k8bug79

Hi, I am hoping for some helpful advice. I have read the threads about paying off UK debts from overseas. Long story short we had to make the move over sooner than anticipated and it meant we couldn't clear a few bits in the UK as we had hoped. Add in the end of year tax credits recalculation which resulted in an over payment and we are left with a few K to clear. We have been managing by sending money home and we can continue to do so, but the reality is it is doing little more than covering the minimum payments- which we have calculated it would take about 10 years and about $70 K in interest to carry on that way. We were hoping to get a loan over here whilst the rate is stable (the $ vs GBP has made the current situation worse at the moment and in my opinion is only going to continue to do so) but after applying to NAB we have been told we can't secure a loan for overseas liabilities. Of course the idea of just walking away is appealing but having done our research we are not confident with that route and therefore we are doing the moral thing and continuing to pay. But it is very frustrating knowing it could end up costing us so much more in the long run. Has anyone any experience on getting a loan here to cover overseas commitment and if so how? The guy on the end of the phone alluded to the fact we could say that we were buying washing machines etc but wouldn't change the application purpose on the current application. We had to reapply. But we are concerned to put another application in and risk of them seeing through it and throwing it out or worse investigating fraud. This is doubly frustrating as we tried so hard to get this sorted in the UK and would have cleared it by now had they helped but all we hit was brick walls. We have credit cards over here but are unwilling to max them out to sort this as we use those for emergencies. Any experience welcome.

We have it badly too- we are in the dark corner of the block so get no natural sunlight and it is all over the ceilings and blinds. We bought damp rid and put it in each room and it's helping. We like you do all sorts of things like open windows, blinds etc. We are moving in a couple of weeks partly due to this and we have made sure we have a unit that faces the right way. I posted on the pio facebook forum and got told it is common. One thing that did come up is the lack of ventilation blocks in our unit- well certainly visible ones. I have viewed loads of places and they did all seem to have damp patches. Hope you get it sorted and that for my sake our move to a sunnier aspect is going to help!!

Nab here too, all great. Easy to set up and easy to get sorted when here. I changed where my card was nominated to be collected and that did cause a little trouble as they hadn't sent it so had to go back a couple of days later to get it and then they didn't activate the account properly so we were trying to buy a TV and it kept getting declined which was not only embarrassing but annoying as we had to keep going back round to them 3 times before it was sorted. But that's just one of those banking things and not necessary an endemic problem. We went in after a month and got a visa card so we could use online, this was easy and we didn't have jobs so it's just seems to be standard that you have to ask for that option as opposed to eftpos only. In retrospect I may have considered Commonwealth as it seems a list of businesses use them and you pay arrives quicker if you are with commonwealth, but we still haven't made the move to them as it isn't causing that much of an issue.

Oop just realised my husbands mobile is in that at $60 too, so $110 (you get a discount if you bundle)

I would say your internet is a bit low. We pay $170pm for internet, phone and inc in that is a TV package but not to the standard of Foxtel. We get more than enough data and cheap UK calls- this is with Optus. But unless you only use the internet for basics I think you'll struggle to find it that cheap. May be wrong tho

Hi @Xerxes I joined Moneycorp back in the UK. You basically 'buy' currency when you want it or it's at a good rate. So in UK I just did this with my debit card. Then it's credited to your money corp online account then you buy x amount of $ with it and chose a recipient- in my case my NAB bank. Very easy. No fees if you join through Pio I think- although I suspect our rate is slightly less favorable than if we were fee paying customers. In return it's slight;y different. I do an electronic transfer of $ to a bank account and they then credit them to my account to but GBP in the same way. I have had no hiccups with them and they are very easy to deal with. Whole process takes just a few days this end. I can't recall how long i took other end. As said before loads of people use them and there are other similar companies as well.

I set up before we went and a Nab account, we used it to transfer our savings over whilst rates were ok- not as good as now sadly :-(

I'm married to an Aussie by descent. He had never even been to Australia and he was my sponsor. I think there is a magical word like- 'normally they reside', but loads of people apply when both are still in UK

Hi Xerxes, I left both my current accounts open- They both had a small overdraft on that we had hoped to clear but just didn't. We downgraded to the basics. i.e no rewards as we couldn't access them. To start with we put them at my Mums address just to stop the post going to my old address and as soon as we had a permanent address we wrote and amended it. Halifax was easy, they accepted the letter. Natwest is a pain and to be honest I don't think it's been changed completely as they required us to go into branch or send a verified signature by a JP etc.! but anyway it is still able to be used. I tried to close the Halifax recently but the forms didn't reach us on 2 occasions so I have decided as it is at nil it can sit there. So each month we transfer a lump sum from our Oz accounts to our UK accounts through Moneycorp and then just pay our bills through online banking from our UK account. It takes about a week to process and so you have to do it well in advance of due date but it's the cheapest way of doing it. You probably can pay direct to the card in $ but there would be a poor conversion rate. We still have the debt, to be honest it will probably take a while to clear as we are chipping away at it. Of course it is appealing to just run away as suggested above but for now we feel morally obliged to do what we can and hopefully one day we'll be in a position to clear it. Good luck with the move. It certainly isn't ideal to come over with money still owing in the UK. But life isn't ideal and we have done it and look forward to the day that we can keep that money currently being used for UK debt to stay in our account! But our life is so much better that I would never tell anyone to not move just because they have to send money home to clear a credit card!

Oh how I love how these threads end up :smile::smile: To answer your question with experience. We have left a couple of cards back in the UK (We have been here nearly a year) we have changed all the addresses to here and we send a lump sum back through Moneycorp to pay off the monthly payments. The GBP is strengthening against the $ and therefore we are not clearing as much as we would like. Cancel all insurances, ppi etc as none are valid over here. There is no problem keeping a UK bank account open just make sure they'll send replacement cards to you when you need them. We added my Mum as a 3rd party signatory to our joint account which was suggested by Natwest as they said that way she can come in and change addresses and make inquiries on our behalf. I will admit to being tempted to walk away, I question who wouldn't, but I am too scared that regs will change and we will have a can of worms to deal with. However they are least of my priority. If things get tough they'll be the first thing to be missed. In response to the 'How can you afford to move' posts, we moved over on a budget and we didn't have any luxuries. We are now way better off than in the UK, have a really good quality of life and have just bought a brand new car. So it's achievable.

You can fill a form jn for HMRC which will speed ip a tax teturn. Also don't forget tv licence as you have paid up in advance. If you don't do the form for hmrc it shouldn't matter just means you won't get a tax refund til next year when tgeg do end of year reconciliation and you'd need to ket them know where to deposit money.

We moved last September UK to Sydney. We had $22K inc flights and shipping. We are us 2 and 3 kids and we managed. My husband got a part time job quickly as a chef, he secured a rental and paid 3 months in advance and bought a cheap car and what we hadn't shipped and needed 2nd hand. We connected internet but didn't get any other outgoings straight off. Stayed as PAYG mobiles, no medical/ house/ car insurance. We only added things in once I was working and now 9 months in we are settled have a house of furniture are fully insured for the usual bits and about to go and test drive a new car. It will depend on what your jobs as to how quick you'll find work. My husband has had 3 jobs since arriving here and got each within a day of looking for them. Mine didn't come up til December which I still consider pretty good going, I had ruled out anything til February. It's very doable and I disagree with the poster above who says it's not fun- I really enjoyed the adventure and the only stressful bit fr us was our first landlord doing the dirty and we had to move sooner than we anticipated. Good luck

As title says sorry to be down but this was one of the aspects of us moving to OZ. Not the largest by any stretch. But we were living in Cornwall with 2/3 of our kids at primary school. We had already moved into catchment area to ensure my 2nd child went to the school because the school was the best in the town and was over subscribed with in catchment applications and I knew of siblings being separated. We rented and moved just down the road and we were pretty much guaranteed a place then by being in catchment and having a sibling at the school. The school was an Ofsted outstanding school and the best in the county so we had high standards to live up to. However, we were struggling financially- jobs were good but wage not brilliant and no career progression. So I applied for a couple of jobs in various locations around the country. But whilst waiting for the application process I looked at school options and there were no decent schools that would accept them- all ofsted 4s and the reports were awful. We also would ave struggled to get them in the same school. We were living an hour away from work adn we thought it may improve our circumstances if we moved closer and lost a car but again only schools that were out of the town could accept them and none could take both. So we were stuck where we were even if we did accept a poor school there was no way of getting them to 2 different ones. I know that the applications for Primary are Dec/Jan with the results being announced Mar/Apr. If you move into the area or know you are moving into the area they will not accept an application until you have a rental lease or a contract of sale on a property. If you call them to say you are moving they will say that you apply in your current area and then the councils will arrange the transfer of paperwork- that way it is not treated as a late application unless the announcement date has passed. But obviously as you are not in the UK you can't apply in your current area. They may have an option but in all honesty I don't suspect they will. After all they will look at is as we have left the system. The school system is so over crowded there that there isn't really an alternative. Hope you prove me wrong.

They've already been dispatched but could give it a shot

Oh no :-( thanks. Was hoping they'd take them back to depot.

Hi. Not a n Oz problem but I thought one of you may have had a similar problem and know the answer. It's my besties birthday today so ordered her fav flowers ftom M&S to be delivered. But found out this morning she'll be leaving on holiday in the early hours for a week. Does anyone know what they do with flowers if they can't be delivered. I'm hoping a neighbour doesn't take the parcel.:GEEK:

We managed to set ourselves up pretty easy second hand (Sydney though not Perth) we shipped our good stuff and sentimentals. But bought beds, sofas, washing machine, fridge. We got kitchenware, cookware, plates and cups etc from Target/Kmart for really cheap. It's not great stuff but it works. We did the move on the budget so I 'm just demonstarting it's possible. We were 8 weeks without our stuff and it would have been pointless to ship the beds and sofas as we would have had to managed for too long without. We did ship our double as we had not long bought a new memory foam matress and had heard bed sizes differ. So we bought a nice 2nd hand sofa and sofa bed and survived on that. Was so please to see my bed!!!!

Yes you have 3 months to do so. I did it the other week, really easy. Simple form- both parts of license, tenancy agreement, passport and voila. I have heard contrasting reports that they are meant to keep our UK license and notify DVLA but they didn't want to know. I got to keep UK license too. Not sure how that works back home. n theory I could get fined 1000GBP as I haven' told them of a change of address>>

How does that work?:confused: seems a bit insane........oh sorry this is Aussie beaurocracy of course it is lol:biggrin:

Yeah defo will be checking it- my understanding is that the companies who offer greenslip also offer fully comp including it- but until I get it from the horses mouth lol

I was going to get my hubby to call up re car insurance tomorrow so hopefully they should be able to help. Just time limited so don't want to waste it if someone happens to know the answer. But yes worst case we'll run down to RMS Thanks

Hi, I know car rego insurance is a little different in NSW. We need to renew our rego later this month and have a few queries that I hope you can help us with. The car is owned (officially) by my husband. The rego and Greenslip are all in his name. I am about to go and do the pink slip- which I suspect just applies to the car so won't be in a specific name. But we are thinking of upping our insurance to fully comprehensive that includes the greenslip. I have the no claims discount as I have consistently owned a car- about 9 years now in total but all UK based. Hubby has 3 years I think UK based. Therefore if they'll accept either it would make more sense to have the insurance policy in my name. But I'm wondering how that works with the car in his name and whether the rego needs to be done in my name also? Do we need to transfer ownership or will it not matter as long as there are policies that cover us both? TIA

ooh and another thing (I sound like i'm doing a sales pitch lol) but securing a rental , certainly in Mortdale, was easy. Less so in Oatley. We had a short term rental which we paid 3 months in advance so secured quite easily. Sadly they decided it was more short term than they originally said and we were left with no real work lined up no advance rent and trying to find a place. We applied for a few large houses- 4 beds $670 region and got turned down cos everyone wanted them. But first unit we applied for we got. Nicely fitted and freshly painted as I said for $510 pw. But I have since found out the two for rent in this block had been vacant for a few months and another I looked at that was over priced is still vacant 2 months on! The opens were busy but noone was really applying. I believe the north shore is a bit of a scrabble for places.

Just checked trains and it would be either redfern or central you would need. Both on the same line (Mortdale is the stop beside Oatley on the same line) For me to walk to the station from a good way across Mortdale is about 5 mins. There isn't much more beyond me before you turn into Peakhurst- and when I was in Oatley I would have to allow 10 mins to walk to the station and I was at the extreme of Oatley. Some of Oatley West ma take 15 mins- but then you can find you are a closer to Mortdale station then anyway. If that makes sense! They are every 10 mins approx at that time in the morning s0 8.17 gets you to Redfern 8.39 8.27 train gets you into Redfern at 8.49 and the 8.37 at 8.59 etc.Central is only a few minutes further than Redfern. I will be commuting to Kings Cross and I can allow myself an hour door to door but train site says 55 mins allowing 15 mins to walk to the station! I won't take that long! Hope that helps

We've been in Sydney 3 months and whilst there is no denying that that wage is low and will be tough to live on, from our experience it's not impossible to live in Oz on a budget- if you are realistic. For the first 6 weeks we had our savings and my husband working 2 days a week on $20 ph. Now he works 38 hours and earns $52K but we can survive with just the basics. Rent $510 pw Petrol $40 pw Train $40pw Food $200-250pw Broadband/Phone/ $110p/m Elec $80p/m Gas $30p/m and that's the lot for us at the moment apart from phone credit We get $400 per fortnight for family assistance/ rent etc (based on both me and my husband earning at some point this year) and we pay for my youngest daughter to go to pre-school 2 days a week which is about $200 per fortnight. Personally we have found Oz so much cheaper than where we were in the UK. We compare #of hours worked in each country to buy the product and Oz always wins. If you are confident of an increase in time then I would say you'll sirvive with savings to help for your extras and 6 months passes sooner than you'll realise- but make sure you have a back up fund if needed.