ducktastic

Yes it was a great proposal from them. We have a relationship manager in the UK and we have been assigned a relationship manager in Vancouver, and we don't arrive for another 12 days.
You will need to check out the rates for transferring money, I believe it was £1000 a day at no charge.

JonboyE

We have pre-authorized debits (PAD) instead of direct debits. I'm not a great fan of PADs because you give up some control of your account to the drawer. E.g. if you are paying for a service by PAD and decide to cancel it you have to get the service provider to stop claiming the PAD, not tell the bank to stop paying it. I heard an example on the Radio recently of a gym that had all its members paying monthly by PAD. The gym went out of business but kept debiting its ex members monthly fees for years after wards.

You can pay pretty much all taxes, clubs, utilities, credit cards stores and so on by internet banking. What you cannot do is transfer funds directly into another individual's account. You can email money to individuals who bank with many financial institutions (I'm not sure if Coast Capital is a participant yet) and this is just as effective - though it does cost a couple of bucks.

Another thing you will get at somewhere like Coast Capital is that you get to deal with who seem genuinely grateful that you have chosen to do business with them.

Bleepedy Bloops

I would also say PC Financial. It is the best thing going in banking in this country if you just want a basic savings or chequing account. There are no monthly fees ever and debit transactions are completely free and unlimited. Plus it can be accessed at any CIBC ABM as well as the Presidents Choice ones at Loblaws, No Frills, etc.

Tripitaka

This is great insight and I'm truly grateful. Lots here that I wasn't aware of; I always like to do my homework before asking on forums but I've learnt more in the last hour on here than I have over the last three days elsewhere.

The PADS thing clearly needs sorting out - how bizarre! LOL. It seems from reading the PC site that Automitic Bill Payments = Standing Orders and PADS = Direct Debits (ish, with caveats from above). The not transferring between accounts is a bit of a surprise but I can get around that with planning.

Thanks (so far). Need my bed now.

Alan2005

You need a wad of cash for HSBC premier. $100k - great if you've just sold your house.

Alan2005

I agree with this. I prefer to control all payments out of the account.

fledermaus

Welcome to Canada.

You also need to give voided cheques to your employers so they can set up paying your wage into your account. They won't take a piece of paper with this info on nor a photocopy of a voided cheque.

Zoe Bell

Ah yes had forgotten about that , you often need them to set up your pre auth. Payments as well.

The concept of actually knowing your bank details is fairly alien as well !

flyboy74

+1 for HSBC... Their premier service makes moving countries really easy. In fact, I think I read somewhere that HSBC premier now has a team of people who specialize in getting you set up in another country before you even get there?

The only snag is that they don't have as many branches as some of the bigger banks...

Tripitaka

Isn't that only for fee-free banking with HSBC Premier? I'll be calling them today to find out more as I need to retain an account in the UK for at least a few years yet as I'll be renting my house here rather than selling.

It's clear I will be needing to take a new view on my banking arrangements, which I'm happy to do and this thread is helping me become informed on that. There are some things that seem odd but that is all part of a new culture and I welcome it.

I work for Hewlett Packard and I'm moving on an internal transfer so I'd be pretty surprised if they needed to see voided cheques in order to pay me - who knows though? Anything is possible!

ducktastic

here is the criteria..
http://www.hsbc.co.uk/1/2/personal/c...OutMore_Button

ducktastic

Yes we have a canadian account/cards before we have left the UK. It was set up by a relationship manager, we got exceptional service, and were surprised by how easy it was.

joepublic

Lots of good info here; I’ll definitely have a closer look at the PC option. I intend opening a bank account when we make our landing trip at New Year.

Out of interest, what are your views on this?

http://www.cdcb.ca/en/index.asp

I’m enrolling into the CF and this is affiliated to it. As a new resident with no credit history, I was thinking that I’d be more likely to get a better limit on a credit card, easier mortgage etc by going with these than I would with another bank?

Thoughts anyone….

rivingtonpike

[QUOTE=ducktastic;8989095]Yes we have a canadian account/cards before we have left the UK. It was set up by a relationship manager, we got exceptional service, and were surprised by how easy it was.[/QUOT

I think I've said this before on this forum, but the HSBC Premiere route has been fantastic for us. Everything set up and working before we even arrived in Vancouver. True - not so many branches as the major Canadian banks, but how often do you go into a branch of your UK bank? The online service is superb; you can link your UK accounts, offshore accounts and Canadian accounts instantly. Money transfers are free and the exchange rates are as good as I have found anywhere else.

As an aside, I received an unsolicited email from my Canadian Relationship Manager only yesterday asking how we were settling in and if there was anything else she could do for us.

Very impressed! (and for a bank that's saying something).......

Tripitaka

Just spoken with the advisor and the minimum savings of £50K are the hurdle for us. You can get the same facilities with the HSBC Advance account too but they then charge a £50 admin fee to set up and transactions through Global View are £5 each. Yikes!!

If you have the savings then it seems a good route; if you don't, it definitely isn't because the costs are high. Yes, it saves potential hassle on setting up the account but after that, they don't provide anything that can't be gained easily through other methods. In other words, the value-add is low to anyone but the terminally lazy or those that can take advantage because they meet the criteria.

Onto reviewing PCF and Coast then... Not sure how to choose between the two at the moment.