We were very organised. we opened a joint Hong Kong bank account and got credit cards before we left the UK. A few days before leaving London, I called to have my card activated. So all good? Well, not really…<\/p>\n
Nous avons \u00e9t\u00e9 tr\u00e8s organis\u00e9s\u00a0: Nous avons ouvert un compte joint \u00e0 Hong Kong et obtenu des cartes de cr\u00e9dit avant de quitter le Royaume-Uni. Quelques jours avant de quitter Londres, j’ai appel\u00e9 pour activer ma carte. Alors tout va bien? Euh non, pas vraiment…<\/em><\/p>\n When I tried using my card on our first day out, it was declined. I was surprised so I went to the bank. That was on the 7th. I realised that they had recorded my British passport and not my French passport on their record. And if you don’t show the right ID, they can’t do anything for you. Because, they can’t verify your ID otherwise. Crazy!<\/p>\n J’ai essay\u00e9 de payer avec ma carte et elle a \u00e9t\u00e9 refus\u00e9e. J’ai \u00e9t\u00e9 surprise et je suis all\u00e9e \u00e0 la banque. C’\u00e9tait le 7. Et du coup, j’ai r\u00e9alis\u00e9 qu’ils avaient enregistr\u00e9 mon passeport britannique et non mon passeport fran\u00e7ais dans mon dossier. Et si vous ne montrez pas le bon document, ils ne peuvent rien faire pour vous, car, ils ne peuvent visiblement pas v\u00e9rifier votre identit\u00e9 autrement. C\u2019est fou, non\u00a0?<\/em><\/p>\n So I came back the same day with the right passport and they were able to activate my card. But I had to wait a few days for the card to be usable.<\/p>\n Je suis donc revenue un peu plus tard avec le bon passeport et ils ont pu activer ma carte. Mais il va falloir attendre quelques jours pour que la carte soit utilisable.<\/em><\/p>\n Next hurdle, getting access to internet banking. So I came back the day after, the 8th, and asked how I can get access to Internet banking. They tell me that I just need to go online at home and everything is explained on the website. So I came back home and did that. Guess what? It wasn’t that easy. I was missing the pin for my credit card so I could not register with online banking.<\/p>\n Prochaine \u00e9tape, avoir acc\u00e8s aux services bancaires sur Internet. Je suis donc revenu le lendemain, le 8, et j’ai demand\u00e9 comment acc\u00e9der aux services bancaires par Internet. On me dit que je n\u2019ai qu\u2019\u00e0 aller en ligne \u00e0 la maison et que tout est expliqu\u00e9 sur le site Web. OK, c\u2019est facile, je peux faire \u00e7a. Et bien, non, ce n’\u00e9tait pas si facile que \u00e7a ! J\u2019ai r\u00e9alis\u00e9 qu\u2019il me fallait un code que je n\u2019avais pas.<\/em><\/p>\n I went back to the bank the following day (9th) and explained that I didn’t have a pin for my card. So they reset my pin. Hooray! I checked that I could use the ATM with my pin and then I went back home and I could register with online banking. But then I realised that I could only see the transactions I have made on my card but I couldn’t see the joint bank account or the transactions Sebastien has made on his card. So something was still not working.<\/p>\n De retour \u00e0 la banque le lendemain (le 9). Je leur ai expliqu\u00e9 que je n’avais pas de code pour ma carte. Ils ont donc r\u00e9initialis\u00e9 mon code PIN. Hourra! J’ai v\u00e9rifi\u00e9 que le code marchait \u00e0 un guichet de retrait automatique et je suis rentr\u00e9e chez moi. J’ai enfin pu m’inscrire sur internet. Je me suis alors rendue compte que je ne pouvais voir que les transactions que j’avais faites sur ma carte, mais je ne pouvais pas voir le compte joint ou les transactions que S\u00e9bastien avait effectu\u00e9es sur sa carte. Donc, quelque chose ne fonctionnait toujours pas.<\/em><\/p>\n So, what did I do? I went back to the bank (10th). I’ve only been there every day of the week… I tried to explain that I could not see the joint bank account and that my card didn’t seem to be linked to the bank account either as I wasn’t able to get cash from the account. They told me they were going to link my card to my account and that I could add my bank account myself on internet, that it was easy and well explained.<\/p>\n Alors, qu’est-ce que j’ai fait? Je suis retourn\u00e9 \u00e0 la banque (le 10)\u00a0! Ca fait juste la 5\u00e8me fois en une semaine que je vais \u00e0 la banque\u00a0! J’ai essay\u00e9 d’expliquer que je ne pouvais pas voir le compte joint et que ma carte ne semblait pas non plus \u00eatre li\u00e9e au compte joint car je ne pouvais pas retirer de l’argent du compte. Ils m’ont dit qu’ils allaient relier ma carte \u00e0 mon compte et que je pouvais ajouter moi-m\u00eame mon compte bancaire sur internet, que c’\u00e9tait facile et bien expliqu\u00e9.<\/em><\/p>\n Ok, I’m not stupid, I can do it. No, I can’t. I didn’t see anywhere where I could add my bank account number. And besides, I don’t even know my bank account number.<\/p>\n Ok, je ne suis pas stupide, je peux le faire. Gggrr, non, je n\u2019y arrive pas. Je ne vois nulle part o\u00f9 je pourrais ajouter mon num\u00e9ro de compte. Et d’ailleurs, je ne connais m\u00eame pas mon num\u00e9ro de compte\u00a0!<\/em><\/p>\n Sebastien told me that in his branch, they were very helpful and they set everything up for him in a few minutes. So either, the branch I’ve been to only has idiots or I am an idiot. It doesn’t make me feel much better about this whole situation. But I thought, I’m going to Sebastien’s branch and all will be sorted. That’s what I did on the 17th (I needed to not go to the bank for a few days to keep my sanity!). I explain to the man at the entrance what my problem is and he tells me that the expert in internet banking is in another branch on the 1st floor and I should go there. I was not happy but I went looking for the other branch. I didn’t find it. It must have been hidden somewhere because Sebastien told me it was quite big and I should have seen it. By this stage, I was really angry and the total unhelpfulness of everyone I’ve been in contact with at this bank. So I went back to the first branch and explained that I didn’t find the other branch. The man was at last ready to help me and did it for me.<\/p>\n Alleluia! I am all sorted! Er… no.<\/p>\n S\u00e9bastien m’a dit que dans son agence, ils \u00e9taient tr\u00e8s serviables et qu\u2019ils ont tout mis en place pour lui en quelques minutes. Bon alors, soit il n\u2019y a que des idiots dans l\u2019agence o\u00f9 je suis all\u00e9e, soit c\u2019est moi qui suis une idiote. Donc, je vais aller dans l\u2019agence de S\u00e9bastien, au point o\u00f9 j\u2019en suis, \u00e7a ne peut pas \u00eatre pire\u00a0! \u00c7a, c\u2019\u00e9tait le 17 (j’avais besoin de ne pas aller \u00e0 la banque pendant quelques jours pour garder ma sant\u00e9 mentale !). J’explique mon probl\u00e8me \u00e0 la personne \u00e0 l\u2019accueil et il me dit que l’expert des services internet est dans une autre agence au 1er \u00e9tage et que je devrais y aller. Je n’\u00e9tais pas tr\u00e8s contente de sa r\u00e9ponse mais j\u2019ai essay\u00e9 de trouver l’autre agence quand m\u00eame. Je ne l’ai pas trouv\u00e9e. Elle devait \u00eatre bien cach\u00e9e parce que S\u00e9bastien m’a dit qu\u2019elle \u00e9tait assez grande et que j’aurais d\u00fb la voir. L\u00e0, je dois dire que la moutarde \u00e9tait bien mont\u00e9e au nez\u00a0! Ras le bol de tous ces gens qui ne peuvent m\u00eame pas aider dans cette banque. Je suis donc retourn\u00e9e \u00e0 l\u2019agence indiqu\u00e9e par S\u00e9bastien et expliqu\u00e9 que je n\u2019avais pas trouv\u00e9 l\u2019autre agence. J\u2019ai enfin pu \u00eatre aid\u00e9e et mon compte a \u00e9t\u00e9 ajout\u00e9 sur internet.<\/em><\/p>\n All\u00e9luia! Maintenant, tout est bon ! Euh non\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n Now, I can see the bank account, but I still can’t use it. I cannot transfer money from it. So I will have to go back again. This time, I’ll go with Sebastien and I will let him do the talking!<\/p>\n Maintenant, je peux voir le compte joint, mais je ne peux toujours pas l’utiliser. Je ne peux pas transf\u00e9rer d’argent. Je vais donc devoir y retourner. Cette fois, j’irai avec S\u00e9bastien et je le laisserai parler !<\/em><\/p>\n I know it was nearly 20 years ago, but when I first arrived in London and set up my account and credit card with Natwest, I just logged in to internet banking and all was there for me. I didn’t have to add anything manually. Just saying…<\/p>\n Je sais que c’\u00e9tait il y a pr\u00e8s de 20 ans, mais lorsque je suis arriv\u00e9e \u00e0 Londres pour la premi\u00e8re fois et que j\u2019ai ouvert un compte et obtenu une carte de cr\u00e9dit avec Natwest, je me suis connect\u00e9 \u00e0 Internet et tout \u00e9tait l\u00e0 pour moi. Je n’ai pas eu \u00e0 ajouter quoi que ce soit…<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" We were very organised. we opened a joint Hong Kong bank account and got credit cards before we left the[…]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":255,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"template-fullwidth.php","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-99","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=99"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/99\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=99"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=99"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sebetanne.co.uk\/hkblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=99"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}