Novel Recensioni 

It absolutly simple and works for everything they promise. Fast and friendly.

Easy to use and does everything I need it for. Great.

I have had no issues with my account so far. The statements have been timely and all transactions were completed within 24 hours.

This bank suddenly closed our account in August 2022 and held all funds. We were told that they will send a check of the funds in the account in 60 days. It is over 6 months now and they stopped responding to emails in November 2022.They have a single person who responds to emails Grace Ann Litan. Our lawyers have contacted their listed address and they have not responded. Avoid this company at all costs.

Grace was very helpful getting my account set up and I love how easy novel is to use. I have issued virtual cards to my team and I use the mobile app to review my transactions. Overall everything is easy to use and works for me

They really are scammers. Seems like the all positive reviews are created by themselves. They held my money in their bank for some so called suspected fraud and never paid. They also didn't reply. They never tell you the rules and then all of a sudden they block your account.

We are business owners from different parts of the world, instead of focusing on the businesses we get stuck with these types of banks and get distracted with these activities.

Novel is one of the bank probably owned by BlueRidge Bank, they did there due diligence at the beginning but still blocked the account only on the basis of 3 transactions. They do not provide any reason or option.

My experience was okay for the first several months after opening an account, but then things became interesting.
1. International USD transfers to USD-denominated UAE bank accounts get converted to AED along the way only to get converted back to USD on the recipient side with the total loss of ~2.5% - total rip off. The first time it happened Novel compensated me the fee and I was assured the issue was now fixed and would never happen again. And as you might have guessed, it did happen the second time I made a transfer and this time there was no compensation. All my emails are now ignored.
2. Novel lured me into purchasing their premium plan for $2k to avoid account closure and effectively stole the money: I was told I must upgrade my current plan because my business is related to cryptocurrency and I won't be allowed to keep using Novel otherwise. There was no option to pay monthly so I had to pay for the whole year. Two days later the plan was still not active due to "technical issues", and the next day they tell me they're closing my account because their policy changed and they will not refund me. So, I paid for a service, didn't receive it, and they won't issue a refund.

Learn from my mistakes, stay away from them!

[UPD] This is a reply to Novel's reply under review - Yes, I'm okay with off-boarding but not okay with not refunding the payment. No, I hadn't been utilising your premium services, you kicked me out the next day after I'd paid for it. And no, the initial currency conversion I've written about didn't happen at the receiving bank. The receiving bank only converted the incoming AED to USD. So you must've used a correspondent bank that converted USD->AED but the recipient can't choose the correspondent bank, can they? It's sender's responsibility.

[UPD2] Why saying the issue with the currency conversion has been fixed and won't happen again? If you hadn't, I wouldn't have tried one more time. By the way, transfers from Mercury to the same bank account went through without any conversions. While I may agree that this issue is only partially your fault, refusing the refund for the premium plan is entirely yours. I would've filed a chargeback if I hadn't been so naive and hadn't used a Novel card to pay for it.
I'm sure you can come up with plenty more excuses, but I'm leaving my review here to warn other potential clients about the kind of service they may receive if they join.

i love their bank. its great service and functionality.

Novel bank is a scam they got away with my 24k USD. At first my account balance was 60usd but one day i funded my account with 24k usd now total balance was 24060usd but after 2 days they closed my account for no reason and sent me an email that i will be getting my money after 6 months. It was frustating that time but it was more shocking when i recieved a check after 6 months just for 60usd only then i contacted them 100's of times but they dont have any information on my funds they simply dont reply to my emails. They are 100% scammers.

I considered using Novel based on some lovely advertised features but I wanted to see some reviews. Now I'm testing to see if the comments here are real. If you can see this comment, they're likely legit.

I'm very satisfied to open this service. Trynovel is working very well. The support is extremely performant and they are available and quick in supporting you.
I highly recommend it!

Novel is new but make his work very well.
As always in business there are problems with payments, you need refunds or the banks delays operations.
Problems, problems and more problems.

But the most important is how you solve them and Novel Bank and his incredible Customer support do its best.

Grace Ann Litan is my account manager and is the best. She answer fast and solve all my problems, even if I make mistakes.

Thinks to change? Yes
Please let customers create more than 3 Virtual cards and offer debit cards delivery options with DHL, UPS or any mail service with tracking. Myself and many other customers will be happy to pay for shipping. Don't use USPS anymore.

Greate team, greate service, greate people. Thanks a lot Novel!

Updated Review (November 30, 2022)
=====
Currently, service is improving. Customer service is becoming more responsive, many issues got resolved

I'll cut two stars for the fact that on October 28 they tried to take down my review, claiming that it belongs to a different business. This happned after they contacted me directly on the email for explaination and support. So it's not a misunderstanding. I don't like that act. I believe that a business must own to its mistakes, and acknowledge customer's honest reviews rather than trying to cover them up by taking reviews down. Otherwise, service is clearly improving, and I think they deserve celebration for their progress. I wish to see them thrive and continue improving.

My old review (for documentation purpose):

This is not a serious financial business; it must be a joke!!

When I signed up, I didn't really expect world-class service. I lowered my expectations to the least acceptable in common business sense. Yet, I was shocked with the level at which these people do business! I'll start with the least significant matters:

1- The client's dashboard is very basic, with very backward UX design. Ok, skipped
2- There's no live support. Actually, their chat box say their average response time is 3 hours. Fine, skipped
3- Almost each and every transaction I perform using their virtual cards I receive a fraud alert from Visa, requesting me to verify that it's legit. This includes payments at top reputation (even financial) institutions such as PayPal! Now I'm getting anxious!
4- I ordered a physical card. They say it should be ready in a few business days, then they'll ship it when they receive it. After over a month from me paying for the card and the shipping fees, they say they haven't even received my card! Plus, whenever I enquire they keep asking me for my full shipping info! A tiny feeling of a scam is developing inside me
5- When I try to issue a transfer, so many fields do not accept perfectly correct data that I always use everywhere else without any trouble!
6- Now for the fun part. What's the single most important aspect of a financial institution? Security, hands down. Ok, let's check that. The dashboard signs you out after a few minutes. Good. No, not really! You know what it takes to bypass that "sign out"?? A simple browser refresh!! Yes, that's it! So imagine leaving your browser with a "You've been signed out" overlay in some forgotten tab, then someone else presses CMD+R and accesses your financial data!

This is a joke. Stay away!

Update (Sep 30): Their CEO contacted me with good promises to act upon my concerns. I'll stay tentative to see how things will go

Signed up, accepted, and wired in my funds all within couple days.

I initially had some difficulties with creating an account with Novel.

When I began the setup of the business bank account for my LLC the process required me to use a third-party vendor to prove my identity and this vendor requested what I would consider to be an overzealous and frankly, dangerously insecure, amount of identity information including "selfie".

I contacted support to explain my position and offer additional documents and my willingness to be identified by a Novel employee over video, but this was initially batted back with pretty poor "you need to adhere to our requirements, we're not forcing you to do so". Which wasn't the best customer service response to a fairly reasonable and valid security concern. A bank should not, while trying to verify your iD, request you to open yourself up to potential identity fraud.

After trying to reach out to the founders of Novel on LinkedIn, and subsequent to posting a 1* review on this platform, and on Google. The customer service agent reached out to me again, as did another.
And at this point I received very positive customer service. Suddenly they were very flexible and willing to ID me with my documentsin a way that didn't require a third-party.

I was offered a Novel employee to identify me over video call (which was an appreciated accomodation) and they booked this meeting swiftly, joined, and very quickly got me through the identity process when I showed my iD over this call.

They asked me to update my review. I did so, giving them a 4* which was reasonable at the time.

Since then, I made a request for a new debit card, and went through the process on the online website (no app for Android yet) and paid the <$10 charge.

I made this request at the end of September. I heard nothing more. I received no email - but I saw no reason to be concerned as the fee was taken from my account.
FIVE WEEKS pass. I need my card to activate some lines of credit.

I send an email to ask about progress of my card. I can tell from the response, it has not been actioned... at all.
It is then presented to me that because I am a non-US resident, I would have to pay $60USD to receive my card in the post.
I ask about delivering to my US hotel under my name for me to collect while I am doing business - am told this is not an option.

When I push back on the cost, and mention the FIVE WEEKS my card request has seemingly sat dormant - I'm offered a 50% discount on the card postage, and am told someone will look into this.
During this time, I travel for business and am card-less and have to find an alternate way to organise some of my creditors who request an active bank card.

At this time, I receive a call from my PA to let me know my card has arrived, in my home country just before Thanksgiving.
No communication is sent, we just receive the UPS postage automated email with no indication it's Novel.

Seemingly they have paid the exorbitant cost for postage.
I return home a couple of weeks later, and my card is there. All seems well at this point.

A week later I receive an automated email that my account will be frozen in 5 days.
I have not paid enough money into my account to keep the balance at $2,000USD or higher.

I contact support again.
No, I have not funded my account, it's true, because, until a week ago, I had no card, and the business I intended to do, I could not do, because of the (almost) EIGHT WEEKS I had to wait for it.
I ask for half this, 4 weeks, leeway, to fund my account with the required $2k.

This request is kicked upstairs, and I hear no more, 2 weeks pass, I assume my request is granted.
Then, I receive an email again - my account is frozen.

I contact support again.
I won't type the back and forth but I'm basically told, I must pay the fees associated with an <$2k account, or, basically, tough luck.
In fact, despite the fact it took 8 weeks to send me my debit card, I am supposed to be happy that I didn't have to pay 60 bucks to receive it.
I'm offered no other flexibility at all, even though I say I will fund my account with the minimum required amount within 2 weeks.

The above explains my * rating. I was detailed because I did not wish anyone to think that I arrived at my opinion casually.

Business-to-business banking requires a banking PARTNER, not a bank that is looking to collect fees, has slow and labourious processes, doesn't action simple requests in a timely manner, and is unwilling to provide flexibility to their clients.

I was very clear in this regard with Novel, that I was looking for a banking partner.
The last email I receive reads (in part) - "If no payment is made the account will be closed."

Consider the above if you intend to do business banking with Novel, I do not believe at this time they are providing anywhere close to the requiste amount of service or functionality to be considered a partner for business banking.

I´ve tried 5 EMIs so far and Novel is the best one in the space, customer support is superb..

As a non-resident without a visa or ITIN, Novel was like a miracle for me since I was able to apply from outside the USA and didn't take long to open the account. Will be recommend to my partners who will need bank accounts