AndrewMarilyn

We arrive early morning Thursday 6 Jan in Sydney and I start work there Monday 10th.

Thursday we will be knackered, but what are the things we must sort on the Friday?

By then we will already have a Oz bank account and temporary accommodation.......looking back on your move, what did you do/meed to do immediately?

Ta

Wol

Sleep, and car!

Bermudashorts

Get online and order a TFN, you can't do it until you get there. As you start work straight away the sooner you have it the better.

Go to the bank and activate your account.

Dorothy

http://britishexpats.com/forum/showthread.php?t=345774

derson

I second the sleep and car recommendation - although it depends if you're in the city or not for the car, you might get away with public transport???? I've been here 2 weeks and am still a bit screwed up with the body clock (although I've had to work some late shifts to overlap UK hours)

And for me, getting internet and a phone sorted. I picked up a Crazy Johns sim at Melbourne airport and then a mobile broadband dongle at Target later on. Absolute lifesavers....

Alfresco

Change your Oz bank account address to your Oz temp address and get a print out as proof of address. Then use this to...

Exchange your drivers license(s) for Oz ones. It's a great piece of ID with your new address on, even if it's temp.

Can't buy a car unless you have a Oz drivers license. (at least in QLD with a QLD license)

Good luck.

Alfresco

Yes and if they give you poxy (savings only) bank cards, order decent Visa or Mastercard debit cards for your account so you can spend more than a restricted daily limit.

saffymouse

I'm new to all this, what's a "TFN"?

verystormy

TFN = Tax file number. A bit like a national insurance number and essential for work in order to pay taxes.

In WA you dont need a WA licence to buy a car. In fact i got away without showing them my UK one as i had misplaced it.

Alfresco

Your name according to the ATO (Australian Tax Office).

http://www.ato.gov.au/individuals/co...tent/38760.htm

Bermudashorts

We bought a car despite only having UK licences, so it is possible in NSW.

Still it is something that will need doing so might as well get it out of the way.

RachH

for us, the first thing was picking up a hire car that we had organised for the first two weeks...then drove it through the local BWS drive through bottle shop (new experience for us that!) for some beer and champagne, then visited the local IGA - didn't realise that there were other supermarkets in the area - was horrified until we discovered Coles and Woolworths - and bought a few lovely seafoody things for dinner. then straight back to the holiday rental and chilled out with wine and food whilst trying to stay awake for the rest of the day and evening!

the next few days like jet-lagged zombies we activated our bank accounts, got our Queensland drivers licences, signed on with telstra for mobile phones and a mobile broadband dongle thingie as we had our laptop with us(not alot of choice for decent coverage in our area unfortunately - we are still with them 2 years later so not all bad). Once we'd done that we went online and got our tax file numbers, signed on with medicare and started looking at permanent rental.

good luck with everything. its a shame you have to start work so quickly...

Dreamy

We did - was just a matter of providing enough other forms of id.

Alfresco

Must be a QLD thing then. The car dealer said if would be "1000" times more difficult to buy a car in QLD without a QLD license.

Anyway, had them done way before then so not worried.

Dreamy

We were in Qld