Scotsman In Texas

Anyone know of any GBP-denominated accounts that are located in the US (and therefore don’t have FBAR reporting requirements) but can still be used like a standard bank account in the UK with chequebook, faster payment transfers etc?

Trying to avoid lots of FBAR liabilities for a shared asset with my kids....

celticgrid

Liabilities?

It’s just a form, once a year. Just reporting, no inherent liabilities.

Jerseygirl

What liabilities? Just fill in the form once a year.

tom169

And to add the form took me all of about 10 minutes to fill in. It's entirely electronic.

MidAtlantic

And if you save the file for next time all the fixed data remains and you just have to change the amounts. That brings it down to 5 minutes (until they change the form).

Scotsman In Texas

When I say liabilities I mean there are huge potential penalties for failure to report a foreign bank account on both FBAR and potentially 8938 as I am sure you all know. Yet another potential for an expensive mistake is a liability in my view. I have a lot of foreign accounts to report and don't want to deal with yet another one.

Also as this is an account for a US partnership that my kids are limited partners of and I don't want to have to deal with 3 more FBAR's for them. I am overwhelmed with forms as it is.

Anyway, the purpose of the post was not to discuss whether or not the FBAR/8938 was a hassle/liability (which I firmly believe it is) but if there were any GBP accounts that avoided this.

Jerseygirl

If you have any joint accounts anywhere you must declare them. I think what you are asking is how to avoid US laws...which is against our Site Rules.

Mercury39

Several financial institutions have foreign currency accounts, some have them onshore in the US as well. Citizens Commercial has such a product and advertised as avoiding the need to Report of Foreign Bank and Financial Accounts, since the account is domiciled in the U.S.

Scotsman In Texas

Thank you Mercury39 that's exactly what I need. Very helpful.

Absolutely not trying to avoid of US laws! Any account domiciled in the US has no FBAR requirement. I want an account domiciled in the US (or is in the IRS net in some way) but in GBP that fulfils my UK banking needs. Not sure how much clearer I can be here.

Jerseygirl

My apologies.

petitefrancaise

HSBC?
I could certainly do this in France with Euros/dollars and sterling.
My company could be paid in the different currencies and I also had to pay for things in the different currencies, so to avoid having currency exchange all the time, I had 3 different accounts denominated in the 3 currencies. Come tax time, everything was "converted" into euros but only in the accounting. Is this what you mean?

mrken30

Citibank has several currency options.

https://www.citibank.com/ipb/europe/...ticurrency.htm

However, you may not be able to use fast pay etc. When I had a UK based USD account, I could not do ACH transfers and I had to send USD checks to the UK to be deposited.

This article suggests a few others http://www.bankrate.com/banking/savi...rency-account/

There is often a fee associated with having one of these types of accounts.

MidAtlantic

As others have said HSBC and Citibank are the big ones and often with big fees.
Just Google foreign currency accounts in the USA and you will find several others.

petitefrancaise

But that would not satisfy this requirement
"used like a standard bank account in the UK with chequebook, faster payment transfers etc?"

Also, since this appears to be part of his business banking requirements any fees would be tax deductible.

penguinsix

Doesn't a partnership with a foreign owner have additional paperwork filings?