RayZor

There are loads of threads on banks, its difficult to know which one to go for so I thought i would set up a poll....

Based on experiences of setting up and actual use, charges and service which banks do people recommend?

e.g.

HSBC
ANZ
WestPaC
CommonWealth Bank
CitiBank
National Australian Bank
Bendigo Bank
ING direct
Suncorp
Bank of Queensland
St Georges Bank
Other..

Thanks....

Poppy

Thought I would bring this back to the top as it's a good way of getting an idea, but this only got 7 votes, but they were all over the place really so not any one stood out above the rest. Just wondered if there were more people out there that wouldn't mind voting so we can get a better picture. I do keep trying to find threads about banks and who thinks which ones are good and bad and for what reason, but it's hard to take it all in.

Thanks in advance.

Australia_bound?

Can't vote for any of em as they're all interested making massive profits to pay large dividends out to wealthy share holders and give huge wages to their directors. How anyone can justify charging people to withdraw money, from bank is beyond me....whole system stinks

Rant over

Poppy

I agree with you, but unfortunately there are not a lot of options if you need to have easy access to withdraw money and cards to make payments easier etc.

Where abouts in NY are you from? I am from Northallerton, although live in London and have done for 24 years!

All the best

Australia_bound?

When I was 17 I used to get wages cash in hand ah the good old days lol

Currently live in Sowerby, really nice area round here, not born here originally from Teesside but gone all posh now

RayZor

thnaks poppy for bumping this up

mand8002

You might not acutally get a true representation of which is the best bank as I would imagine that many people have stayed with the bank that they have been with since arriving. I know that I tried researching which bank to use and in the end we just opened an account at the first bank we came to on our walk from our short term rental into the city. This happened to be the Commonwealth Bank and although plenty people don't like the Commonwealth I am quite happy. The most it ever costs me in fees each month is $5 and I think that is quite an acceptable charge.

lian and jon

Hi,

I voted for the Commonwealth Bank of Australia and here is why:

It took just 4 days to send application form to London and have back details of the new account they had opened for us in Perth. They even gave us the name and telephone number of our account manager who we are to see when we arrive.

Even better they set up a 'migrant' bank account in London which you can pay your money into. It can then be held untill you want them to convert and send to Australia and our UK account manager even phoned us to say the cheque had arrived and when did we want to transfer.

Unlike high street banks who may not charge commision they give proper Forex rates.

Today they have transferred at $2.402 /£. Tranzfers offered me $2.395 and my own High Street bank would only have given me $2.35. Work that out!

Beware of no commision and a low transfer rate. The difference between Commonwealth rate and High Street bank could be $0.05. On £50,000 that could be the difference between $120,100 and $117,500 and thats a lot of 'no commission'.

Hope this helps,

Jon

renth

Can the people who voted for the Crimminwealth Bank please give me the address of their crack dealer because they must be on drugs.

I also notice that 2 are still in the UK and have yet to experience the pleasantrys of being charged $1 to get your balance at an ATM and charged for just about every transaction.

Decent exchange rates? - use Ozforex and Tranzfers - 7 quid a pop, any amount.

And to cap it all, the "Migrant Banking" thing, just wait till you meat the lovely Chinese lady at CBA offices in Perth (if that's where you're headed) - one of the biggest bitches I've ever had the displeasure of dealing with.

Rant over

HSBC rules.

galloping gaijin

Surely this should be titled "most popular back"?

You could only make a decision if a bank was the best if you have had experience of the others on which to make a judgement! There would be no problem with "the best beer poll" as most people will have tried more than one brand - but with banks you can't chop and change every week.

Personally I've voted Citibank - no problems moving money around, no charges for withdrawing cash from anyones ATM machines, and they've got back to us with all our queries on FX etc.

galloping gaijin

Just as an aside, can any give examples of the buy/sell spread from Tranzfers/HiFx so I can make a comparo with the spread and hence the 'take' from my own bank?

renth

http://www.tranzfers.com

gedge

Valid point, you can ony judge on your experiences. I have banked with ANZ and HSBC. Without a doubt I'd recommend HSBC over ANZ as they make it so much easier to do fee free banking. They are not without fault, but most of my grumbles would be the same with UK banks, except day to day banking fees.

biggy

I use Westpac wont vote for them as they r shit and a rip off......just charged me $400 for the past years mortgage fee FFS!!!

gedge

Is this a new account from Citibank? I've noticed some new ads recently pushing their fee free account, but it's the first I've heard of it. Just wondered if it's a new concept to them, and where the catch may be?