As far as I'm aware none of the banks will consider what you have in the UK banks, As for credit for a car I found this very easy to get if you go with a dealer, I know if can cost a bit more sometime and its secured on your car but depends how much you need a car. I would say just bring some of your money out her and go from there, Because who knows how long the rates will be like this, Also need to take into account, What interest rate your getting in the UK to what you can get over here. Currently a few banks are offering around 5.50% + for savings accounts on the internet.
Gary

I worked for Suncorp for 4 years and they, as an organisation, are bastards.

Customer service is appalling and the number of cock-ups is numerous.

What's that? I worked for them therefore I was a bastard? Probably true ...

Oh, "positive experiences"? Hold on, I'll have a think.

How the hell is Westpac winning the poll!

Simply the worst bank I have ever been with. They don't care about their customers and provided poor service.

I am going back to a "foreign bank" probably HSBC.

Also try using your Westpac credit card overseas and see how many charges they add. Disgraceful.

Luckily I still have a UK credit card which I use when I go on holiday, which has no fees at all.

I am very happy with the new NAB Gold Bankling account I opened just before Xmas.

This includes free overseas ATM withdrawls + no commision fees, however the exchange rate was also a nice surprise. I withdrew cash from an HSBC ATM in London, checked xe.com at the time and the live market rate was $1.801. My £100 withdrawl cost me $180.53 i.e. a rate of $1.805....can't argue with that!

As I think I said before....NAB are removing monthly fees....for gold banking no fee if you deposit $5k a month, other accounts I don't think there is any deposit requirement.

So do I But when I use it here in Australia, I get charged the same as when I use my Australian credit card for overseas.

I used my Australian Woolworths Credit card for a UK Moonpig transaction the other day.
£7.18 cost me $13.30 all up, or $1.85 to the £. The Oanda Interbank average rate for the day was 1.82060

None whatsover. I had this discussion with an Australian HSBC person, as I bank with both UK and Aus HSBC, and they give no benefit for that at all.

But then, if you don't have a bad credit rating, the fact that you have no history is no problem either.

I'd put a positive vote in for St George, but my only point of comparison is the Commonwealth, which we found to be awful.

I have an ANZ Visa card and was very surprised to get additional charges when using the card abroad. So watch out for this.

The Oz banks have it easy and I don't think the market is that competitive, on the other hand they haven't "misbehaved" like their US and UK counterparts!

We have a St George offset mortgage thingy where anything you have in your current account or savings offsets your interest payments on the mortgage. There are fees for this but as long as you have sufficient funds then you are still ahead of the game.

The interest rate is quite competitive too: 5.98% at the moment. So I would recommend this.

Ok is it easy to change banks if ours turns out to be a dud?

Was thinking either Westpac or Commwealth, so if they don't shape up, would it be the same as changing banks here in the UK?

Depends what type of visa you have.

If temp visa them HSBC won't issue a credit card without holding the amount of the credit card on deposit with them.

Westpac require a tax return and proof of funds before they will consider you for a credit card.

ANZ no problem - credit card given without any deposit with them.

These banks are absolutely ridiculous. You can fully own your house, car and have no debts yet they still refuse you a credit card as you have a temp visa regardles that it is for 10 years and renewable and that you have made Australia your home.

Hmmm interesting/disturbing. We have PR visas. I suppose we'll shop around, if one doesn't suit us we'll move to another after a while.

Probably won't need CCards at first.

We had to open a bank account as we only scraped together the points for our visa by investing in Aussie gov bonds (think that option no longer exists?).

NAB were the most responsive - they quickly opened us an "investment manager" account - it's actually instant access, but no cards etc which we weren't bothered about then - only really need them when you actually go to live there.

The deal is that when you go to validate your visa (or move there fullstop), you let them know you're coming & set up an appointment in advance for when you arrive - they then prepared our cards etc for a new proper bank account to be collected in person so that they could check passport etc (and try to cross sell us things!).

All very smooth and easy. Once they've seen you and your ID, you can open any accounts you like (and track them on their internet banking which is efficient and user friendly).

Hope this helps

is NAB winning per no Monthly fees?
how about other hidden fees, coz I've read on ANZ as they don't have any hidden fees, we just need to pay 5$ monthly fees.

Good thread but I'm even more confused and undecided as before! We are heading to Perth in 6 weeks and we are just looking into bank accounts.
HSBC here tried to convince us paying £100 for the benefit of sending our credit report over was worth it - is it? Not sure my credit score is worth it anyway

What do the Aussie's call a current account? Is it a savings account? We don't want any credit cards, investments etc. we just need a basic everyday account and maybe a savings account for the kids.

From the limited options I would choose HSBC.