CCMay

Hi All,

Returning to the UK after living in the US for 5 years (extremely stressful already)...

We previously used Odyssey for our relocation and it wasn't a great experience, a bunch of our stuff was broken and they hardly helped with our settling in when it came to getting an SSN etc.

I also contacted Atlas and Internations thinking they were full service but all they did was share my information with 40+ international shipping companies and now I'm being spammed with movers that want to give us a quote =/

By full service this is what I am hoping for -

• Customs requirements
• Foreign currency and banking
• Important paperwork and UK gov requirements
• Goods shipping and storage

Can someone please direct me to a thread here with other 1 stop relocation service providers that help with the shipping and legal requirements when you return to the UK?

durham_lad

Here is a recent thread you can view and add to

One stop advice service for returning to the UK?

SanDiegogirl

Doesn't sound like this OP has any visa issues (returning to UK so presume all are Brits) - unlike the other OP who had to get a visa.

Sorry, don't know of any 1 stop shop - but the majority of folks returning to the UK don't seem to need this anyway .....

Helen1964

I’m afraid I don’t know of any one-stop shop either.

Assuming you’re all UK nationals, is it really very complicated? I’m planning to move back myself in a couple of years so you’ve got me worried now!

Here’s my plan for what it’s worth:

Sell our flat in France and move into a local Airb’nb for the last month or so. While we clean the flat, cancel utility contracts, notify the French tax authorities that we’re moving to the UK, etc.

Find a good international removal company (by word of mouth or ask for recommendations from people on this forum). Presumably the removal company would have a handle on all the customs procedures.

Get them to move all our stuff to a reputable self-storage facility in the area we’re planning to move to. I’ve checked and you can arrange for the storage facility to give access to the removal people, so you don’t necessarily have to be there in the UK to meet them.

Book another Airb’nb in the UK and drive there in our old French-registered car. Buy a car in the UK. Either sell our French car to a dealer in the UK or drive it to France and sell it to a garage there. Use my Mum’s address for paperwork.

Look around for a long-term rental. Not easy to find at the minute apparently.

Re banking, if you’ve closed all your bank accounts in the UK, open a Wise borderless account now, before you come to the UK. Within that one account, you can have “pots” in different currencies, including a Sterling pot. It functions just like a UK bank account - you get a sort code, account number, and a Visa or MasterCard card. It’s great.

Re healthcare, as you may know you’re entitled to NHS healthcare from Day 1 of your residency in the UK. Admittedly I’m not sure how easy it is in practice to sign up with a GP if you’re staying in an Airb’nb and have no utility bills yet.
Another foreseeable difficulty might be exchanging your foreign driving licence and registering and insuring a vehicle if you don’t yet have a permanent address in the UK.
Maybe be a family member would let you use their address until you’re settled? I think one of the Forum regulars - Pistol Pete - once suggested getting a short winter let because the advantage of these is that you can get utility bills. I would need to double-check that.

Not sure if any of this helps but good luck anyway. If you could tell us precisely what your concerns are and why you think a relocation company is necessary, maybe we could suggest solutions.

durham_lad

Great post.

I will add that for us we did not need a utility bill to prove we lived where we said we did, they simply accepted the address of our rental property. We also did not have a modern format NHS number, just our old one so they couldn't look up our records, and that was no problem in terms of registering and being issued with new NHS numbers. (We had been away for 29 years). We registered the same week we were back and I made an appointment that same week so I could get my US prescription issued in the UK. The GP asked what I took it for and she said that it was exactly what they prescribe in the UK and wrote me a repeat prescription there and then.

We did need utility bills for just about everything else, from changing our bank account address (we had kept alive our old UK bank) to registering to vote.

Lion in Winter

Yes, very helpful.

Also, as I think about it, I have no idea who to talk to/how to get utilities either turned on or in my name in a rental.

I also have zero idea about how to get at home internet and tv connected.

The list of things I don't know about my own country gets longer and longer, and I feel like an idiot

Helen1964

Honestly I think you’re worrying unnecessarily.
I have a little rental house in the UK and whenever tenants move out, I have to contact an electricity provider and take over the account for a few weeks until new tenants move in.
It’s a very painless experience - or at least it is with Power NI in Northern Ireland. We usually end up chatting about the weather in Co. Tyrone.

Just ask people for recommendations once you get to the UK. The letting agency might also be able to advise you on how to get electricity, gas and landline/internet connections.

Will you be going straight into employment in the UK? I just ask because if you don’t have a job, landlords may well want you to pay quite a bit of rent upfront.

Any family/friends back in the UK who can help? For example I was thinking that, if absolutely necessary, I could ask my Mum to transfer her gas bills into my name for a while. If, say, we found we were going to be stuck in an Airb’nb for a long period (as happened to a lady from Devon who posted on this forum a while ago).

Just treat it all as an adventure and don’t be afraid to pester everyone you meet with questions.

Helen1964

That’s reassuring about the GP.

I expect it depends which part of the country you’re in but there does seem to be a shortage of long-term rentals at the moment. And yet - if you don’t already own an empty house in the UK - a long-term rental could be the only way to get the utility bills needed to access other services.

Off the top of my head, possible solutions include:

lower your standards and rent even just a tiny place, leaving the bulk of your stuff in self-storage (you can access it any time). Once you’re settled, look around for a better rental or buy;

ask/bribe a kindly relative to transfer their gas/electricity bills into your name for a while;

investigate Pistol Pete’s suggestion that with some winter lets, you get utility bills. Where IS that man when I need him? Sunning himself in the Caribbean no doubt.

Johnboyuk

Google will tell you everything. Use a phone or local library until you get a connection. Utility and Internet providers will do all of the leg work for you. Finding accommodation and getting a bank account can be difficult if you have no recent history so you need to think about these in advance. Issues such as tax, doctors, etc. you can deal with as you go along.

Nypool1e

durhamlad, after you returned to England did you & do you still file US tax returns every year? If so, how would I go about filing US tax returns when I come back to England?

Bul23

Hi
I am moving back to UK with my family we hope January and are currently waiting for my husband's spouse visa to come through. I thought buying a second hand car in the UK in the north of England, was the best option but my husband decided today that driving our Italian registered car up from Italy loaded up with our belongings was a good thing to investigate. Time is short and I was about to send the Tor 1 application in for transfer of residence for the couple of boxes of personal belongings we plan to take with us.
Does any one know about the costs and paperwork involved in.importing a used vehicle( Volvo ) from EU to Uk? Is it a viable option at all? Many.thanks in advance.This forum has so much useful info on it for folks like us planning a move/ about to move !

Bul23

Hi
I am moving back to UK with my family we hope January and are currently waiting for my husband's spouse visa to come through. I thought buying a second hand car in the UK in the north of England, was the best option but my husband decided today that driving our Italian registered car up from Italy loaded up with our belongings was a good thing to investigate. Time is short and I was about to send the Tor 1 application in for transfer of residence for the couple of boxes of personal belongings we plan to take with us.
Does any one know about the costs and paperwork involved in.importing a used vehicle( Volvo ) from EU to Uk? Is it a viable option at all? Many.thanks in advance.This forum has so much useful info on it for folks like us planning a move/ about to move !

Helen1964

The following might be helpful. Sounds like a bit of a pfaff. And after all that bureaucracy, you still end up with a vehicle with the steering wheel on the wrong side.
We may well drive our French car over to bring some stuff that we don't want the removal guys taking but after that, I think we'll drive it back to France and sell it to a garage.
Importing vehicles into the UK: Getting vehicle approval - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)

Bul23

Thanks very much Helen for your super rapid response. I will check out that link. I imagine you wouldn't want to keep your vehicle in the UK because of the bureaucracy and possibly extra cost of having a vehicle with a foreign registration?

Any one any idea about buying second hand vehicles in UK, taxation, insurance etc nowadays? I have been away from UK for many years.

durham_lad

We returned to the north of England in 2016 and hired a car for 2 weeks on arrival. We found and bought a second hand car from a dealer within a week and turned the hire car in early. Insurance was easy enough as was taxing the car. No car to trade in, no financing. It was surprisingly quick because we need an automatic for my wife to drive and expected automatics to be few and far between.