Feb 15 2009
Experience of the Commonwealth Bank’s Expatriate Account
It was easy to open the Commonwealth Bank account before moving to Australia. We visited the Commonwealth Bank’s branch in London with all the required paperwork. If I remember rightly, we had to bring our passports and two other forms of ID. We met our account manager and she went through all of the paperwork with us.
I think that you can also do the paperwork by post, if it is not convenient for you to visit the Commonwealth Bank’s London branch.
We were told that it takes 3-4 working days for funds to be transferred from your holding account at the Commonwealth Bank in London to your Australian bank account (with the Commonwealth Bank). You also have to allow an extra working day or so for the funds to be transferred from your UK bank account into the holding account.
The first time that we transferred money in this way, I transferred funds from my UK bank account on the Monday and they were in our Australian bank account by that Thursday, so it took about 2 working days for the funds to be transferred from the holding account to the Australian account.
The second time we transferred money using this method, it took a little longer - 5 working days from the day on which I transferred the money from our UK account to the day on which the money was received in our Australian account.
Both times, we were charged just fifteen pounds sterling for each transaction and the currency was converted at the exchange rate of the day on which the money was transferred. It would have cost us a lot more if we had used another method to transfer the money.
Since then, we haven’t used the holding account as we have few funds left in the UK. It is nice to know, though, that the facility is there, if we ever need it in the future.
You can find out more about this account here. Please note that this review is based solely upon my personal experience and that I have not been paid for this review.
We had the same experience opening with the Commonwealth from New Zealand - did all via email - then called to get the a/c no. I transferred the cash via internet banking a few days before we left home. We arrived in Brisbane with an appointment the next day to pick up all the cards etc. Very simple to do compared to everything else you do in Australia which seems to require an address - try getting a drivers licence without one! You need a bit of creativity sometimes!
Hi Lis - I didn’t know that you could open a Commonwealth bank account from New Zealand - I guess the bank tries to attract expats in the countries in which it has branches. I agree - it is straightforward compared with a lot of other things in Australia, although sometimes I find that things seem complicated on paper and they are less so in practice!