Tuesday 22 October 2013

Setting up an Australian bank account as an immigrant

One of the first things that you need to do following any international move is to set up a bank account. This was actually surprisingly easy and pleasurable to do - and a lot less troublesome than in Ireland or the UK.

My wife and I have both had previous experiences (as a Brit moving to Ireland and vice versa) of getting stuck in the home address/bank account feedback loop of madness, i.e. you need an address to open a bank account and you need a bank account to get somewhere to live. Happily, the Aussies are a bit more pragmatic/sensible in their fight against fraud and one can open an account with just a passport within a certain period of arriving in the country. This alone has made the past week a lot less stressful.

On the advice of a friend, we opted for an account with NAB (National Australian Bank), which is fee-free and comes with decent internet banking, if my experience so far is anything to go by. The pain-free setup was made even more relaxing by the friendly bank staff and the fact that they were playing a pretty awesome set of 20th Century power ballads in the branch. They were even able to order us debit cards straight away - something else that Nationwide in the UK would not do for six months! I think getting a credit card will be equally painless - we just need to wait for a couple of payslips.

With a bank account sorted - and therefore a means to transfer some of our UK funds - the rest of the immigration process feels a lot less daunting.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Thanks for leaving a comment! (Unless you're a spammer, in which case please stop - I am only going to delete it. You are just wasting your time and mine.)