Dutch Bank ABN Amro pulling out of SL

I spoke to our personal Dutch Bank ABN Amro today regarding the setting up of our slapt.me company account and was told they do not want to be associated with SL and some of the companies in the game and are pulling the plug on their sim etc. in SL and therefore wouldn't set up the RL account, not that this is a problem for us as we will go another bank lol.

They haven't released a press release about it yet but thought I would mention it here. Wonder what other RL companies are thinking of pulling the plug on SL?

that sounds like a very harsh and potentially damaging decision for SL, refusing your money because its associated with SL, sorry that is both scary and amusing.

Word that they were leaving SL came out about a year and a half ago, I'm surprised they still have a sim here even now.

I guess banks find it very hard to withdraw.

ABN Amro have been cutting back their SL presence over a long period - 18 months ago they had 16 regions then in April and May last year they cut back to 5. They dropped 4 of these regions at the beginning of May this year, leaving just one region .

I know it is they said they will release a press release about it but I said I would help them by advertising the fact that they want to not be associated with SL.

We went to them as that is where we have our mortgage and one of our Bank accounts and coupled with the fact they had/have a presence here in SL

It is no matter as the bank that has my personal account has no problems with it so it looks like they get our business now, just wanted to mention it as I to found it amusing as well, but I do seriously wonder what other RL companies may be thinking of withdrawing from SL as it is an 18+ game/platform

What made me wonder as I said if SL is so bad why didn't they just pull the plug on it all than remaining here, ah well big business never makes sense at times

PS: I know Brenda will be pleased as she hates RL businesses in SL

ABN Amro were taken over some time ago by one of the Scottish banks that have recently gone belly-up. This take over saddled them (the Scottish bank) with massive toxic assets.

Yep I saw that but the bank specifically said to us "that they did not want to be associated with SL nor with the companies in SL", that is what struck me as strange as a Dutch bank they were normally more open minded seems like the Scottish ties have influenced them

Not that it really matters to us as we have other options it just got me thinking what other companies are maybe starting to think the same way? and is SL becoming synonymous with adult stuff only when there is so much more on offer here

LOL - them Scots are real dour!

I think it's just finances at the root of it - they have recently announced thousands of redundancies too - so SL is hard to justify in the current economic climate.

Good riddance though. For a rl company, ABN had its SL presence set up in a most immature manner that reeked more of a swindle than of a serious business plan. (the price at which they exchanged L$ and the price of renting land from them were dead giveaways) So I really doubt you would've found any benefit from them "knowing" SL.
What they did manage, was to create something of a Dutch community. Leave the residents to sort out policing the place, and then simply take their hands off and leave it with hardly an explanation.

Overall, ABN in SL wasn't anything but an "easy money" scheme, which failed like every other one of those.

I am sure you are right maybe not with the Scottish bit lol it did though strike me as strange that the statement by 2 different staff on the issue was that they wanted to dis associate with companies in SL and also with SL, but I do agree that finances are probably a big factor as SL to the bank was just an advert for them judging by their sim

Thanks for that input and now I hope they do not run my mortgage like they run their SL land and that from a bank with branches around the world lol

errr banks are in the mess they are in, because they did do that!

Dam I need to pay it off quick then, I hate dam banks generally give me a good old fashioned mattress any day

Just make sure no helpful relatives secretly decide to buy you a new one.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6469706.ece

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Aes

Hilarious, given the generally atrocious mismanagement of investments that led us into the current global crisis: it's like fretting over a smudge on the paintwork when your car has already been written off in a motorway pile-up.

Nah, your money is about as safe as it gets now. After the Bank of Scottland incident, the Dutch state bought up ABN to make it financially healthy again and sell it off again after. Quite a lot of employees are going to lose their job over this though, but tbh, that organisation could've used some trimming years ago already.

Something you said struck me as odd, and I think it is a lot more stupid than you're letting on, Lord.

That bank refused to open a REAL-LIFE corporate account for your REAL-LIFE business, because it was "related to" SL? Snuh?

What does them pulling out of SL have to do with refusing to open a RL business account? Are they now determining which businesses they want as customers, based on the kind of business they are in?

I mean, yeah, banks won't open accounts for fraudulent/criminal enterprises, or for people who have abjectly horrible credit, but discriminating against particular kinds of legitimate businesses is just stupid.

That sounds pretty screwed up to me.

Yes the bank refused to open a RL bank account for our registered Dutch business and in our discussions today with them, they refused because our business was in SL and therefore adult and they do not want to be associated with anything that is in Second Life and are currently withdrawing themselves from SL.

BTW my credit is good etc. etc. However the bank I have my personal account with has no problems and I am seeing them next week to open the business account lol

It just struck me as so strange that I had to bring it up here and on a few other sites as I to felt it was totally stupid

That's really pretty normal, a bank is going to make a judgement call on a business plan's viability before it hands out the money, you kind of have to go for a personal loan if you don't want them to consider that. It's exactly the same situation where you would want to take a close look at the prospectus before buying a bond. Since that particular bank went into SL itself and failed to make it work, it's kind of understandable that it's not going to want to invest any more into SL ventures.

LOL I did not go asking for money we are totally self financing and certainly do not want or need to borrow the banks money so it would have had no investment stake in us at anytime. Secondly their decision was made before we got to the appointment on the 7th July, they turned us down with the reasons above, knowing that we did not want to borrow money etc. beforehand. Their reasons were as I have stated

"that they do not want to be associated with anything that is in Second Life and are currently withdrawing themselves from SL."

Fortunately my personal bank sees the viability and future of Virtual worlds and is happy to take our company's business.

Frankly I don't believe that the whole story is being told here. They would never have inquired as to the nature of your business if you were simply asking them to roll some coins. You were asking for a more involved banking relationship than that.

They had a presence in SL? *shrugs* Never heard of that bank.

I am sorry you are totally wrong here and obviously do not understand how the banks here in Holland work, just as I know nothing about the banks in the USA so maybe you can tell me how yours work so let me explain to you what rules we have here.

When you go to apply for an account here you have to tell the bank whether it is for personal or business we of course told them it was a business account. Then we sat with the bank clerk and filled out a form about what we do, what we are planning to do and give them our company registration papers that we get here in Holland when you register with the KvK and as we are an internet business here in SL with our web shop we of course give them our sites URL, they ask if you need bank finance which of course we replied no. After they have photocopied all the documents and my passport they then send them to the business department here in our main city center.

Then you wait and they send you an email saying we will be in touch shortly with your appointment, it is at this stage they then decide how they will react and if they will grant you a business appointment and it was then we had the phone call from them.

At no time did I ask for or need anymore involvement from the bank apart from a normal banking account with no overdraft, no credit cards ( I have my own) so no nothing more involved than a place to pay funds into.

I have an excellent credit rating owe no one apart from the mortgage, pay my credit card in full every month and have a large overdraft that i do not use.

As I stated ABN were clear about the reasons as to why they would not grant the account as I stated earlier and I must admit we to were gob smacked when they gave the reasons and that was they did not want to be associated with SL.

On a footnote I have no reason to not to tell the full story and those that know me here will attest I do not bullshit lie or give false information and have full RL disclosure here in SL about myself because of our business and am happy to hand out my phone number to people that do business with us here, business address and fax number are on the website and my home address is registered with the KvK as the Director of www.slapt.me . The reason we went to ABN first was twofold, the fact they have our mortgage and joint account and secondly that they had a presence here in SL so we thought that they would be the best choice lol

I have nothing to lose by posting this thread as my personal bank want our business but just wanted to see what others thought