You people must live in a different DR than I do. Oh no...that's what we use to tell Pichardo. Anyway, I opened and hold both personal and business accounts with several Dominican banks, the first one (Leon) only wanted Passport and opened account on the spot. Granted, times changed since I opened that account, and now they take your info and do a quick check (24-48 hours) and open you a provisional account, which they can cancel within 30 days (they tell you that during those 30 days they do Interpol and DEA checks, yeah right). Other banks (Progreso, Santa Cruz) only require one letter of reference from a Dominican or foreign bank, nothing else. If you have cedula, nothing but a cedula should be required. And it's cedula, not cedular nor cellular nor anything similar, CEDULA. Also depends how fluid you are in Spanish. If your Spanish is decent you will have less problems opening account up than with English only. You will be treated more as a "national" than "foreigner" meaning less hassle opening that account.