Opening a Bank Account in Barbados
Barbados still has exchange control, and that - not anti-money-laundering paperwork - is what decides how a newcomer's account works. The Exchange Control Act makes it unlawful for anyone but an authorised dealer to buy, borrow, sell or lend foreign currency without permission, and the authority is the Minister of Finance, who has delegated most of it to the Central Bank. The rule that matters to a new arrival is the Central Bank's definition of residence for exchange control, which is nothing like the tax definition: a national of another country counts as resident only after continuously residing in Barbados for at least three years and only if not on a work permit. Until then their Barbados dollar account is an External Account, their foreign currency account is a non-resident one, and the Central Bank has given general permission for their net salary to be credited to it.
At a glance
- When a foreign national becomes resident for exchange control
- After continuously residing in Barbados for at least three years, and only if not on a work permit
- Account of a foreign national who is not yet resident
- An External Account - a Barbados dollar account with an authorised dealer in the name of a non-resident
- Salary into an External Account
- Permitted. General permission has been granted to authorised dealers for net salaries earned by such foreign nationals to be credited to their accounts
- Foreign currency accounts
- Open to residents and non-residents alike, and payments from them may be made without reference to the Central Bank
- Currency notes out of the country
- Up to the equivalent of BDS$2,500 in foreign currency notes and coins, within an annual travelling allowance of BDS$20,000
Stated by the Central Bank in its exchange control FAQs. Visitors may take out any foreign currency notes they originally brought in.
- Who the exchange control authority is
- The Minister of Finance, who has delegated much of the authority to the Central Bank of Barbados
Requirements
- An authorised dealer - only authorised dealers may legally hold and deal in foreign currency
- The dealer's know-your-customer and anti-money-laundering requirements
- For a resident wanting a foreign currency account: an application to the authorised dealer
- For a resident wanting an account with a bank abroad: the Central Bank's approval, with the dealer justifying why the account is necessary
In detail
Residence for exchange control is a different word
A person can be tax-resident in Barbados in their first year and still be a non-resident for exchange control for three more. The Central Bank's test is continuous residence for at least three years, and it excludes anyone on a work permit however long they stay. So a professional on a renewed three-year work permit never becomes resident for exchange control purposes at all, and their Barbados dollar account remains an External Account indefinitely. That cuts both ways: an External Account is more restricted in some respects and freer in others, because funds in it can be moved out again without the permissions a resident needs.
Three kinds of account
An ordinary Barbados dollar account held by a resident is subject to the full exchange control regime. An External Account is a Barbados dollar account with an authorised dealer in the name of a non-resident, and the Central Bank has given authorised dealers general permission to credit the net salary of a foreign national who has not yet completed three years. A Foreign Currency Account is denominated in another currency; the Central Bank says the full amount of funds brought into Barbados by residents and non-residents can be maintained on it, and payments out of it may be made without reference to the Central Bank. For a newcomer, the practical advice the regime implies is to arrive with the funds and keep them in foreign currency.
Country-level policy
Barbados publishes its law in three places that do not agree with each other about how current it is, and none of them says so on its face. The Supreme Court's statute library carries the Chapters, printed by the Government Printer, with a Law Revision Order year in the running head of each page - 2007 on the newest pages of the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act, 1997 on the Income Tax pages that carry the residence and domicile rules. The Attorney General's Office carries annual Acts and statutory instruments, and its series of annual Acts stops at 2020. The Government Printing Department publishes the Official Gazette, which is where an Act of 2021 or later is actually found. A reader looking for the law in force has to use all three, and an amendment made between 2021 and today is invisible in the first two.
The Exchange Control Act, Chapter 71, is in force, and it works the way exchange control always has: a general prohibition, with permission from the Authority as the exception. Only an authorised dealer may buy, borrow, sell or lend foreign currency. Payments to or for the credit of a person resident outside Barbados need permission. Securities denominated in Barbados dollars cannot be transferred between a resident and a non-resident without the Central Bank's permission. The Authority is the Minister of Finance, who has delegated most of the work to the Central Bank, which in turn delegates to authorised dealers and depositaries. For a person moving to Barbados the practical consequence is that "resident" means something different here than it does for tax: three years of continuous residence, and never if you are on a work permit.
Exceptions by origin
No exceptions recorded
Nothing we have read treats any nationality differently for this topic. The rule above applies to everyone.
What the law says
«Except with the permission of the Authority, no person, other than an authorised dealer, shall, in the Island, buy or borrow any gold or foreign currency from, or sell or lend any gold or foreign currency to, any person other than an authorised dealer.»The Act is still in force and still works by prohibition plus permission. "Authorised dealer" is defined in section 2 as a person authorised by an order of the Authority.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
«make any payment to or for the credit of a person resident outside Barbados; or»One of three prohibited payments, each needing the Authority's permission: a payment to a person resident outside Barbados, a payment to a person resident in Barbados on behalf of a person resident outside it, and placing a sum to the credit of a person resident outside Barbados.
Read it at the sourceAbout this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
Practical notes
Non-residents may use locally issued credit cards on condition that the balance is maintained on an External Account or a Foreign Currency Account to cover claims against the card.
The Act is quoted here from the edition the Law Courts publish, which prints no revision date. It has been amended since - the Central Bank refers to an amendment of 28 February 1974 abolishing the sterling area distinction, which is reflected in the text we read - and later liberalisation has been done by Central Bank circular rather than by amending the Act.
Nothing in the Exchange Control Act or in the Central Bank's published guidance conditions the opening of an account on immigration status as such. The three-year test is about which rules apply to the account, not about whether an account may be opened.
This record rests on the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Central Bank of Barbados exchange control FAQs. We did not read the Central Bank's circulars, which are where the detailed permissions live.
- consolidatesExchange Control Act, Chapter 71 of the Laws of Barbados
Supreme Court of Barbados - Laws of Barbados
About this source
The statute library of the Barbadian judiciary, publishing the Chapters of the Laws of Barbados and the subsidiary legislation as PDFs printed by the Government Printer. It is the only place the consolidated Chapters are published as a browsable set, and it carries the Constitution, the Immigration Act Chapter 190, the Income Tax Act Chapter 73, the Customs Act Chapter 66, the Exchange Control Act Chapter 71 and the Caribbean Community Acts.
Standing: Maintains the text in force
Cannot be cited for: It consolidates and does not issue, and its editions are old and dated per page rather than per Act: the Immigration Act and the Income Tax Act print Law Revision Order years of 2007 on their newest pages and 1997 or 2002 on others, and no page says what the Act looks like today. It must not be cited for anything amended after about 2008 without checking the amending Act - section 17(1) of the Immigration Act was substituted in 2020 and this edition does not show it. Several of its files are scans with no text layer: the Barbados Citizenship Act Chapter 186 is unreadable and the Road Traffic Act Chapter 295 is largely so, and neither may be quoted from this publisher. Extraction of the Immigration Act PDF silently loses four pairs of pages, so an absence in it is not evidence of absence in the Act. It must also not be relied on for completeness, and the gap is the publisher's rather than ours: its Immigration Act lists sections 15, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 30 and 31 in its own arrangement of sections and prints none of them. Two independent extractions of the file agree, every page but the last carries a text layer, and the headings Charging of member of crew, Persons unlawfully entering, Applications for work permits and Deportation orders each appear exactly once, in the contents. A negative claim read off this Chapter - that the Act says nothing about something - can be neither trusted nor disproved from it.
We re-read it every 180 days. More about this source
- administersExchange Control FAQs
Central Bank of Barbados
About this source
The delegate of the Minister of Finance under the Exchange Control Act, and the body that in turn delegates to authorised dealers and depositaries. Its exchange control pages carry the operative definitions a newcomer needs: who counts as resident and non-resident for exchange control, what an External Account is, what a Foreign Currency Account is, and what general permissions have been granted to the banks.
Standing: Applies the rule
Cannot be cited for: It administers and does not issue. Its definitions of resident and non-resident are published guidance, not statutory definitions, and they are not the Income Tax Act's definitions - the same person can be resident for tax and non-resident for exchange control for three years. The detail lives in Central Bank circulars that the FAQ pages reference but do not reproduce, so the FAQs must not be cited as the complete position. Figures for travelling allowances appear without an instrument behind them.
We re-read it every 90 days. More about this source