Bank blockage when starting a company: the droit au compte only comes after the K bis

Three banks have turned down your file. You look for the remedy, and everyone gives you the same answer: the droit au compte (the right to a basic bank account), the Banque de France will designate an institution. That is correct, and it is unusable — because this remedy only opens after registration, whereas you are blocked before.

The legal gap: between the articles of association and the K bis, there is nothing

The sequence is locked by three texts which, taken together, form a dead end.

A commercial company only becomes a person upon its registration: it « enjoys legal personality from the date of its registration with the registre du commerce et des sociétés » (code de commerce, art. L. 210-6 ; code civil, art. 1842). Yet the droit au compte under article L. 312-1, I, 1° du code monétaire et financier is reserved for natural or legal persons « domiciled in France ». And the arrêté du 31 juillet 2015, which sets out the documents required, requires a company to provide an original extrait K bis less than three months old.

Run the loop. To exercise the droit au compte, you need a K bis. To get a K bis, you need the certificate of deposit of the capital. For the certificate, you need a depositary that has said yes. The droit au compte is a post-registration remedy. At the precise moment the bank refuses you, no remedy exists — there are only other depositaries.

We have no trick to sell you for getting around this. What we can do is give you the exact list of the doors the code leaves open, and say which are genuinely usable.

What the code really allows: four depositaries, or three

The lists differ according to the type of company, and they are broader than you have been told.

For the SARL and the EURL, article R. 223-3 of the code de commerce provides for three depositaries: the Caisse des dépôts et consignations, a notary, or a credit institution. The funds must be deposited within eight days of their receipt, and the deposit is recorded in the articles of association.

For the SA, the SAS and the SASU, the rule is in article R. 22-10-6, in force since 1^st January 2021. You have to follow the chain to find it, and that is why so much content still cites the wrong articles: R. 22-10-6 sits in the chapter devoted to listed companies; it applies to the unlisted SA through the limitative cross-reference in R. 225-13, and to the SAS through article L. 227-1, which makes the rules of the SA applicable only « to the extent that they are compatible » with the SAS's own regime. In passing, if you read somewhere that the deposit texts are articles R. 225-6 and R. 225-12: R. 225-2 to R. 225-12 have been repealed since 1^st January 2021 by article 5 of décret n° 2020-1742.

The text for sociétés par actions adds a fourth door that no one cites: the intermediaries mentioned in 2° to 7° of article L. 542-1 du code monétaire et financier. Its 6° readmits the institutions of article L. 518-1 — Trésor public, Banque de France, La Poste, instituts d'émission d'outre-mer, and the Caisse des dépôts itself, which therefore appears twice in the list for the SAS.

Two obligations are rarely mentioned, and they do not fall on the same person. Whoever has received the funds must deposit them within eight days — except, precisely, when it is a credit institution or an intermediary under article L. 542-1 that received them (R. 22-10-6, al. 2). The depositary, for its part, must provide the list of subscribers to any subscriber who proves their subscription.

The Caisse des dépôts: a door closed without any text having closed it

« It is the most poorly documented point in the whole matter, and it must be stated precisely. » — and in 15: « The discrepancy is sharper still. »

The Caisse des dépôts no longer accepts capital deposits since 1^st June 2021 — the service-public information sheet says so. But no published text appears to have carried out this removal: neither a loi, nor a décret, nor an arrêté could be identified on Légifrance. The code still cites it, at the top of the list, in R. 223-3 as in R. 22-10-6, without the slightest mention of repeal.

There is something more troubling. Article R. 22-10-6 was created by the décret du 29 décembre 2020, which came into force five months before the closure, copying the old article word for word — Caisse des dépôts included. On the institution's website, the address of the old deposit page now displays « Accès refusé »; all that remains is a « Restitution Capital social » page, filed under the heading of unclaimed sums and written in the past tense.

The route was not closed by the law, it was closed by the institution, and the code did not follow. « If you were looking for the décret that removed it, look no further: the code still cites it. For you, the practical consequence is a single one — no point trying the Caisse des dépôts, you are left with the notary and the credit institution. »

If sums were deposited before 2021 and never claimed, be aware that they do not lie dormant indefinitely: article L. 518-24 du code monétaire et financier assigns to the State the deposited sums that have remained thirty years without any transaction, the institution having to notify the known beneficiaries six months before the deadline.

Neobanks: why capital deposit is closed to payment institutions

The official information sheet « Constituer et déposer le capital social d'une société » (entreprendre.service-public.gouv.fr, fiche F32333, checked on 20 October 2025) retains only two depositaries — « a credit institution or a notary » — where the code cites three or four. An administrative information sheet is not a norm, and this divergence is worth knowing. But it carries one decisive sentence for anyone meeting refusals:

« The share capital deposit cannot be made in a payment institution. »

This is, according to that same sheet — which has no normative force —, the exclusion of the players that operate under payment-institution status. We have not measured the share they represent among online capital-deposit offers. Those that work rely on a partner credit institution, and it is the name of that partner that appears on the certificate. Check it before paying anything at all.

A second restriction that the code sets out nowhere: the sheet allows payment by cheque only if it comes « from a bank domiciled in France ». Here too, this is an administrative position, not an article of law — but it is the one the counter will apply.

The notary, the only door that does not depend on a commercial policy

The notary is the only depositary whose access does not depend on a commercial policy. It is cited by R. 223-3 as by R. 22-10-6, for all the forms concerned, and it has no risk committee to convince.

Its mechanics are counter-intuitive, and they reopen the door that the Caisse des dépôts closed. The funds do not stay at the notary's office: article 15 of décret n° 45-0117 du 19 décembre 1945 requires that « the sums held by notaries on behalf of third parties on any basis whatsoever […] be deposited in current-availability accounts opened at the Caisse des dépôts et consignations », accounts which « may be debited only for the settlement of the matters that are the source of the deposits ». Beyond three months, they shift to so-called mandatory-deposit accounts, opened in the same place.

Going through the notary means bringing your capital to the Caisse des dépôts. The direct route is closed; the indirect route is the one the law has organised since 1945.

« A point of vocabulary: the official sheet writes « the share capital is said to be placed in escrow ». The code, for its part, says only « with a notary », without qualifying the deposit. On the cost, we have found no official fee applicable to this service: ask the notary's office for a written quote before committing, and check that it covers the issuing of the certificate of deposit. » : it writes « the share capital is said to be placed in escrow ». The code, for its part, says only « with a notary », without qualifying the deposit. We will go no further, and we will give no fee: we have verified none.

From abroad: the code stays silent, the documents demand

If you are based in Berlin, Milan, Madrid or Lisbon, start with a cautious piece of good news: the obstacle is not in the texts. We have explained elsewhere why it is your registered office that must be in France, not you, and what the choice between SASU and EURL when you live abroad changes, even before the bank. R. 223-3 and R. 22-10-6 write « a credit institution », without attaching the slightest condition of territory.

But an absence of prohibition is not a vested right, and three reservations apply. « Établissement de crédit » designates an authorisation status, not a synonym for a bank. The administration sets a condition of territory on the cheque. And it excludes payment institutions, which are often the only offer available from abroad. One more reservation if your bank is authorised outside the Espace économique européen — the case of the United Kingdom since 2021: the absence of a condition of territory in the text says nothing about an institution authorised outside the EEE, a point we have not verified.

The real obstacle is elsewhere: it is documentary. To make the deposit, the sheet requires the identity document of each of the partners, the list of subscribers, and a draft of the articles of association less than a year old. Gathering valid identity documents for partners scattered across three countries often takes more time than the formality itself.

A European gain exists, small but real. Article 3, § 1 of règlement (UE) n° 260/2012 requires the payee's provider, reachable for a national transfer, to be reachable also for a transfer initiated from an account held in another Member State: you can therefore transfer your contribution from your national IBAN to the French account of the company being formed. Article 9, § 2, for its part, prohibits the payee — therefore you — from imposing a payer account located in a particular Member State. Beware, however, of the most widespread misreading: this regulation governs the relations between payer and payee of a transfer. It does not require any greffe (the commercial court registry), any guichet unique or any depositary to accept a foreign account as the receptacle for the capital.

Finally, a reassuring point for what follows: once the company is registered, the droit au compte requires no French residence of the director. The criterion bears on the company's domiciliation. The arrêté requires only an identity document of the legal representative — no nationality condition, no residence permit, and no proof of address, unlike what it requires of natural persons.

The certificate, the release of funds, and the way out if nothing succeeds

The chain of documents closes on a divergence between the text and practice, and it can prove costly.

The depositary's certificate has a legal basis only for the SA and the SAS: article L. 225-13 requires that it be drawn up « at the time of the deposit of the funds ». For the SARL, no article requires it — R. 223-3 merely imposes a mention in the articles of association. But the guichet unique asks for it anyway, in the form of an original certificate, dated and signed, accompanied by the list of subscribers. A bank that refuses to issue the certificate therefore blocks a SARL that the code did not subject to that document.

Downstream, the withdrawal of the funds is conditional only on producing the « certificate of the greffier attesting the registration » (R. 223-4 for the SARL, R. 22-10-12 for the SA and the SAS). No release deadline appears in the texts. If your bank tells you to wait a few days, that is its own practice, and we have found no basis that supports it.

And if the registration never comes? The contributors can recover their funds on the expiry of a six-month period running from the first deposit (C. com., art. L. 223-8 and R. 223-5 ; art. L. 225-11 for the SA and the SAS). The route without a judge nonetheless requires an agent representing all the contributors: it becomes inoperative as soon as one partner is absent or in disagreement. And if the project restarts later, the deposit must be redone in full.

The day after the K bis: a free remedy, poorly kept deadlines

Once registered, the remedy finally exists. It is more generous than people think, and it keeps its deadlines far less well than announced.

The procedure, and the trap of silence

The bank must give you the refusal certificate « systematically, free of charge and without delay ». Above all, remember this: silence kept for fifteen days from the acknowledgement of receipt — or from handing the request over in person at the counter — counts as a refusal (art. R. 312-6-1). Hence the value of writing by registered post rather than chasing a letter that will not be handed to you: 48% of applicants surveyed in 2024 reported struggling to obtain it, against 54% in 2023 (rapport annuel de l'Observatoire de l'inclusion bancaire 2025).

The file comprises the identity of the legal representative, the original extrait K bis less than three months old, the refusal letter or the acknowledgement of receipt more than fifteen days old, and a sworn statement of the absence of an account. The Banque de France designates an institution within one business day; that institution notifies the documents expected within three business days, and opens the account within three business days of receiving the whole set.

A detail that matters: the simplified procedure, where the bank itself forwards the file, and forwarding through an association are open only to natural persons. A company files its own application.

What you get exactly

The basic banking services are free for a legal person — article D. 312-8 expressly targets the legal person and speaks of a service provided « without any contributory consideration on its part ». Do not confuse this with the capping of intervention fees at 4 € per transaction and 20 € per month (art. R. 312-4-2): that applies only to natural persons not acting for professional purposes.

• Included: opening, keeping and closing the account, transfers, direct debits, monthly statements, a payment card each use of which is authorised by the issuing institution — that is, a card with systematic authorisation — and two banker's cheque forms per month, or equivalent means of payment.
• Excluded: the overdraft, credit, the chequebook, the standard card without systematic authorisation.

The limits: deadlines not kept, an anti-money-laundering check that remains

The deadlines are not kept. In 2024, only 48% of accounts were opened three weeks after the designation, against 62% in 2023 (Banque de France, rapport annuel de l'Observatoire de l'inclusion bancaire 2025, chapter 1, based on the CSA surveys carried out among 1,000 beneficiaries of the procedure). Article R. 312-7 expressly allows the bank to ask for additional documents in case of doubt, which restarts the clock. And in 2025 the Banque de France handled ten thousand difficulties arising after the designation, very often linked to the anti-money-laundering supporting documents.

More fundamentally, the designation does not neutralise the due-diligence obligations. Article L. 561-8, II states that the prohibition on entering into a business relationship, where the institution cannot meet its due-diligence obligations, « also applies where a credit institution has been designated by the Banque de France ». The designation gives you an institution, not a secured account: it does not exempt you from the check.

As for closure, the Banque de France page announces a two-month notice period — without repeating the exceptions in the text. Section IV of article L. 312-1 sets aside that notice in two cases: the deliberate use of the account for transactions that the institution has reason to suspect as pursuing illegal ends, and the communication of inaccurate information. A reader who relies on the official page will believe themselves protected by a notice period they do not have.

On this ground, one decision is often cited the wrong way round. In a judgment of 30 June 2021 (n° 19-14.313), the Cour de cassation did not uphold a closure without notice: it quashed, for lack of legal basis, the judgment that had found the closure unlawful, and remitted the case. The condition relating to transactions suspected of pursuing illegal ends remains intact, and it must be demonstrated.

What we cannot do for you

We may as well put it in black and white: a domiciliation company cannot receive the deposit of your capital. Articles R. 223-3 and R. 22-10-6 admit only the Caisse des dépôts, a notary, a credit institution and, for sociétés par actions, certain financial intermediaries. We are not among them, and no domiciliation provider is.

What an address unblocks is the greffe, not the bank. The domiciliation contract is a named document in the registration file, as proof of use of the premises — just like the other documents that add to the cost of registration. It creates no right as long as the company is not registered, since it is registration that brings into being the legal person to which L. 312-1 reserves the droit au compte.

One last thing, in honesty. It is often read that a domiciliation address would heighten banks' distrust and trigger refusals. We have found no admissible source — neither from the ACPR, nor from the Banque de France, nor any text — that establishes it. We therefore do not assert it, and neither do we deny it.

What to take away

• The droit au compte only works after registration: it requires a K bis less than three months old, which you cannot have before depositing the capital.
• The code opens three depositaries to the SARL (Caisse des dépôts, notary, credit institution) and four to sociétés par actions (the same, plus certain intermediaries under article L. 542-1).
• The Caisse des dépôts no longer accepts these deposits since 1^st June 2021, but no published text has been identified that removed it from the list: the code still cites it.
• The administration excludes payment institutions and accepts a cheque only from a bank domiciled in France. These are administrative positions, not articles of law.
• The notary is the only door that does not depend on a commercial policy — and the funds there pass on to the Caisse des dépôts, under a décret of 1945.
• From abroad, nothing in the texts prohibits depositing with a non-French credit institution, but this is only an absence of prohibition. The SEPA regulation does, however, let you transfer your contribution from your national IBAN.
• After the K bis, the basic banking services are free for a company, but with no overdraft, no credit and no chequebook — and in 2024, fewer than one account in two was opened three weeks after the designation.

Sources verified as at 21 August 2026: code de commerce, art. L. 210-6, L. 223-7, L. 223-8, L. 225-3, L. 225-11, L. 225-13, L. 227-1, R. 22-10-6, R. 22-10-12, R. 223-3, R. 223-4, R. 223-5, R. 225-13 ; code civil, art. 1842 ; code monétaire et financier, art. L. 312-1, L. 518-1, L. 518-24, L. 542-1, L. 561-8, II, D. 312-5-1, D. 312-8, R. 312-6-1, R. 312-7 ; arrêté du 31 juillet 2015 ; décret n° 45-0117 du 19 décembre 1945, art. 15 ; décret n° 2020-1742 du 29 décembre 2020, art. 5 et 9 ; règlement (UE) n° 260/2012, art. 9 ; Cass. com., 30 juin 2021, n° 19-14.313 ; Banque de France, rapport annuel de l'Observatoire de l'inclusion bancaire 2025 ; entreprendre.service-public.gouv.fr, fiches F32333 et F35934. The administration's positions cited in this article — exclusion of payment institutions, cheque from a bank domiciled in France — appear on an administrative information sheet, which has no normative force. Domisiège cannot receive the deposit of share capital: this activity is reserved for the depositaries listed by the code de commerce. Domisiège is finalising its prefectural authorisation in Indre-et-Loire ; its references will be published as soon as they are granted. This article does not replace an examination of your situation.