How to Compare Business Bank Accounts: The Fee Lines That Actually Differ
Written with AI assistance and reviewed by the NorwegianSpark SA editorial team.
Business account comparisons almost always rank on the monthly fee, because it is the one number every provider publishes in the same format. It is also, for most businesses, the smallest cost in the account.
The costs that actually differ are FX margin, transaction pricing beyond an included allowance, cash handling and the price of the things you did not know were extra. This is a method for comparing those, rather than another ranked list.
Start From Your Own Flow, Not From the Pricing Page
Before you look at a single provider, describe one representative month of your own activity. You need six numbers and you already have them.
- How many inbound payments, and by what method — domestic transfer, card, direct debit, international.
- How many outbound payments, split the same way.
- How much foreign currency you convert, and between which pairs.
- How much cash you deposit or withdraw, if any.
- How many cards you need, and how much of that spending is in a foreign currency.
- Your average and peak balance.
Every comparison after this point is that month, priced by each provider. Nothing else is a comparison — it is a feature list.
This takes about twenty minutes with a bank statement and it converts an unanswerable question into arithmetic.
The Five Costs That Actually Differ
1. FX Margin, Which Is Not on the Fee Schedule
This is the largest hidden cost in business banking and it is usually not in the fee table at all, because it is inside the exchange rate.
A provider quotes you a rate. The mid-market rate — the real interbank midpoint — is a different number. The gap between them, expressed as a percentage, is a fee. It is charged on every unit you convert, and it does not appear as a line item anywhere.
To measure it: take a quote for a real amount, note the exact time, and compare the rate against the mid-market rate at that moment. Do it twice — once in market hours and once at a weekend, because several providers widen the margin outside trading hours and do not advertise that they do.
A business converting a meaningful amount each month will usually find the FX margin larger than every explicit fee on the account added together.
Providers that charge an explicit fee and give you the mid-market rate are easier to compare and usually cheaper. Providers that say "no fees on transfers" while pricing inside the rate are not doing you a favour.
2. Transaction Pricing Past the Allowance
Most accounts include a number of free transactions and charge beyond it. The included number is prominent; the overage price is not, and the two are frequently on different pages.
Price your real monthly volume, not the allowance. And check whether the count includes inbound as well as outbound, direct debits, and card transactions — the definition varies enough to change the answer.
3. Cash
If you handle cash, this can be the largest cost of all, and it is where app-only providers are weakest.
Check the price per deposit, whether it is charged per transaction or per amount banked, where you can physically pay in, and the price of the retail network if the provider outsources it. A business banking a few thousand in cash a week can pay more for that than for everything else combined.
If you handle no cash, ignore this entirely — and be sceptical of any comparison that ranked providers partly on it.
4. International Payments, Priced End to End
The stated transfer fee is one part of the cost. The others are the FX margin above, any correspondent or intermediary fees deducted along the way, and whatever the receiving bank charges.
The only measurement that means anything is what the recipient actually received against what left your account. Ask any provider whether fees are guaranteed at the sending end or whether intermediaries may deduct — the answer changes the number materially, and it is a question providers answer honestly when asked directly.
5. The Things That Are Extra
Ask specifically, because these are rarely on the headline page: additional users, physical and virtual cards beyond the included number, same-day or priority payments, accounting integrations, API access, statements and letters your accountant or a lender will ask for, and chargeback or dispute handling.
A cheap account that charges for the four things you need every month is not cheap.
The Non-Price Comparisons That Change the Answer
Some things are not costs until they go wrong, and then they dominate everything.
Eligibility for your structure. Whether the provider serves your legal form, ownership arrangement and industry. Confirm before applying, in writing.
Deposit or safeguarded. Whether your balance is an insured deposit or safeguarded e-money. In the EEA, deposits are covered to €100,000 per depositor per bank through national schemes; in the UK, £120,000 per eligible person per institution for failures after 30 November 2025; in the US, at least $250,000 per depositor per insured bank per ownership category. Safeguarded funds sit outside all of those and work by a different mechanism.
Permissions. Multiple users with roles, payment limits and dual authorisation. Check it exists on the plan you are buying.
Accounting integration. A maintained two-way integration, not a CSV export.
Support. Whether a human is reachable, and how fast, when a payment has not arrived.
Exit. How you close and move. This is worth asking at the start because it is unanswerable once you need it.
Comparing Fairly Across Different Kinds of Provider
If your shortlist mixes a bank and a fintech platform, normalise before comparing.
Price the same month through both. Include the FX margin on both sides. Note explicitly that one gives you insured deposits and possible credit while the other gives you safeguarded funds and better software — and decide whether that difference is worth the price gap in either direction.
Do not compare a bank's wire against a platform's transfer as though they are the same product. Compare total delivered cost on the same real flow.
A Repeatable Scoring Method
Score each provider on your own month, in this order: total cost of the month including FX margin; eligibility, which is pass or fail; protection, deposit or safeguarded; capability, whether it does what you need without workarounds; and operations, meaning permissions, integrations and support.
Cost breaks ties. Eligibility and protection do not — they are gates.
Run it once a year. Pricing changes, your flow changes, and the account that was right at ten customers is frequently wrong at two hundred.
The Summary
The monthly fee is the number every comparison uses and the one least likely to decide your total cost. FX margin, overage pricing and cash handling decide it, and none of the three is comparable without pricing your own real month through each provider.
Twenty minutes with a statement beats any ranked list, including a good one.