First of all, among four high-street banks I approached when just arrived into the UK, one clearly showed their lack of interest for immigrant; two others couldn't answer my simple questions about foreign currency operations; and Barclays welcomed me, provided a cheerful personal banker who was able to answer all my questions. So in fact I opened my account with them on the same day.
It was in Barclays where I received a credit card right off the bat (and many my colleagues had to wait 6 months before that...). Methinks they actually tweaked some cryptic parameters on my CC application - like how many months have I spent here... Anyway the result was clear.
No, they don't charge you for taking cash. In fact, life becomes much better as you get more products with them. Then comes Platinum account and Platinum Barclaycard. Many niceties become in fact FREE.
Barclays' Online Banking is one of the best of its kind, and supports statement downloads into Microsoft Money (v. important for me as I use it profoundly). Quarterly statements with funny information. They also provided me with ISA.
In fact, don't have reasons to complain about my banking with them. (Except mortgage, but I guess that's common attitude to immigrants).
Actually Barclays is not that bad
It was in Barclays where I received a credit card right off the bat (and many my colleagues had to wait 6 months before that...). Methinks they actually tweaked some cryptic parameters on my CC application - like how many months have I spent here... Anyway the result was clear.
No, they don't charge you for taking cash. In fact, life becomes much better as you get more products with them. Then comes Platinum account and Platinum Barclaycard. Many niceties become in fact FREE.
Barclays' Online Banking is one of the best of its kind, and supports statement downloads into Microsoft Money (v. important for me as I use it profoundly). Quarterly statements with funny information. They also provided me with ISA.
In fact, don't have reasons to complain about my banking with them. (Except mortgage, but I guess that's common attitude to immigrants).