Help me become a Londoner!

[Joelle Nebbe-Mornod]

(Hopefully this is the address I am subscribed on...)

I came to the UK in 2000 and had trouble

I had come to the bank with a)a letter about the job b)money to put in the  
account (travellers cheques, at the time) c)passport
I did not yet have an address so could not supply utility bills etc. Some  
banks would not touch it. Lloyds outright refused to open an account for me
(said they could not validate my swiss passport!), but hsbc did. I suspect  
since they have operations in Switzerland hsbc


Barclays caused trouble a few years later over my swiss passport for a  
business account.

If you are from the EU there should be no problem, but if you have an US  
passport be prepared to shop around a bit as some banks just dont want the  
tax hassle.

Find out if your current bank has a branch in London (many have) which  
could give you an account and basic cards.

Joelle



On Thu, 19 Nov 2009 17:29:11 -0000, Abigail <abigail at abigail.be> wrote:

> On Thu, Nov 19, 2009 at 06:00:27PM +0100, Merijn Broeren wrote:
>>
>> > - open a bank account
>>
>> This is the one that prompted me to respond. I had lots of trouble with
>> opening a bank account. One thing that is strange for a foreigner like
>> me and most likely to a .it citizen is that there is no citizens
>> register in the UK. So you don't tell the government where you live.
>> Which means the bank has nothing to go on to make sure you live where
>> you say you do. It takes a rental agreement or a mortgage statement for
>> them to set up a bank account for you. Or a paid utility bill, but they
>> don't all take that as a proof of address. They'll take a bank statement
>> :-) I didn't try switching my .nl bank account to my new London address,
>> that might have been worth trying. In the end I just put my partners BT
>> bill in my name, waited a month and opened a bank account on the
>> strenght of that.
>
> I opened a bank account at Barclay's in 1996 when I spend a few months
> in London. No problems at all. They didn't ask for a rental agreement
> (I wasn't paying rent) or a mortgage statement (didn't own property).
> Neither did I pay for utilities.
>
> Your story reminds me of the time I opened a bank account in New York.
> (Chase: You can open an account with us, provided we can sent your  
> statements
> to your address in .nl. Oh, you don't have a .nl address, just an address
> in New York? Can't do that.)
>
>
>
> Abigail


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