PostFinance Bank Review 2025 – Pros & Cons
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(Disclosure: Some of the links below may be affiliate links)
PostFinance is the bank of the Swiss Post. It is one of the largest banks in Switzerland. But is it any good?
I answer this question in this article. I will look into PostFinance’s bank services in detail and see its advantages and disadvantages. They have changed many things recently with their banking packages and how they handle negative interest rates. I include all these changes in my review.
By the end of the article, you will know whether you should use PostFinance.
| Monthly fee | 5 CHF |
|---|---|
| Users | 4’000’000 |
| Card | Mastercard Debit |
| Currencies | CHF, EUR or USD |
| Withdrawals in Switzerland | Free at PF ATMs, 2 CHF at other |
| Withdrawals abroad | 5 CHF |
| Languages | English, French, German, and Italian |
| Custody bank | PostFinance |
| Depositor protection | 100’000 CHF |
| Established | 1906 |
| Headquarters | Bern, Switzerland |
PostFinance
PostFinance is the financial entity of the Swiss Post. It was founded in 1906, making it a very mature bank. As of 2021, it is the fifth-largest retail bank in the country. In 2020, the bank managed 123 billion CHF in customer assets and had about 4.2 million customers. It is interesting to note that the bank has been losing customers for several years. It already had 4.2 million customers in 2011 and almost 5 million at its peak in 2016.
PostFinance offers many services:
- Savings and checking accounts
- Vested benefits and third pillar accounts
- Investment funds
- Trading on the stock market with PostFinance E-Trading
In this article, we will only focus on the banking services of PostFinance, not on their other features.
Currently, PostFinance is not allowed to grant mortgages and loans. Instead, it offers mortgages via third parties. However, in 2021, the Federal Council announced that it was looking at privatizing PostFinance to enter the credit market. So, this lack of mortgages may change in the future.
I used PostFinance myself for many years until they introduced new fees in 2018, and I moved to Migros Bank after that. Before that, my experience with them was mostly positive.
Banking features
We should look at the features PostFinance offers for bank accounts.
You can access your account from the e-banking web application or one of the mobile applications on Android or iPhone. Since PostFinance is a traditional bank, you can also conduct operations at their offices. From the application, you can do everything you expect from a bank account:
- See your balance and transactions
- Pay your bills
- Transfer money to other accounts
- Pay e-bills
As of July 2021, PostFinance will offer new banking packages and convert existing customers to these packages. So, we will focus on these banking packages in this article. There are two banking packages:
- Smart
- SmartPlus
The features of the two packages are the same, but the fees differ, as we will see in the next section.
You get a private account in CHF, EUR or USD with your banking package. You can then open other accounts if you want to hold multiple currencies. But these are still distinct accounts, not a multi-currency account.
Historically, this card was unique (not a Mastercard, Visa, or Maestro). However, since 2022, PostFinance has delivered a Mastercard Debit card. A Mastercard is good because you can use it everywhere.
With the package, you also get a savings account.
You can also use PostFinance with Google Pay and Apple Pay to pay from your phone! And you can also use PostFinance with TWINT. That way, you will not even need a physical card to shop!
So, overall, PostFinance will have more than enough features for your banking needs.
Banking fees
We should now take a look at fees for the banking packages.
You can do the basic operations for free:
- Send money to and from your account
- Pay your bills
- Pay your e-bills
- Pay with your card in shops
If you want to withdraw money, you can do so for free at any PostFinance ATM (or in PostFinance offices). However, if you withdraw at any other ATM, you must pay 2 CHF per withdrawal and 5 CHF if you withdraw money abroad.
If you want paper documents, you will pay 5 CHF. Even though I have not been using paper documents in many years, I think this is excessively expensive.
On top of that, you will pay an account management fee for each of the packages:
- Smart will cost 5 CHF per month
- SmartPlus will cost 10 CHF per month
SmartPlus has only two real advantages over Smart:
- You get free withdrawals at any ATM in Switzerland
- You get free withdrawals abroad
Also, you get a 50 CHF discount on PostFinance credit cards. However, this is not an advantage since better and free credit cards are available.
Overall, the SmartPlus account does not make sense unless you withdraw a lot of money at other ATMs. I would even argue that the SmartPlus package does not make sense, period. Paying 5 CHF monthly more for free withdrawals is a ripoff. I do not understand their banking packages. So, in any case, I would strongly advise against the SmartPlus package. It is just too expensive for its value.
5 CHF per month is relatively reasonable for the Smart banking package. However, there are better and free bank accounts available in Switzerland that offer other advantages!
There is one way you can get lower fees: by investing your money with PostFinance. For example, if you have 25’000 invested with PostFinance (e-trading, funds, or third pillar), you will get 5 CHF per month out of your bill. So, the Smart account will be free, while the SmartPlus will cost 5 CHF per month.
The problem with that approach is that PostFinance products are expensive and sub-optimal. I would not recommend investing in any of their products. So, investing in PostFinance will cost you more than what you will save on the fees. So, I would prefer paying 5 CHF per month to PostFinance rather than having 25K of my assets invested. However, the PostFinance e-trading offering is not too bad. So investing in ETFs with PostFinance would be alright. But I would not recommend their funds.
On top of that, if you have more than 100’000 CHF in your account, you will pay a negative interest rate of 0.75% on the amount of money higher than the threshold. The threshold can be higher if you have a lot of money invested in PostFinance assets. Even if this is not great, most people should not have that much money in their PostFinance account. Having that much cash probably means that they should invest some of it or diversify across banks.
Overall, the fees are not catastrophic (some banks in Switzerland are more expensive), but they are not good. Indeed, some much cheaper banks have better advantages (no currency conversion fee, for instance!).
User Reviews
We should look at what other users think of PostFinance.
We start with Postfinance Reviews on Trustpilot. There are 230 reviews at the time of this writing, with a horrible average score of 1.2 (out of 5 stars). This score is the worst I have seen on Trustpilot for a bank. People complain about basically every aspect of PostFinance:
- Constantly introducing new fees without new features
- Very difficult to reach customer service
- The new app (introduced in 2020) is worse than the old one and without any advantages
- Slow transactions
If we look at the positive reviews, we see four 5-star reviews from the same person out of nine reviews. This is a bad sign.
It is not better if we look at the app reviews on Google Play. There are almost 20’000 ratings, with an average score of 1.7 (out of 5 stars). Many ratings complain that the new app is significantly worse than the previous one. There are still a few reviews that say they are happy with the new one, but overall, the reviews are awful.
And the reviews of the app on the App Store are barely better. Out of 6’660 ratings, the app scored 2.2 (out of 5 stars). The reviews are consistent with the reviews from the Android side, with slightly more positive reviews (or maybe more nuanced reviews).
Overall, we can easily say that PostFinance currently has a poor reputation among its customers. I can see the difference in reputation compared to 5-10 years ago, when everybody was satisfied with PostFinance. Then, everything went downhill, with more fees, poor communication, and fewer features.
Security
We also need to look at the security of using PostFinance as a bank account.
Before October 2017, PostFinance had a special state guarantee for its customers. This state guarantee protected assets without limits. This is the same protection that many cantonal banks have in Switzerland. However, this state guarantee has been revoked, and PostFinance is now protected by Esisuisse like most Swiss banks. So, if it bankrupts, customer assets are protected for up to 100’000 CHF.
However, since Esisuisse has a limit of 6 billion CHF and PostFinance has more than four million customers, the guarantee would only be, on average, 1’500 CHF per customer. This is a disadvantage of Esisuisse since larger banks are less protected than small ones.
Nevertheless, PostFinance has an excellent credit rating and is financially healthy.
As for technical security, PostFinance has high standards. They use multiple authentication methods and provide good security information on their website, which is a good sign.
So, overall, I would say that it is currently safe to have your assets with PostFinance.
Alternatives
We can quickly compare PostFinance against some alternatives.
PostFinance vs Neon
All the services you need to pay, save and invest, in a neat package, with extremely good prices!
Use code thepoorswiss to receive up to 100 CHF in trading credits!
- Pay abroad for free
- Invest with great fees
Neon is a digital bank account with many great features.
Neon has the same features as PostFinance. However, they do not have traditional offices, so you must do everything on the phone.
Neon’s account is mostly free, making it significantly better than PostFinance. You can also pay abroad without currency conversion fees and make affordable international money transfers, so you can save some money with Neon over PostFinance.
They have a great reputation, and their application is working nicely.
So, if you do not mind a digital bank account, Neon’s account is better than PostFinance’s.
PostFinance vs Migros Bank
Migros Bank is from the Migros group, the biggest retailer in Switzerland.
They both have the same kind of features (all banks do). With Migros Bank, you can have many more places to withdraw money since you can withdraw in most Migros shops. With both banks, you can go to the bank’s office to do operations or get support.
At its cheapest, PostFinance costs 5 CHF per month, while a Migros Bank account is free. So, Migros Bank is significantly cheaper than PostFinance.
Also, Migros Bank has a much better reputation than PostFinance.
If you are looking for a traditional bank, Migros Bank is significantly better than PostFinance. If you need more information, read my Migros Bank review.
FAQ
What is the difference between PostFinance Smart and SmartPlus?
SmartPlus is 5 CHF per month more expensive but offers free withdrawals at any ATMs in Switzerland and abroad.
Who is PostFinance good for?
PostFinance is only good for people that really want to do business with PostFinance.
Who is PostFinance not good for?
PostFinance is not great as a bank account. It does not have the best features nor the best prices, so there are better alternatives for both traditional and digital banks.
PostFinance Bank Summary
PostFinance
PostFinance is the bank of the official Swiss Post, one of the largest banks in Switzerland.
Product Brand: Swiss Post
3
Pros
- Multiple applications to access your account (mobile and web)
- Good technical security
- Support for TWINT
- Support for e-bills
- Mastercard Debit cards are well supported
Cons
- Expensive bank accounts
- Trying to make you invest in sub-optimal products
- Very poor reputation from its customers
- Expensive currency conversions
- A negative interest rate for more than 100'000 CHF
- Limited bank protection in case of bankruptcy
- The PostFinance is not the most practical card
- The SmartPlus banking package does not make sense
Conclusion
Overall, I see no significant advantage to PostFinance. The Smart banking package is not particularly expensive, but cheaper alternatives exist. You could reduce your fees using their investment products, but there are much better alternatives, so you should not do that.
For instance, if you want a truly digital bank account, I would recommend Neon over PostFinance. With Neon, you will have a free bank account, currency conversions abroad, and cheap transfers in foreign currencies. Except for the 30K daily limit, I can only see advantages to Neon. If you want more information, I have a review of Neon.
If you are looking for a traditional bank, I would recommend Migros Bank over PostFinance. With Migros Bank, you will pay only 3 CHF per month, and if you have more than 7500 CHF in your account, you will not pay any account management fees. On top of that, you will have the same features as PostFinance. So, you get the same but cheaper. Again, I have a review of Migros Bank if you need more information.
What about you? What do you think about PostFinance?
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Hi Baptiste,
I’ve just noticed that PF had recently lowered the fee for the SmartPlus banking package to 10 CHF: https://www.postfinance.ch/en/private/paying-saving/banking-packages-accounts/banking-packages-for-adults.html
Not that it would matter – I still agree it doesn’t make any sense to use it. But for completeness it’s good to keep the info up-to-date.
Cheers!
Hi Alojzy
Thanks for letting me know, I had not noticed. I will definitely update the article in the next few days. As you said, it won’t make much difference, but I always try to keep my articles up-to-date.
“Hello poor Swiss, I currently have an account at PostFinance, but I would like to switch to Migros Bank. The problem is that with the PostFinance package I also have a 3rd pillar account and an e-Management account (trading). It seems to me that you had the same situation: you were at PostFinance and then you switched to Migros Bank. In this case, do you think I should transfer my 3rd pillar? I also have the Finpension. How did you manage it? Has the Migros Bank app been improved? Thanks, regards
Hi Gabriele,
Yes, I would recommend moving away your 3rd pillar. PostFinance is really inferior to Finpension 3a. As for trading, you could move that to something else.
The apps have improved with the new version, but it’s still not great. You could also switch fully to Neon (my main account today) and there you could use Neon Invest to replace PF e-trading.
Please correct the table above. PostFinance offers CHF, EUR and USD accounts at no additional costs apart from the 5 fr per month.
They do, yes. But you have to request to open other accounts and they are still separated one from another. But it’s true that once you pay for the package, you can get multiple currencies that.
Hi, Baptiste.
I received an ad in the mail for their new services for portfolio management: https://www.postfinance.ch/en/private/investing/asset-management.html.
Any thought how it compares to others?
Hi Yvan
I did not look into it in details, but at first sight, there is nothing really special about it. It starts at 0.75% fee, not counting the fund fees (which seems relatively high, but I did not do the math since they do not share the aggregate fee) and no counting stamp duty. So, this would make it an expensive robo-advisor, apparently.
I have PostFinance account. Now I’m moving to the US and I see their fees are truly not that great…
However for now I’m keeping my Swiss account because I don’t know how it’ll go in the US for me :)
But their customer service is really poor, can only confirm…
Guess I should be happy that at least they are safe.
Hi Ana
Thanks for sharing your experience!
I got a call today from a Postfinance compliance gnome. He complained that my wife transferred a larger sum of money to my Postfinance account, before the money was moved to IB. He said that’s not the way to do it. He inquired whether we have a joint account at IB(!!) and how the money was invested (!!). He asked me about a small transfer to wise, too. A foreign institute, that rang their alarm bells. Frankly, I think these guys are out of their mind. Anyone similar experience?
Hi PG
I never had any issues transferring large sums from Migros and Neon to IB, but never tried from PF. As long as the accounts are in your name (or names if joint), I don’t think this could lead to any trouble.
I think that they use this as a scare strategy to keep the money in their accounts.
They didn’t block any transaction. The call happened weeks after I did this. I didn’t hang up, because I was curious what they were going to ask. It sounded more like police questioning. I know that the quality of banking services is quite low in Switzerland, but this was impertinence.
They are probably overstaffed, if they have such kind of time to spend with me on the phone. If you call their service line, prepare to wait (sometimes 30 minutes) and be greeted by an incompetent person.
Thanks for sharing the details. That’s weird!
Thanks for the article!
Just canceled my Postfinance account. But I still have one tricky question about its Twint and credit card.
When I switched Migros Bank, I realized that their Twint cannot be linked to a credit card. But the Postfinance twint could be linked to a credit card for payment. Then I wonder if all the transactions over Twint would be counted for the cashback calculation on the credit card? Is there a specific t&c on this regard?
Hi
I am afraid I have no idea. I have never used TWINT, even less with a credit card. If you want to pay with your phone using your credit card, could you use Apple Pay or Google Pay?
Hi Mr. Poor Swiss
We hold our account with Postfinance since my wife and me want to have a joint account which is not possible with all these digital banks. We also have our brokerage there with E-Traiding and even use their basic credit cards (only CHF 70 for both of us and even a little cashback). Before we had also several accounts and cards, but like you mentioned in your article about simplifying life this is now our “I buy everything at Galaxus strategy”. Simple, plain and everything under one roof, not the cheapest services for every product, but still ok. Migros Bank would be no solution for us by the way, since I use Linux and their E-Banking requires Windows or Mac OS as far as I know.
Regards from Schaffhausen
Thomas
Hi Thomas,
You are right that currently none of the great digital bank accounts offer joint accounts. That’s also why we have our main account at Migros Bank. And yes, their E-Banking is from another age and really sucks. They are currently deploying a new one so this may change hopefully.
However, if you are open to foreign brokers, you may want to consider something like IB, because this would allow you to save a ton on investing fees. Even though simplicity matters, it has his limits :)