Pensions

A French neighbour has had problems with her pension being paid into a Spanish bank account. They have said they will not do it ?

[quote="Chrisdee"]A French neighbour has had problems with her pension being paid into a Spanish bank account. They have said they will not do it ?[/qAnd theres me thinking France was in the E U

Buho wrote:If necessary use a relative's or friend's address but NEVER NEVER NEVER give up your UK sterling bank account because you never know when you might need it.

It is a criminal offence to give a false addess

Natwest and Nationwide allow expats to set up a current account in UK. Natwest requires certified copies of your passport and a utility bill plus a NI number.
Nationwide requires you to attend in person to open the account.
Problems are, I would suggest, nothing to do with Brexit. Some private pension companies won't pay into a foreign bank account due to the costs involved or possibly even the way their software is set up.
My pension (non state) comes across every month and costs me £2.10 each time. The state pension is paid with no fees.
The bloke quoted in that article has so many "coulds" and "maybes" and "perhaps" in there that I would suggest it could be discounted.
There seems to be a racking up of scare stories in the press at the moment. No planes flying, shortage of food and medicines in UK, prices shooting up and so on. I reckon most of it can be taken with a pinch of salt (no shortage of that in this area).

Not sure why some people think it is 'scaremongering'' rather than just assessment of possible outcomes. Certainly the risk of Britain crashing out of the EU without any deal is apparently looking more and more likely. Frankly that is scary ( IMO!!!) . In such a (still hopefully worst case) scenario, then overnight thousands of legal frameworks and safeguards will cease to have any validity and nobody knows what will happen next or how long it will take to get new operational frameworks in place. All responsible businesses have to do risk analyses and make contingency plans. Financial Services are flagging the risks they see and that includes that the legal framework allowing UK Firms to operate in the EU (and vice versa for EU firms operating in UK) could cease to apply. Which throws up the possibility that they might not be able to make cross border payments. I think this is to do with 'passporting rights ' and such like which allows firms to operate across the EU.

Now if they see that as one of the possible risks well certainly they need to flag that ( and if I lived in Spain in receipt of a private annuity paid direct to Spain right now I'd be very glad they have flagged it, enabling me to make contingency plans in case that happens. Like opening a UK bank account ).One would imagine things will get sorted out eventually but how long will that take ? And if you are waiting for access to your money in the meantime..., well it might be just a trifle difficult.

People talk about 'oh it was alright years ago before the EU, so it will be alright now;' they are overlooking over 40 years of law and regulations , custom and practice that has to be unravelled, in a world that is vastly different from what it was 40 years ago. Every individual will just have to cope as best they can with the uncertainty and the consequences. For some people it might feel better just to think 'it will never happen', or 'it won't make any difference .' If that works for you, fine.

Others might prefer to be aware of possible issues so they can try to prepare for them, in so far as they can do anything about them at all. For instance , making sure they have an operational UK bank account they could use if the worst happened and if there really were to be problems with cross border annuity payments.


While we are still in the EU, as an EU resident you should be able to open a UK bank account without being resident in the UK. You might have to pay fees for it and there may be a few more hoops to go through but you should be allowed to. Like you can open one in Spain without being resident or even having a Spanish address. You might have to turn up in person once for the 'identity and anti-money laundering' checks. But a quick trip to the UK could be worth it. That, of course is another of those things that is likely to no longer be possible or be very difficult once we leave the EU (i.e. opening a UK bank account as a non resident. Quick trips to the UK might also be not as quick or cheap either, but that's a different can of worms) , so if you want a UK bank account as a safeguard it might be better to do it now before we leave the EU.

For info - I found this online from the TSB re non UK EU residents opening a TSB account in the UK

https://www.tsb.co.uk/current-accounts/ ... residents/
That seems to suggest you could do it remotely. I haven't tried this myself so can't say how easy it is. Maybe someone else in the forum who has opened a UK account as a non UK resident could advise.

There are people owning properties in the EU who come from countries that are not members of the EU, how do they go on, does anyone know?

From what i have just read . If you have a U.K. State pension , and a U.K. bank account that it's being paid into - then nothing will change.

Thankfully , my U.K. State pension is paid into my U.K. bank account .

My Spanish pension is paid into Sabadell on the 25th of every month .

I think this is more to do with Private and Company pensions .
But , it's early day's yet - let's wait and see.

Why would any Brit who lives here support Brexit? It’s like Turkeys voting for an early Xmas.

Buho is right, never give up your UK sterling account.

What next, the remain voters donning sandwich boards with "The end of the world is nigh".
In the original referendum I voted not to join the Common Market, along with millions of others. I don't remember so much bleating from those of us who did not want to join, the decision was made and unfortunately, in we went.
Now, by the same process, we've voted to leave. Like it or not, we should all get behind that decision and stop undermining our government in these negotiations.