Teaandtoday5

We use quite a lot of cheques. Mostly for stuff like school trips/fund raisers and kids activities. Seems safer than cash when delivery is out of my hands.

SchnookoLoly

Ah that make sense - I suppose once you have kids a lot of their activities are funded by cheque!

Teaandtoday5

Also I'm presuming that my 100th post was the reason for the sudden appearance of a third red star. Proof positive I spend too much time on this site!

SchnookoLoly

You're telling me (Post #3159 in 3 years and 1 month... ............. .................................... )

Theoldfields

You've had some great advice already.

Our experience with moving money over from our house sale just over a year ago was that the foreign currency exchanges were best. We used Halo and had good experiences with them but it's quite a competitive Market so I am sure there are others that are just as good.

We brought a credit report with us which helped with getting a higher credit limit with RBC for our credit card but it wasn't required for the standard bank account. We didn't use them but I've heard on here that you can set up a Canadian account with HSBC from the UK before you leave.

Good luck

Green Toadster

We arrived from the UK 3 weeks ago and had a hell of a time getting set up with HSBC before we left trying to get an account set up. WE can do it, we can't, back and forth etc.

However, when we got here we went to HSBC after final bit of advice within the UK from a member of staff in one of the branches and got set up for an account within 1.5 hours. We were given a temporary card and a pin in the branch also.

The guy we dealt with was excellent and also got us a credit card to start building our credit history. Take a passport, Work Permit, Passport and offer of employment.

I would recommend HSBC on the experience in Canada not the UK.

GMS_AMS

Hey Green Toadster,
Yeh, we were the same re HSBC. Wanted to set up an Expat or International Account before we left the UK (which is 6 weeks today, YIKES!) - but wouldnt have 3 months wages going in before we left (or something along those lines?!?!).
We've got a few banks that we want to check out when we get there, HSBC is defo on the list.
How's things going? Did everything go to plan/smoothly? Any hints & tips for us?
G

ontario70

Scotiabank have a welcome to Canada package for new immigrants, i hope its still the same as we've been here 4 years now. hope i'm not giving you wrong info
We popped into service Canada when we first arrived and got our SIN numbers and then went to Scotia and opened up our bank accounts and we were able to get a visa card with a $1000 limit as well.

Good luck and hope the move goes well

caretaker

Bank at your local credit union, comrades, the big banks are class criminals. Also my credit union gives me a far better deal than Scotiabank ever did. For things like rrsp and tfsa accts Canadian Western has very good interest rates.

jkgtr

Sorry to butt in on your thread but i am in a similar situation.

Specificaly i am scratching my head about the money transfer. I was going to use somebody like UKforex to transfer instead of the bank for better rates but i am still a bit lost as to declaring this transfere as it will be over 10000CAD.

Does this need to be declared when landing on goods to follow, do i declare it with a reciept or statement from the broker i use?

thanks

Former Lancastrian

If wired to the account in Canada the notification is done automatically and no need to inform CBSA on arrival.
If you are entering or leaving Canada and are carrying $10,000 or more including any combination of coins, domestic or foreign bank notes, and securities, such as travellers cheques, stocks and bonds, you have to complete Form E677, Cross-Border Currency or Monetary Instruments Report - Individual.

The clue is carrying not being wired

jkgtr

thanks for clearing that up!

Rosie Lee

TorFX is great for transferring money. Getting a Credit card is difficult, we had to go for a $1000 secured card, and cheques, yes we use loads of them. I agree though it's mostly for kids trips fees, fundraising etc etc.

DanielM

We gave up on getting an HSBC in Canada, even with UK accounts with them it was a hassle trying to getting it set up. Ended up walking into a TD and getting set up on the spot.

A good bit of advice I read here was to just go to whatever bank is convenient for you wherever your staying. You'll probably be seeing them a lot to begin with and you don't want seeing them to be a trek.

I'd recommend getting some Canadian cash before you fly over, have it with you when you land and you can use it to open an account here (also to spend on stuff).

As for cheques, we just moved into a condo and had to give 12 to our landlord, 12 for our parking spot and 12 for our locker (all rented of different people). So yeah, they are still used quite alot (direct debits don't seem to be a thing here).

Good luck and remember to bring lots of tea-bags.

Lisa Wright

Hi!

My husband and I are moving over to Canada in 6 weeks so we're in a very similar boat! Eeek!

Hadn't even thought about getting our medical records before we go... oops!

We were so confused/worried about the banking situation and transferring the large amount of money that selling our house created-we looked into using our bank (Barclays) but in the end we used a London based fx company and they've looked after everything for us and seemed a lot more reasonable than the bank! Let me know if you would like their details

Good luck with your move!