The Situation with Opening Bank Accounts for Non-Residents in the Czech Republic in 2026

The Situation with Different Types of Bank Accounts Involving Non-Residents of the Czech Republic

Can a Non-Resident Individual Open a Bank Account in the Czech Republic?

This is currently very difficult and extremely challenging in practice. If a foreigner applies to open a bank account in the Czech Republic, Czech banks now require, in almost all cases:

• The foreigner must have some type of long-term visa, temporary residence permit, or permanent residence permit in the Czech Republic. Without this, most Czech banks will not even accept an application.
• The applicant must be physically present when submitting the application. It is not possible to do this remotely.

Unfortunately, if the long-term visa requirement is not met, almost all banks in the country will reject the applicant immediately. The banks that do accept applications from clients without a long-term visa still require additional justification as to why the account is necessary.

We have had clients for whom we tried to justify the need for an account on other, quite reasonable grounds, particularly ownership of real estate in the Czech Republic that they genuinely rented out. In such a situation, it is reasonable to have an account into which rental payments can be received and from which expenses associated with maintaining the property can be paid.

In these cases, banks formally accepted the applications (although quite reluctantly), but unfortunately, all of them were ultimately rejected. It was also difficult to obtain any information about the reasons for the rejection.

At present, there are only a few specific situations in which opening an account is still realistically possible:

• A person who is a citizen of another EU country. Some banks in the Czech Republic accept such applications and continue to open accounts. There are other specific considerations involved, but opening an account is still possible in these cases.
• A person who is a citizen of another generally "low-risk" country. It is difficult to provide a specific list of countries, and the bank needs to be asked individually, but this may include, for example, citizens of the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, or Israel.

If your circumstances match one of these situations, you can contact us and we will try to find a solution.

Is It Possible to Open a Bank Account for a Czech Company with Non-Residents in Its Ownership Structure?

If a Czech legal entity has a non-resident in its ownership structure, opening a bank account in the Czech Republic will be extremely difficult, despite the fact that the company itself is Czech.

When considering such applications, banks will focus on two main factors:

• Who the company's director is, what citizenship the director holds, how familiar the director is with the local environment, and whether the director can genuinely take responsibility for the company's activities. The situation becomes particularly difficult if the Czech company's structure includes a person who is both a non-resident of the Czech Republic and not a citizen of any EU country.
• Another important factor is whether the company conducts genuine business activities in the Czech Republic and has real counterparties in the country that are themselves genuinely operating businesses, rather than merely paying for a registered office and accounting services.

Detailed Information on Opening a Bank Account for a Czech Company with a Non-Resident in Its Corporate Structure

That is the situation in brief. We have a separate page on our website covering this topic:

To avoid repeating the same information here, please see that page if this issue is relevant to you. Everything is explained there in as much detail as possible.

Can a Foreign Company Open a Bank Account in the Czech Republic?

At present, opening a bank account in the Czech Republic for a foreign legal entity is practically impossible.

Some time ago (approximately until 2018–2019), Czech banks were indeed quite willing to accept applications from non-resident companies seeking to open bank accounts and actually opened such accounts.

Apparently, this was due to a rather uncontrolled approach to accepting new clients and the effective absence of established compliance procedures for them. Banks simply did not expect to receive such applications and had no specific procedures in place for handling them. During that period, Czech banks opened many accounts for foreign clients.

Later, however, they realized that the quality of such clients was highly questionable and that some very questionable financial flows were passing through these accounts. Subsequently, both on the banks' own initiative and, of course, under pressure from the government authorities regulating their activities, these accounts began to be closed.

By now, almost all such accounts belonging to foreign companies have been closed. Opening a new account for a non-resident company is still theoretically possible (the law does not actually prohibit it), but the practical chances of success are minimal.

A positive outcome may realistically be possible only for very well-known foreign companies representing major established brands whose activities are genuinely connected with the Czech Republic — for example, a large organization planning to enter the Czech market with its products or services while operating through a foreign legal entity.