Santander is closing my UK current account

[hotandsticky]

10 minutes ago, OJAS said:

Nothing to do with the law but everything to do with individual UK banks' terms and conditions, I'm afraid. Even though they are IMHO effectively acting as a cartel as regards the residency requirement, successive UK governments have shown no appetite for flexing their legislative muscles in order to force any change - most likely, I strongly suspect, because of the general indifferent (and even downright hostile) attitude shown towards expats generally (not just those based in LOS) back in Blighty.

 

It is all to do with compliance with regulatory requirements - and there is a perceived increase risk to falling foul of those regulations with non-residents. Answer  - remove the risk; solution; no new non-resident accounts and start closing existing ones for good measure.

 

Your point about cartel is absolutely valid and a virtual cartel has existed forever. If you being uncharitable you might call it a sheep mentality, or monkey see monkey do.

[somo]

On 10/3/2023 at 7:31 PM, Polar Bear said:

If you have funds in your Wise account,  you can withdraw cash from an ATM with a Wise debit card. You can make 2 withdrawals a month, at a max of £200 each, without a fee. More than that,  and they start charging you. As far as I remember,  they don't charge you for overseas spending on it.

 

(By free, I mean they don't charge a specific fee there will still be a markup on the exchange rate.)

Wise do not provide debit cards ifyou joined in Thailand, They say they are working on it. However the Paypal Mastercard debit card I have linked to my Wise account can be used with ATMs around the world for a GBP1.00 fee per transaction. The exchange rate is down to Mastercard and they have some of the best available.

[Polar Bear]

33 minutes ago, somo said:

Wise do not provide debit cards ifyou joined in Thailand, They say they are working on it. However the Paypal Mastercard debit card I have linked to my Wise account can be used with ATMs around the world for a GBP1.00 fee per transaction. The exchange rate is down to Mastercard and they have some of the best available.

Ah sorry,  my mistake.  It's the PayPal card you are getting in the UK, not a UK Wise card. Hopefully the PayPal workaround does the trick.

[somo]

11 hours ago, Polar Bear said:

Ah sorry,  my mistake.  It's the PayPal card you are getting in the UK, not a UK Wise card. Hopefully the PayPal workaround does the trick.

Yeah, When I signed up with Wise some months ago I did so purely to transfer money as Santander wanted me to walk into one of their offices to do an international transfer and offered ridiculous rates. At the time I didn't realise Wise is effectively a bank and I could link my old English based Paypal account to it. I received the car withing days and have activated it simply by entering the 'end date' online. Very easy.

so I am now set up but I will still continue arguing my side with Sabtander and have at least got them into an email dialogue. Someone on here suggest I email their CEO as he eventually got to keep his account by being persistent.

[OJAS]

On 10/4/2023 at 10:33 PM, somo said:

Wise do not provide debit cards ifyou joined in Thailand, They say they are working on it.

Yep, in typical Yes Minister-speak debit cards will no doubt be provided by Wise "in the fullness of time and at the appropriate juncture".????

 

I strongly suspect that it's Thai banking regulations that are proving a major stumbling-block here.

 

[OJAS]

21 hours ago, somo said:

I didn't realise Wise is effectively a bank and I could link my old English based Paypal account to it.

Sadly the Paypal option is no longer available from Thailand for foreigners.????

 

 

Edited October 6, 2023 by OJAS