Banking in the UK (or not)

To all new UK transplants: the very first thing you should do when you arrive is open a bank account.  You can get Starbucks or Pret first if you’re starving, but after that, go open a bank account.  Do not go to your hotel or your friend’s place or your office, go to the bank and open an account, or at least make an appointment to do so.

This is for 2 reasons.  First, you need a bank account to do very nearly anything else.  To get a credit card, get a (monthly) mobile phone account, sign up for internet, and, of course, lease an apartment, you need a bank account.  

Second, depending on your bank, it may take a long time.  Not like a few hours, which is the longest I’ve ever waited to have an account opened in the US.  No, more like a month.  

It’s always rainy at Citibank

I assert this because it’s been 3 weeks so far since I started the account opening process with Citibank and I’m nowhere near having an account.  I did not expect this.  For starters, I’m a Citigold member in the US.  I don’t have 7 figures of assets with Citi, but I do have 6; this is supposed to assure a higher level of service.  The Citi personnel to whom I spoke in the US advised me that opening a UK account would just take a day or two.

Due to this assurance, and contra my hard-won advice in the first paragraph above, I waited a few days after arrival to go into a Citibank branch.  The UK personnel informed me that the soonest account opening appointment was 2 weeks out (which seemed crazy to me, but is par for the course, as I’ve discovered) but that I could apply for one online and bring in the paperwork, which might be quicker.  I did so.  It’s not.

The next step after receiving my initial paperwork was for them to verify my account info with the US.  This took over a week.  I have no idea why.

After that, my info had to be sent to the account opening team.  This was done by post.  That’s right, not fax or email or some integrated online system; the branch employees simply packaged up my “online” account paperwork and sent it in the mail.  I have no idea how many days this took to reach the account opening team, or indeed, whether it ever got there.

I went back into the branch for the 3rd time this morning to check on the progress of my account.  They can’t even find it in the system, which apparently means that it has not yet even made it to the stage at which it’s started to be created.  At this point, I will have to pay my apartment deposit with a credit card and eat the 5% excess fee, if the management company will even allow it.   

So my advice is this: start the account opening process as early as possible, and diversify your approaches if possible.  In my case, I should have made an account opening appointment at the branch AND started the process online.  At least then I would have had a known maximum of a 2-week wait instead of the limbo in which I currently find myself.