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Banks supporting Macs for business accounts?

YerethYereth (110 posts) • 0

I've been using Merchants and BOC for years now, but both of them lack proper support for Mac. Merchants even requires you to download an entire software suite to manage accounts properly, and I'm not impressed with the mobile apps either. BOC only supports macOS versions of many years ago, as is often the case with Windows browser support as well.

Is anyone aware of a bank that supports Macs with regular browser logins for business accounts? (please note that private user accounts are handled in an entirely different way with all banks)

michael2015 (784 posts) • 0

Yereth
I gave up long ago and installed Parallels for MacOS although I'm unsure if it'll work the same with Apple's non-intel CPUs. You can download and run a demo copy to test your bank's PC apps and key fobs for compatibility.

Parallels allows you to run native MacOS and boot up the app when you need to run WINOS (or other OS's, such as unix flavors) in parallel with the MacOS. It seems to run at speeds close to WINOS native mode - aka good enough for most video games - with some caveats.

The drawback - you need to carve out enough disk space for it to boot and run WINOS - 32GB should be enough for a minimum config (because it uses memory paging - this assumes your computer has 8-16GB RAM).

As this is for business - you could install the WINOS partition on an external drive (recommend SSD) which would theoretically increase security (unless you lose the external drive).

Finally, you'll need a LICENSED version of WINOS to create the bootable parallels image or genuine multi boot partition. I installed both the parallels winos image (along with other operating system images) and also created a bootable WINOS partition - for those rare but pesky winos apps that refused to run under parallels. The advantage of having a bootable partition - you can always just reboot the macOS into winos and run it in native mode.

Otherwise - parallels creates something similar to a disk image - so hope you have a LARGE hard drive with lots of space available (AFTER you eat the 32GB drive space for parallels).

After using it for a while - it's rather seamless, other than the extra delay time used to boot or "wake" the WINOS partition. Parallels allows you to "sleep" the WINOS, so it'll restart in its last known booted state, which is convenient. Also beware the infinitude of WINOS updates. Also you'll need WINOS antivirus software, just to be somewhat safer - but most of the major freeware packages should suffice.

This worked well for me until CCB finally ditched the USB dongle security device (which used to catastrophically fail roughly every 3 months) - but that was on a regular consumer/customer account.

Best wishes...hope this helps, as I recall it used to be a major pain to change the registered primary bank tied to a business.

YerethYereth (110 posts) • 0

Thanks for that Michael. Looks like Parallels just released their long awaited M1 version, which would work for my laptop. I used to use a dual boot but I'm not in the habit of ever closing apps or turning off my computer, so it always seems like a hassle.

BOC unfortunately uses a browser login without supporting most browsers and still requires software to be installed and two dongles (for businesses).

Construction bank ditching the dongle for private banking unfortunately doesn't mean it did the same got business accounts. Always feel there's a strong case of "security through obscurity" happening here.

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