I was doing my shopping for banks in February of 2010 and I can say by far mBank.com.pl had the best offer by far. They let you do a single or joint account and they set up additional currencies for free in addition to PLN. So if you need EUR and GBP and USD all in one account, you can do it and it costs you nothing. If you have a business account it does cost a small amount each month. For a small company, I can definitely recommend using an individual (personal) account in the beginning. When you grow, then you can shop around again for the right account. I know this sounds odd, but this is the reality. Be warned however, that mBank is cheaper because they are considered a “virtual” bank even though they have a physical address in the Warsaw city center and a hotline as well as online support.

Also, in Poland mBank is owned by the German arm of CommerzBank called “BRE”. I’ve used them for the past 4 years without ANY problems. Any time I had problems I was able to resolve it via phone.

http://www.mbank.pl/en/guide/faq/#tabs=1

http://bre.pl/

https://www.commerzbank.com/

I hope the links help. Disclaimer: I do NOT work for any of the mentioned companies, I’m just a pleased customer of mBank.
-Tyrel

Also about other types of companies (oddly, sole prprietorship is left out):
http://www.paiz.gov.pl/index/?id=97e48472142cfdd1cd5d5b5ca6831cf4

The easiest fomr of company to open for a legal resident is without a doubt the “działalność gospodarcza” (sole proprietorship) – but you have to remember that all liabilities (legal, financial) are on you personally. If you go bankrupt or get sued, any personal assets can be seized to pay debts. Aside from the obvious answer to not get sued or go bankrupt, an easy way to hedge yourself is to make sure your spouse or family are the legal owners of major assets (cars, homes, etc…) HOWEVER, you should always seek professional legal/financial advice when setting up your company.

I found this page to be a gem in helping out. It is from the “Ministry of Foreign Investment” :
http://www.paiz.gov.pl/

After you understand that, find yourself a competent English-speaking accountant from a “Biuro Rachunkowe”. You’ll probably pay them anywhere from 100 to 300 zloty per month, but they will make sure everything is legal and they go to Urząd Skarbowy (tax office) for you and file all your paperwork. That is worth it! They can also advise on what can be deducted (among other things)- as this is NOT always straightforward and OFTEN not intuitive here in PL (yet).

I hope this helps.
-Tyrel

just read your blog, it’s amazing cleared my head about “how to open” a company.
but at the end i realized, the self-employed type that u talk about, seems like for EU or europen citizen, what about for asian people like me?? is there any “simplest way” to open a company??? i have already NIP, my PESEL will be done in few weeks, and seems like i have to go thru this spolka z.o.o.. cud u pls tell me more…

thank for spare ur time b4 and after

u great, best regards,

Alexander

I just thought I would send you an e-mail to thank you for your blog article on starting your own business in Poland. It helped me a lot the last couple of days as I am in the process of starting my own “działalność gospodarcza” now. I found your blog on Thursday evening and on Friday morning I was already in my local Urząd Gmina :-)

My name is Michael. I came to Poland from County Down, Northern Ireland more than 6 years ago before Poland was in the European Union (wasn’t easy not knowing any Polish whatsoever!). Now that I speak Polish it’s a lot easier (an it helps having a Polish wife :-) )

I’ll continue reading your blog. It’s very entertaining.

Thanks again

Michael

Just set up my own company a few weeks ago and it’s good to have all this stuff documented to help folk. It;s not the easiest process in the world but blogs like this help immensely.

I am trying to find an accountant at the moment but as I have very little going through the books right now, I’d love to find a way to do it on my own.

Good luck

Shaun