How to open a corporate bank account in Korea as a foreigner

The corporate bank account is the step where Korean company formation becomes physical. Everything up to here — articles, registry, tax office — can run on a power of attorney signed abroad. The bank is different. It wants to see the person who will control the money, it wants to know whose money it is, and it wants to understand what the money is for.

None of that is peculiar to Korea; every bank in the world asks the same questions. What is peculiar is the precision with which Korean banks ask them, and the set of statutes behind the questions. Understanding those statutes is the quickest way to understand why the branch asks for what it asks for — and to bring it on the first visit.

The three laws behind the questions

Plus the Electronic Financial Transactions Act for online banking, and anti-fraud rules for new accounts.

Real name

Under Article 3 of the Act on Real Name Financial Transactions and Confidentiality, a financial institution must transact in the real name of the customer. For a company, the real name is the name on the business registration certificate (사업자등록증) with its 10-digit number, and the bank verifies it against the original. That is why the account comes after the tax office, not before.

Customer due diligence

Under Article 5-2 of the Act on Reporting and Using Specified Financial Transaction Information, banks must carry out customer due diligence (고객확인, gogaek hwagin) when an account is opened: verify the customer’s identity, identify the beneficial owner (실제소유자, silje soyuja) — the individuals who ultimately own or control the company — and, where the risk calls for it, verify the purpose of the transaction and the source of funds. A bank that cannot complete these checks must refuse the account. This is the provision behind every question about who owns your company and what it will do.

Foreign exchange

If the account receives foreign investment or makes payments abroad, the bank acts under the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act: it converts the money, issues certificates and reports flows. For a foreign-invested company the bank that handles the investment is usually the one that opens the operating account, because it already holds the file.

Every question at the branch is a statute speaking. Answer the statute, and the branch is quick.

What the bank checks

The company

• Corporate registry extract (법인등기부등본), recent — usually issued within three months
• Business registration certificate (사업자등록증)
• Corporate seal certificate (법인인감증명서) and the registered seal itself
• Articles of incorporation (정관) and shareholder register (주주명부)
• For a foreign-invested company: the foreign investment registration certificate (외국인투자기업 등록증명서)

The people

• The representative director (대표이사)’s passport and, if resident, alien registration card
• For each beneficial owner holding 25% or more, or otherwise controlling the company: identity details
• For a corporate shareholder: an ownership chart up to the individuals at the top, with supporting documents

The purpose

Banks increasingly ask for evidence that the company is a real business: a lease, a first contract, an invoice, a website, a short description of customers and suppliers. Under the due diligence rules this is not curiosity; the bank must assess the account’s purpose, and a company that cannot explain itself is a company the bank cannot open an account for.

Who has to come to the branch

The default is the representative director (대표이사) in person, with passport and the corporate seal. Several banks accept a proxy (대리인) carrying a power of attorney sealed with the registered corporate seal (법인인감) and a seal certificate, plus the representative’s identity documents — but practice varies by bank and by branch, and many are reluctant when the representative is a non-resident foreigner. Plan for one visit by the director and treat a proxy as a bonus, not a plan.

Before you travel

The trip to the bank is usually the only trip a foreign founder makes during the formation, so it pays to plan it like a small project. Work backwards from the appointment.

The visit, step by step

1. Choose the bank. The large commercial banks all serve foreign-owned companies; the question is which branch has experience with them, and — for a foreign-invested company — which bank holds the investment file.
2. Check the file against that bank’s list, including recent extracts and apostilled corporate shareholder documents.
3. Book a time with the corporate desk; walk-ins are possible but slower.
4. At the branch: identity check, due diligence questionnaire, signatures, seal impressions, registration of authorised signers.
5. Accounts opened: a KRW operating account and a foreign currency account, usually in USD.
6. Digital banking: internet banking registration, a one-time-password device or app, and a corporate digital certificate.

New-account limits — and how they lift

New Korean accounts, corporate included, usually start as limited accounts (한도제한계좌, hando jehan gyejwa). The limits come from supervisory guidance introduced to fight ‘cannon accounts’ (대포통장, daepo tongjang) — accounts opened in someone else’s name and used for phone and online fraud — under the anti-fraud framework of the Special Act on the Prevention of Telecommunications Financial Fraud. Daily transfer and withdrawal amounts through internet banking and ATMs are capped at modest levels until the bank is satisfied the account serves a real business.

They are a default, not a judgement on you. Limits are raised when the company shows the bank evidence of genuine activity: electronic tax invoices (전자세금계산서) issued under Article 32 of the VAT Act, contracts with customers or suppliers, a lease, payroll, VAT filings. In the first months, keep those documents ready to show the branch; a first quarter’s VAT return is often the moment limits go.

Limits are a default, not a verdict. Invoices lift them.

Digital banking and certificates

Korean corporate banking is almost entirely digital, under the Electronic Financial Transactions Act. To use it, the company needs a corporate digital certificate (법인 인증서) — the bank’s own, or a general-purpose business certificate that also works with the National Tax Service’s Hometax — and a one-time-password device or app. Transfers, payroll, tax payments and electronic tax invoices all run through these.

For a non-resident director this is where most of the friction lies: certificates and OTP apps are tied to Korean phone numbers and, often, to a Korean identity number. The usual solution is to authorise a resident manager or accountant as a user with limited rights, keeping approval of large payments with the director.

Foreign currency accounts and foreign investment

A company that buys or sells abroad should hold a foreign currency deposit account (외화예금계좌), usually in USD and sometimes EUR or JPY. Incoming payments in foreign currency can stay in that currency; outgoing payments abroad are made from it after the bank checks the supporting documents — an invoice, a contract — as the foreign exchange rules require.

For a foreign-invested company (외국인투자기업) under the Foreign Investment Promotion Act, the investment arrives first, through the bank handling the notification, which issues the certificate of foreign currency purchase (외화매입증명서). After incorporation, the capital is moved into the company’s operating account. Using the same bank for both keeps the file in one place, which matters at visa renewals and audits.

Which bank?

The major commercial banks — the large national groups and the state-owned industrial bank — all open accounts for foreign-owned companies, and most large branches in Seoul’s business districts have English-speaking staff on the corporate desk. Foreign banks in Korea focus on large corporate clients rather than start-ups. Three practical criteria matter more than the brand:

• Experience with foreign-owned companies at the specific branch.
• The foreign investment file — if the bank already handled your FDI notification and remittance, it knows your company.
• Location near the head office, because the branch may want to visit or see you again.

Branches and liaison offices

A branch (외국회사 지점) of a foreign company or a liaison office (연락사무소) also needs a Korean account, and the account is part of how it is set up. Before registration, the branch or office is reported to a foreign exchange bank (외국환은행) under the Foreign Exchange Transactions Act; that bank typically becomes its designated bank for receiving operating funds from the parent.

The documents shift from the Korean company to the parent: the parent’s certificate of incorporation and extract, the board resolution establishing the branch or office and appointing the representative, and the representative’s identity — all apostilled and translated. A liaison office has no business registration certificate but a unique number (고유번호) from the tax office, which serves the real-name rules instead. Because a liaison office may not earn income in Korea, its account should show money coming from the parent and going out as rent, salaries and expenses — not customer receipts.

Money between Korea and the parent

For a foreign-owned company, the account also carries the flows with the owner abroad: service fees, royalties, loans, repayment of loans, dividends. Each needs a document the bank can file — a contract, an invoice, a board resolution, a loan agreement — and some are reported under the foreign exchange rules. Plan them before the money moves rather than explaining them afterwards.

Price them properly as well. Intra-group payments are tested at arm’s length by the tax office, and a bank seeing large unexplained payments to an affiliate will ask the same questions the tax inspector would. Dividends go out only after the company has approved its accounts and withheld tax at the domestic or treaty rate.

Paying salaries, tax and suppliers

Once open, the account carries the company’s statutory payments. Payroll goes out monthly, with income tax withheld and paid by the 10th of the following month and social insurance contributions debited. VAT is paid four times a year. Corporate tax is paid with the annual return and the interim prepayment. Most of these can be scheduled or paid directly through the bank’s corporate banking and Hometax, using the corporate certificate.

Payments to the foreign owner — dividends, service fees, loan repayments — go through the foreign currency side with supporting documents and, for dividends, after tax has been withheld at the domestic or treaty rate.

Cards and payment services

A corporate debit card is usually issued with the account. A corporate credit card is a separate application with the card arm of the bank or a card company and is assessed on the company’s financials, so a new company often starts with debit only and adds credit after its first financial statements.

Companies selling online need a payment service provider to accept Korean card and mobile payments. The provider settles into the corporate account and will run its own checks, typically asking for the business registration certificate, the mail-order sales registration where required, and the account details. Opening the bank account first saves a round trip.

The director’s personal account

Separate from the company, a director who will be paid in Korea needs a personal account. A resident with an alien registration card (외국인등록증) opens one like any resident. A non-resident can usually open only a restricted non-resident account, which is enough to receive a salary but not much else. Founders moving on a D-8 typically open the personal account after alien registration, on a second visit or after relocating.

Keeping the account healthy

Due diligence is not a one-off. Under the Specified Financial Transaction Information Act, banks refresh customer information periodically and whenever something material changes. Tell the bank when the representative director changes, when shareholders change, when the head office moves or when the business changes direction, and send the updated registry extract — the bank will find out anyway, and an account whose records no longer match the registry can be restricted until they do.

Large or unusual transactions, especially to or from abroad, may prompt questions; the answer is the same document trail that lifted the new-account limits. A company that issues electronic tax invoices, files VAT on time and pays salaries through payroll rarely hears from its bank.

A worked example

A founder from Singapore forms a Seoul Jusik Hoesa with KRW 50 million of capital, without foreign investment status. The business registration certificate is issued on a Monday. The following Thursday he flies in. On Friday morning, with passport, corporate seal, fresh extracts, articles, shareholder register and a one-page description of his trading business, he opens a KRW operating account and a USD account at a branch near the head office. He registers for internet banking, installs the OTP app on a Korean SIM bought at the airport and authorises his accountant as a viewer. The account starts with limits; after two months of electronic tax invoices to Korean customers and the first VAT return, the branch raises them.

If the bank says no

Refusals are uncommon with a complete file, but they happen. The usual reasons are the ones the due diligence rules point to: beneficial ownership that cannot be traced, a business purpose the bank cannot understand, a high-risk country or sector in the ownership chain, or documents that disagree with each other. A refusal at one bank is not a ban; fix the gap and try a branch with more experience of foreign-owned companies. What does not work is trying the same file at five branches in a week.

Mistakes we see

1. Arriving before the business registration certificate — the real-name rules make the bank wait for it.
2. Old extracts — registry and seal certificates older than about three months.
3. No ownership chart for a corporate shareholder, so the bank cannot identify the beneficial owners.
4. No story — no lease, contract or description of the business.
5. Forgetting the seal — the registered corporate seal is part of the signature in Korea.
6. Leaving without digital banking — then discovering abroad that every payment needs a certificate.

Korean terms at the branch

Questions readers ask

About the author

Alexander Baranov

Founder of the BCA Group · cross-border corporate and tax adviser since 2008

Alexander advises foreign founders and groups on company formation, tax structuring and corporate law in more than 40 jurisdictions across Europe, the Gulf, Asia and Latin America. He is the author of nine books on international business and tax and writes regularly for professional finance and tax journals. He works in English, German, Spanish and Russian.

This guide is based on the Korean statutes cited in the text and on our own filings. It is reviewed when the law or official rates change.

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