest chapter in the tale. I’ve just had my meeting with Imran Zaidi, my relationship manager from Mashreq Bank. The idea was that we would meet up so I could sign and stamp about 12,000 documents (ok, about eight documents) and show Imran the original copies of items like my trade license, my passport, etc. It should be mentioned that Imran had traipsed all the way to my offices in Media City, saving me a trip to his office in Dubai Outlet Zone. Gold star for that kind of service, Mashreq.
We had met in a café, I had a green tea, Imran had a cappuccino and things were going fine. That was until I noticed something on an addendum document that read, ‘One time set-up fee: $2,500’.
“What’s this set-up fee Imran, do I need to pay $2,500?” I asked.
“Yes, that’s right…” he said.
“Why is this the first time I’ve ever heard about this fee?”
“Did Hassaan not give you the details in a proposal?”
“Nope.”
Imran gets on the phone to Hassaan and a brief discussion takes place regarding my not having been told about the fee schedule – apparently some documents were meant to be sent to me but they weren’t. While Imran whispered into his mobile, I worked out that $2,500 is just under AED 10,000. And guess what, it turns out that the set-up fee isn’t the only fee I’d not been told about. Imran gets off the phone and tells me there is also an annual fee of $2,500 (AED 9,200) as well as a security fee of $10,000 (AED 37,000), which is refundable but that is a moot point if you don’t have it in the first place.
I’ll spare you the tears and histrionics that ensued over the next few minutes as the icy fingers of disappointment gripped me about the throat and squeezed. Silly me had assumed that taking a three per cent cut of every transaction would be sufficient payment for the bank’s efforts, how naïve and innocent that belief seems now. It was going to cost me about AED 60,000 to get this payment gateway set up – even though I was not even certain it would generate any revenue.
“Stop everything then Imran,” I said bitterly [and dramatically]. “I don’t have the money to do this. I’m going to have to forget the whole thing.” [Sob.]
“No, wait,” Imran said. “I will talk to my compliance department and put a special case forward that would waive the annual fee and the security deposit. But the set-up fee is non-negotiable because this is passed onto us from the credit card agencies…”
So, I may be able to get the gateway for about AED 9,200 that’s if Imran can get the other fees waived. And that is a monumentally huge ‘IF’, he tells me.
Still, that’s AED 9,200 that I didn’t think I’d need to find. This is on top of the AED 25,000 I need to pay this week to renew my trade license. What to do? The outgoings for a shoestring budget start-up seem never-ending, I’m beginning to see why so many fall at the first few hurdles. Just FYI, Imran tells me that in general, a small business should expect to pay the bank a minimum of about AED 15,000 to get an online payment gateway up and running. After that there is an ongoing transaction fee of 3.5 per cent (but they will reduce it to three per cent).
By the end of this meeting, three things are set in motion. First, Imran has gone off to make the argument to his compliance department that the Mashreq Bank-generated fees should be waived in my case. Second, I’m deciding whether I can come up with AED 9,200 assuming the compliance department feels sorry for me and obliges. Third, I’m back to square one on the ‘there must be another way’ thinking process.

THREE WEEKS LATER, ‘COME BACK PAYPAL, ALL IS FORGIVEN’

I haven’t heard a word from Imran since the meeting described above so I’m assuming his compliance department laughed in his face at the suggestion of waiving fees. So I am back to the start and still asking the question, ‘how will I take payment from people via my website?’ It looks like it’s going to have to be our old frenemy Paypal. Apparently, you can link a Paypal account to a credit card and retrieve funds that way if you’re in a country like the UAE where you can’t link it to a bank account. We’ll see. I’m having another meeting with my web developer next week to discuss. I’ll let you know how that goes.

THREE WEEKS AND ONE DAY LATER

I have to take back what I said about not having heard a word from Imran since our last meeting. He just called me and surprised me with the news that the Mashreq compliance department has agreed to waive all the usual fees for setting up my online payment gateway except the AED 9,200 one. I did not expect that! According to Imran, they have never done this before for anyone. Before me, the cheapest price for this was AED 15,000. So, next step is that my developer will test the integration link (Notice how I write that like I know what it means?). But there is a twist to this tale... I've just been told about another option, called Payfort. I'll be looking into that and writing another blog about it, so stay tuned if this is the kind of thing you're interested in.



For more blogs form CPI Financial, Visit our website.http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog

Tarnished reputation?

Gold maintains its lustre without tarnishing in air or water and is one of the least reactive of chemical elements. It is insoluble in nitric acid which otherwise dissolves metallic elements, a particular property that has been used to confirm the presence of gold and gave rise to the term ‘acid test’. However, while gold does not tarnish, the same may not necessarily be said of the reputations of those that handle it. Dubai’s reputation is under attack and, in particular, that of Dubai-based gold refiner Kaloti Precious Metals, the largest gold refinery in the Middle East.

UK newspaper The Guardian claims that in 2012 Kaloti ‘paid more than $5bn in cash for the metal and accepted gold from more than 1,000 customers who walked in off the street with no paperwork’.
The regulations of the Dubai Multi-Commodities Centre require gold refiners to make detailed checks of cash deals worth more than AED 40,000. However, it appears that Kaloti did not have a system in place to do this in 2012. The paper’s story is based on leaked documents from Ernst & Young (E&Y), which had been brought in to review Kaloti’s business practices.
Among specific allegations by The Guardian, Kaloti was said to have ‘taken millions of dollars of gold knowing it was plated in another metal and seemed to have been smuggled out of Morocco’.
The refiner has responded, “There is absolutely no evidence that Kaloti falsified any documentation. In its audit report, E&Y clearly stated that ‘findings were inadequate documentation in the supply chain’.
“Kaloti had full KYC documentation on all its Moroccan clients and had proper import documentation and invoices stating that this particular consignment was gold from Morocco. 
“Kaloti accepted it had a shortcoming in the initial audit, quickly remediated it, and is now fully compliant.”
The Guardian also claimed that Kaloti had ‘accepted 2.4 tonnes of gold in more than 1,000 transactions with customers who provided no paperwork’; and ‘paid cash to Sudanese suppliers who had hand-carried gold to Dubai – sourced from small-scale, artisan mining operations – but did not check whether they had approved mining licences’.
The refiner has responded, “All cash transactions mentioned in the report were conducted for clients that were on boarded by Kaloti and have full compliance KYC documentation. Each transaction was monitored by E&Y and each of the suppliers were checked by E&Y. There is no evidence that Kaloti was involved in money laundering; or any of our clients for that matter…”
The paper admitted that, “The Guardian has seen no evidence that published reporting of Kaloti failings was out of line with regulatory rules or industry practice.” It also said, “While there is no evidence that the refinery accepted conflict gold, major breaches in new guidelines were uncovered, raising concern about the history of huge volumes of shipments.”
In its public statement responding to the international media reports, the refiner said, “Kaloti would like to take this opportunity to reassure that these allegations are false and without any substantiation. Kaloti has strongly denied these claims and any implication relating to regulatory non-compliance in the gold trade.”
It added, “In all of Ernst & Young’s reports and findings during the process, Kaloti was never found to be sourcing from conflict zones. Any non-compliance during the initial audit stage was related to specific documentation anomalies, which were swiftly rectified, and not to any findings of conflict gold within the supply chain. There has been no evidence in any of E&Y findings that Kaloti sourced gold from conflict zones…
However, the refiner admitted, “As stated in the audit’s Consolidated Report, published on our website in accordance with the requirements of the regulator, Kaloti had shortcomings in the initial stages of the multi-staged process. However, as per DMCC Guidelines, Kaloti submitted a corrective action plan and immediately started the remediation process. The company received a fully compliant final audit result, which was confirmed by Ernst & Young.”
Unfortunately, it is perhaps not enough to be in a position to refute the allegations that have been made. Better by far to have systems in place that preclude them from ever being made in the first place. Gold is a key factor in Dubai’s trade, the gold business in the emirate is estimated to be worth around $70 billion a year.
The row centring on Kaloti is not over claims that it imported gold from conflict zones but that the systems it had in place meant that it was impossible to determine the origin of some of the gold it imported.
There are now strict international rules regarding so-called ‘conflict diamonds’. The global community is attempting to put in place similar rules regarding ‘conflict gold’. Kaloti could perhaps restore the lustre to its reputation and indeed boost its business by ensuring that not only are its systems and business practices correct but also that they are clearly seen to be correct, obviating the need to defend itself against any future claims otherwise – that would perhaps be the refiner’s own ‘acid test’.

For more blogs form CPI Financial, Visit our website.http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog

Thoroughfares, tweets and property prices

by Zoya Malik
 
There’s a lot to be said in favour of a smooth daily commute for a healthy and positive start to one’s work and school day.

 Traffic gridlock in The Gardens, in Dubai.

Residents at master developer Nakheel’s Discovery Gardens, The Gardens Community and Al Furjan Villas have been up in arms this past month due to the appalling traffic gridlock faced by Dubai commuters and school drop-off parents in its surrounding areas. A development that serves up to 30,000 residents and boasts 95 per cent occupancy has seen its roadways strained with bottlenecks due to a sudden RTA move to close a temporary dirt-path leading off from the Ibn Battuta Mall to the Sheikh Zayed Road. It seems this path has served as an informal fourth exit used by hundreds of cars every day for a swift getaway during morning and evening rush hour. The abrupt cut off that served as a lifeline for a number of years has frustrated commuters and children on buses servicing three local schools. Last week, the matter was made worse due to the rains and flooding, bringing greater pressure to bear on The Gardens’ historically poor drainage that caused accidents and left cars and vans abandoned in the flood water.
In the daily press, travellers’ have tweeted their travails as “being trapped” in vehicles from 45 minutes to two hours to reach school and work. Anxiety levelled at the RTA and Nakheel has been over children’s health and safety on buses, left without snacks and access to bathrooms.

 

On 13 February, Nakheel advised, “Today’s traffic congestion at Discovery Gardens is the result of a road closure by the RTA for safety reasons.  We continue to liaise with the RTA, impressing upon them the urgent need to address traffic congestion in the area.  Meanwhile, to help ease the situation, Nakheel has today opened up a temporary route between Discovery Gardens, Al Furjan and the E77 (Al Yalayis Road), which connects Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Road and Sheikh Zayed Road”. Since then The RTA announced, “As regards to the traffic congestion at Discovery Gardens the RTA  is about to undertake further road works in the area with a view to providing two additional entries and two exits for the Discovery Gardens and Ibn Battuta Mall at Interchange 5.5 on the Sheikh Zayed Road and the Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Road. Works in these solutions are expected to be completed by the end of this year 2014. These works are undertaken as part of the next 5-Year Plan, which provides for completing parallel roads in that area”.
This lack of foresight in proper urban planning in a growing city creates headaches for the community at large and property owners. Many residents renting properties are thinking of moving out of the area. In speaking to Sohair Elmeniawi, Client Manager at Exclusive Links Real Estate Brokers responsible for The Furjan Villas, she commented, “We are finding that the absence of the originally promised exit to the Emirates Road, standing water and lack of a security gate in this prestigious development is scaring buyers away. While traffic issues are a main-stay of this area, property prices had risen in 2013 for three bedroom villas from AED 2.3 million – AED 2.9 million. Although Nakheel has done a good job with quality at Al Furjan, now prospective buyers are shying from such serious infrastructure issues. So access particularly is affecting property movement and so communities will get affected. It’s the RTA’s responsibility to sort out immediately, especially in view of the area’s proximity to the Jebal Ali Airport, Abu Dhabi and EXPO 2020 pavilions that will be located in this area.”
As a school mum to the area, the daily challenge puts undue pressure on the morning run to work. The school is accommodating and so are my bosses in their understanding, of matters far beyond one’s control. Patience is a virtue, yet the consequences of ad hoc planning should not be left to the good graces and acceptance of helpless residents.
Perhaps this raising of exigent petitions through social media and the show of reluctance by home- buyers to commit, may make the case and the endorsement for change and propel local agencies to cooperate in the planning and development of living spaces that are amenable for ease and safety of movement and peace of mind for all. 

For more blogs form CPI Financial, Visit our website.http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog

A real-estate of affairs

by Zoya Malik

Suffice it to say that property buying can be a very dizzying experience. While researching Dubai’s housing sales market recently, I discovered the numerous perplexing challenges and limitations that house hunters are currently facing, in a lopsided market (expatriates can only buy in certain ear-marked developments), inflated by Dubai’s economic recovery.

 

 Rents surged by 40 per cent last year, boosted by the Expo 2020 excitement and are now forcing tenants to re-assess renewing their leases. Due to these extreme hikes, many long-standing Dubai residents are deciding to take the plunge and enter the property market. However, the UAE Central Bank’s highly anticipated and imminent new regulation on banks’ mortgage-lending caps has caused anxiety among purchasers. Under this regulation, based on a loan-to-value ratio for the first investment up to five million dirhams, expatriates will be limited to borrowing up to 75 per cent of the property value – the challenge being to gather a minimum down payment of 25 per cent. (Currently most banks require a 15 per cent deposit and will finance the balance on various interest-rate terms).

So borrowers, otherwise confident about meeting monthly repayments, will immediately feel the burden of having to find a larger deposit that may effectively price them out of the market. Buyers must also calculate for paying an additional 6 per cent on top of the property price to include the Buyers fee at 2 per cent, the Sellers fee at 2 per cent and the broker’s commission at 2 per cent, which shouldn’t apply if buying directly from the developer. There is also a handling charge by the Land Registry on the purchase. As market pressure bears down, so momentum abounds and prices are rising to squeeze out as much juice and mileage for all interested parties. New projects are now coming on-line at a steady pace in Dubailand, Sports City and Jumierah Village South, but it seems not quickly enough to satisfy this pressing demand. And everyday prices for the same properties are being pushed up due to several unprecedented factors.
In new developments, buyers may be delayed in securing the property of their choice having to await the seller acquiring the title deed to the property from the Land Registry.  Sellers in possession of a title deed have turned this to their advantage and are charging a premium on the advertised prices for their new builds, to take advantage of this time lag. In view of the looming mortgage cap, buyers are submitting to these higher charges as competition heats up between units’ bona fide handovers. Many buyers are even buying properties unseen, in a bid to clinch the best deals of the moment.
Banks are challenged to step up lending at attractive rates to capture this new buyer interest and brokers equally to secure the best price, close the deal before regulation comes in and earn their commissions.
The only other hope is that the rental market also comes to heel, giving residents more options to suit their lifestyles and wallets.

 Ref: http://www.cpifinancial.net/blog/post/25144/a-real-estate-of-affairs

Getting a business bank account and online payment gateway for a start-up

by Tamara Pitelen
 

Tamara Pitelen chronicles the journey to opening a bank account for a small business that also offers an online merchant payment gateway.

It is three months since I first attempted to open a business bank account for my new born company, Awakenings Media.

You can read my first blog about this journey here.

I have succeeded in opening a Rakbank business account. The process took about eight weeks and involved the hapless staff of Rakbank paying me a visit to my office at least five times. Three of these visits were because someone back at their head office did not think my signature was suitably consistent across the various documents they required me to sign. So, a number of young gentlemen were forced to make the trek from their office in Deira to my office in Media City – via public transport – so that I could have another go at signing my signature 25 times in the same way. I ended up telling the last man that I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t write my signature the same way 25 times. He said, “please Madam, please, just print the letters, it must be the same.” So, I ended up dropping the usual flourishes, strikes and swirls that one makes when doing their signature and reverted to primary school block printing of the letters in my name. I know this is going to come undone. I know that in, say, six months or so, I’ll forget and sign a cheque with my usual flourish, which will be rejected by the bank and involve weeks of back and forth trying to sort it out.

Anyway, I do want to give full credit to Rakbank for being so obliging. In stark contrast to various other banks that couldn’t be bothered even emailing me more than one word answers (Citibank), banks with random fees for nothing in particular (ENBD) and banks I’ve long decided to avoid for a long and bitter list of reasons (HSBC Middle East), Rakbank went far and beyond the call of duty to help me open my account. It just took quite a long time. However, I’ve since found out that Rakbank can’t offer me a merchant payment gateway for my website. As a small publishing company, I’d need to take payment from people through my website in return for subscribing to my magazine. We are not talking Donald Trump levels of transactions here but I do need to be able to take payment by credit card or Paypal from people who want to buy my magazine. It turns out that only four banks in the UAE have the license to offer an online merchant payment gateway. This big four are Emirates NBD, National Bank of Abu Dhabi, Mashreq Bank and Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank. Why can't a UAE-based start-up just use Paypal? Mainly because you can't get the money out of Paypal unless it's linked to a bank.

I’ve already decided against ENBD because of their random AED 200 a month fee for just having an account. So I just called Mashreq Bank and they tell me that yes, I can open a Business Value Account that will get me a merchant payment gateway, the main conditions include maintaining a minimum balance of AED 10,000 (falling below gets you a AED 250 per month fee) and a standard monthly fee of AED 50. I can live with that.
Within half an hour of my inquiry call on 24 December 2013, I got a call back from a gentleman who is emailing me the initial set-up documents for the payment gateway.
By early January, I had my account set up and activated, my Visa debit card and chequebook couriered to me and I was told the set up of my online payment gateway was on the way. It all took about 10 days and nobody said anything about my inconsistent signature.

So, if you’re a start-up looking for a UAE bank that can offer you a business account with an online payment gateway for your website, I recommend Mashreq Bank.

Next step, getting the payment gateway integrated into my website. I’ll do another blog about that.