Can you use a different company's bank account for your business?

[DaveFischer]

For example, I have a EU-company with the same name as my Georgian company.

If I just open a bank account with the papers of the Estonian company, can I not just receive money like that?
Declare 0 income as the EU company and take the income on my Georgian company.

Especially since banks seem more open to accepting EU business customers.
Ideally I'd empty the Transferwise/EID account on a monthly basis and transfer the money to the Georgian company's bank account.

TransferWise and other EID's don't seem happy to directly accept clients from some countries.
But as the name of the companies are the same, what's the worst that could happen?

 

[Sols]

If you're asking if it's possible to commit tax fraud, bank fraud, and money laundering, the answer is yes.

The worst that could happen is someone at TransferWise realizes what's happening and closes your account. There are a few ways this could go down:

• They ask to see a copy of the agreement between your Estonian company and the payer.
• The payer inputs the name and address of your Georgian company, which someone at TW notices and asks you proof that the Georgian company has an office in Estonia. At the same time, they will look up the company in Estonia.
• After the first year or two, TW asks to see (audited) financial statements of your Georgian company and when it doesn't match up with what's been processed on the TW account, they will start asking questions.

In the end, the best case outcome is they just freeze your account and you lose the money (until you can petition a court in the UK to release your funds). The worst case is they submit a SAR and you end up subject to a money laundering investigation.

I wouldn't recommend it.