The new account, developed by the Orwell Group, is designed for everyone, but is particularly relevant to the growing number of consumers and businesses who live and transact internationally.

One of the key hurdles people face when they move abroad is the ability to set up a new bank account, which, with a traditional bank can take up to several months. Then users are left with multiple bank relationships and disjointed services from those banks, say Orwell.

Similarly, small and medium size businesses often face delays in getting banked in new markets and excessive costs as a result of their banking arrangements, which can seriously impact their ability to trade.

Through a single on-boarding process, individual or business customers can open and manage multiple current accounts across multiple countries in different currencies. Currently, ipagoo is available in the UK, France, Italy and Spain and will expand into Germany and then the rest of Europe over the next two years.

ipagoo customers can choose the account that is linked directly to their debit card and change it when it is convenient to do so –switching from a euro-based account to sterling, for instance.

Through a service known as ‘cash pooling’, account holders can also combine the money available in individual accounts into a pool and use the overall balance to make payments even if the nominated account has insufficient funds available.

The service costs £10 a month for individuals to use, and £15 for businesses.