Who do you bank with?

[TarkaTheOtter]

Sorry in advance for the boring question!

We are currently living abroad (Europe) but have financial ties to the UK - rental income and dh's salary. Because we are only away temporarily we would like to keep most of our finances in the UK. But we are struggling to open new accounts because we are not resident.
In particular we will lose the introductory rate on our savings accounts in a few months and then they convert to a terrible rate so we would like to move them.

We use a good, cheap forex trading platform thingy to move our money for living expenses so that's not really an issue. We just want good interest rates.

Does anyone bank with a bank who are ok about UK expats? Or can you suggest an alternative way for us to save/invest which accepts expats? We already pay the max overpayment into our mortgage.

Ps this makes us sound much better off than we actually are - it's only temporary whilst our rent is being covered and our UK house is let out.

Sorry, didn't mean for that to be so long!

I think Natwest allow you to have an o/seas address but not sure what their investment type products are like sorry.

Halifax definitely do not so don't bother with them.

Thanks!
We're with First Direct and they let us use our existing accounts but not open new ones.

I don't think we are in the league for "proper" expat offshore accounts, which rules out a lot. Just want a big standard domestic current account and savings accounts with reasonable rates.

"Bog standard"

I'm with cooperative/smile, and nationwide, they don't mind about an overseas address, but I haven't tried to open a new account since I've been away. I would give a UK address if you can when you apply, it's about credit checking I guess. - your house or a relatives. Only mention your European address as a correspondence address if it's really necessary.

When we moved we were told we can open an account if we live in the UK and keep it, but not open one if we'd already left. One account I opened online the day before we left! We sold our house at the last moment so suddenly needed to spread our money out as it was when there were banks closing in 2008.

Anyway, we use coop, HSBC were good, Tesco, and Halifax.

Sadly, we are in a dispute with Halifax and I wouldn't recommend them.

HSBC were great for support and helpfulness, but we didn't get much interest so closed that one. Tesco and Co-op both OK but no one is giving great interest right now.

HSBC are probably the most global, and therefore a good choice. They get slagged off a lot here (HK) for poor customer service (and random stuff like accidentally issuing a 4 year old a credit card ) but they're better than the alternatives.

NatWest is awful. Stuck with them though. I've gotten to the point where I put my dad on the account last time I went home. It has made life a bit easier. It took 3 weeks to move money over and in the end I flew over and did the transfer in person.

We use HSBC, they seem very used to the whole expat scenario and also have branches globally which makes it all very useful.

Depends where you are. In Dubai HSBC are dire to say the least. The local branches of HSBC are franchised so have no actually relationship with the UK. We banked win them as Premier customers before we left the UK and that means nothing here. So all the pre planning of accounts opened and credit cards etc came to nothing. Two fold problem, HSBC uk should have better and more thorough links with their overseas branches, as then they would have known it wasn't possible to prepare any accounts etc without a residents visa which couldn't be done until we arrived.
We have accounts with HSBC in various countries and when they call us, they require a security check, that's fine but they won't say which country or account they are calling about and they can't see all the accounts. It's not easy.
Sorry op I realise that doesn't answer your question and for that I can't help.

We used Citibank while in the US. We had a UK-based joint account which we could switch to be £ or $. They didn't charge us for conversion and it worked pretty well.

Thanks for all the options.
We are in Ireland but will probably move further afield next year.

I originally used FD because they had the cheapest Intl transfers but have since discovered that their exchange rates are appalling. We now use a different company to buy and transfer our euros which is still a better deal despite having a bigger fee.
Have been with HSBC before and not had any customer service problems but their savings rates are practically zero.

The difficulty in opening accounts is due to money laundering, not credit checks. I still bank with Lloyds for a current account and use offshore accounts for savings. Offshore accounts can be opened, but they will need to know the source of your funds and need proof of identity and address. Original documents or notarised copies need to be sent. It is a pain to provide all the documents so I keep all my accounts open (at various banks) even if the amount in the account is small. Once you are registered there opening other accounts within the same bank is easy. If you are in the EU you can have interest paid gross, but you have to opt for exchange of information with you local tax authority. Alternatively they will deduct tax at source.

We used to bank with Coop in the Channel Islands but they closed their branch there and we had to open a new offshore account. It was pretty difficult without having a massive wedge of money as a minimum balance (lots were 25000GBP!).

As ShanghaiDiva says, it's to do with money laundering. We finally managed to find one with Standard Bank based in the Isle of Man who only want a 5000GBP minimum balance. The charges aren't great but at the time we didn't have a lot of options.

It can be a good idea to open a bank account with establishments abroad because then it makes the whole process much easier. If you use Barclays or HSBC for example, you'll find opening bank accounts abroad much easier. I'd also suggest you look into a currency broker if you need regular overseas payments etc. They can undercut banks by around 3% and won't charge you any commission or fees for converting your Pounds into Euros.