Job transfer to London

Parent Cafe
1

<p>My daughter has been offered a transfer to her company’s London office and most likely will accept. She has a list of questions and concerns, but also asked her father and me what we thought. While excited for her, my mind was running through all a move would entail. Her company takes care of all visa and work related paperwork, so that is a big relief.</p>

<p>As she travels international for work now monthly, living in London will not be a big change for her. She also studied abroad in Spain, so again living in another country isn’t a big deal. </p>

<p>I am looking for ideas and suggestion for moving and finding housing in London. I don’t know if it matters, but she would move in June of this year and the Olympics are this July in London. I am thinking housing might be a bit difficult to find as anything that had availability might rent for the summer for all the media and such during the Olympics. Will she have a problem leasing a place not being a local? </p>

<p>What about tax returns; I assume she would file here as well as the UK? Any tips?</p>

<p>We will have to either store her furniture and things she won’t need in London or move it to our home, a 12 hour drive away. Hopefully this will be covered in her moving expenses. Her car will also come home to us, although it is currently registered in her name in DC. Can I leave it tagged and registered there if we end up driving it here? I know a car should have the tags transferred to our state within 30 days, but she doesn’t live here, just her car will!! I will check with our DMV.</p>

<p>I would assume she wouldn’t have a problem opening a checking account in London and her credit cards should be able to stay the same. Would there be any reason to open new card in the UK, or just tell the companies she will be living in London? I think she gets her bills all emailed, so she wouldn’t have to worry about them being mailed. Guess her Costco Amex will not get as much use ;)</p>

<p>Currently her cell phone is on our family plan as it works out cheaper for all. She expenses her international usage with her company and I would assume they would continue to do that, unless they want her to have a UK phone number. She may be one of that people that carry around two phones as her US phone will be her lifeline to her family and friends her!</p>

<p>Any other words of wisdom are greatly appreciated. While my daughter will have a lot of guidance with this move, I just want to make sure we don’t miss something; since she did ask me.</p>

2

<p>It sounds like her company has some “roots” in London. Would they by chance provide her with at least temporary housing? Or do they have suggestions for lodging? </p>

<p>What a nice opportunity!</p>

3

<p>just reading the title of your post my first thought was “jealous” and I know my DD would love to live abroad. I’m sure lots of ccers will have more experience than I but I will say from my traveling I would definitely get a bank account and credit card there. Our cards don’t have the chip used in Europe. Cards with no foreign transaction fee work fine for trips but to be there all the time I would a chip card for convenience.
I would imagine she will carry two phones. DD did when she spent extended time out of the country.</p>

4

<p>Most companies who send employees overseas handle their tax returns for them. She will pay taxes in the UK and either use Form 2555 to not pay tax on it here, or get a tax credit for the UK taxes. How long will this assignment be for?</p>

<p>Housing in the UK will be expensive. I hope the company helps her out. I’m going to assume that she will need a UK cell phone. I’m also sure she can continue to use her U.S. credit cards. Wonderful that everything is online these days.</p>

<p>But what a wonderful opportunity.</p>

5

<p>For calls in Europe, definitely get a Mobile phone there. So much more efficient in both price and use.</p>

<p>For calls to here…one word…SKYPE.</p>

6

<p>When we worked in Germany we only paid German taxes, except the year my husband was paid from an American grant. As I recall we did file something that said we were overseas and paying taxes locally, and there’s some paperwork involved in making sure you can still vote. If she’s there for long enough it may be easiest just to get a local credit card as few American cards have the chip. I imagine she’d get a local cell phone. My residence overseas predates cellphones! Except for finding housing while the Olympics are going on, none of this is too difficult. We did a similar thing when we were young (spent a few years in Munich) and it was a wonderful experience. I second the Skype suggestion - it worked great when our son was in Jordan last summer.</p>

7

<p>My S has lived overseas for almost 2 years now. He kept his local bank account and uses his debit card from it for cash and uses a credit card that piggy backs on our account at times. There has been no reason to have a local card but be sure her card does not charge foreign transaction fees. He also has a local bank account to put his earnings into and can transfer between accounts as needed electronically. He has a local cell and we use Skype to keep in touch. He pays taxes in the country he is in and then files a tax return here (I file for him) that says that and then does not owe here. The logistics have been a little challenging, but not too bad. There are always other expats around to give advice in every country.</p>

8

<p>During our stint as expatriates, we weren’t required to pay federal income tax, even though we worked for an American company, because we weren’t in the US for more than 30 days. Not sure if tax laws have changed. It was worth counting the days and taking vacation time abroad to save the tax dollars…</p>

9

<p>If she is willing, it could be helpful if she gave one of you a power of attorney, including specifically a HIPPA release for medical information and insurance issues. Trying to get medical records or deal with insurance claims from overseas can be excessively painful.</p>

10

<p>I assume your daughter has run the numbers to make sure her salary will be enough to cover expenses in London? Years ago, my husband and I (both engineers) were offered the opportunity to run an engineering office in London. We were SO excited, until we found out what the company wanted to pay us. It was more than we made in Maine, but when we ran the cost-of-living comparison calculations, we knew we would have a VERY hard time making ends meet. When we explained the situation to the firm, they said they just couldn’t pay us more than they did their British engineers. We had to turn the offer down. That was hard to do, but I still think we made the right decision. I don’t think the company ever did open a branch office there.</p>

11

<p>If the assignment is longer than a year, you should consider to sell the car, so you don’t have to worry about it. There will be a small insurance to be paid on cars stored in garage as well.</p>

<p>The company should pay for the storage of her stuff in the USA, you should not take on her stuff in your house. It should be part of moving allowance.</p>

<p>I think it would be better to open checking and savings accounts in London and it would be even better to get a Euro credit card over there. If she uses any financial resources in the US while in London, including credit card, there will be an exchange risk/difference. I think its easy enough to have all the financial resources locally is a logical step. Of course, cell phones must be from local providers.</p>

<p>Congratulations and I will trade positions any day.</p>

<p>Been to London many times and I really can’t get used to the cost of everything is around 1.5 time of the US, basically you spend 1 Euro=1 Dollar.</p>

12

<p>Is her company sending her over there as an expat or as a local. As an expat, they would file her tax return, housing allowance, cost of living adjustment, and her home visit. As local she wouldn’t get any of that. If she is going as a local, she should get them to adjust her pay to take care of cost of living. It is expensive to live in London, so she needs a higher salary to make it worth her while. Everything is negotiable. Have your daughter consult an account, so she is fully aware of her tax obligation/benefit by working overseas.</p>

<p>As far as the logistic with credit cards/bank acct. We have been living overseas for the last 1.5 year. Our billing address is my parents’ address. My parents forward our mails to us once a month, if it’s really important they’ll fax/scan it for us. We have a local bank acct, but only because my firm requires us to do so and it’s free. We could have just used our US checking account without any issue. We put everything on our AmEx.</p>

<p>When D1 was in London for her job training. She unlocked her iPhone, popped in a pay as you go sim card ($25/mon) for unlimited data and local calls, I think .02/min for international calls. When she came home, she just popped in her AT&T sim card and she was good to go.</p>

<p>We have a Costo card and we could use it here.</p>

13

<p>I haven’t had a chance to talk to my daughter today as she has been in meetings all day, as well as the rest of the week. I know this has been a lot for her to take in and think about as the offer came out of the blue. While she has been traveling every month to Europe, I guess she never though they would want her to be based there as their London office is small. This offer comes at a good time as she was getting a bit burned out with all the international travel, but still loves her job. Being based in the UK will still require a good bit of travel, but some of it can be day trips; this allows her to sleep in her own bed at night!</p>

<p>The formal offer has not been handed to her yet, so she doesn’t have to give an answer yet. What is killing her is not being able to talk to her close friends at work; she is busting at the seams with excitement and can’t share with some of her closest friends.</p>

<p>Grad school keeps getting put on hold; first a nice promotion and now this offer. I know she can go to grad school at any time and maybe she could go while working in London depending on her travel schedule. I have no idea if the program she wants is even offered in London, but that is my daughter’s job to fine out.</p>

14

<p>snowball, congrats to your D. Living in London is a great opportunity, although not without its challenges. My D has been there for a few years now and loves it but, as others have mentioned, it is extremely expensive. This is one aspect of a transfer that she will really have to explore. Without an adjustment in salary and some subsidy of living costs, it will likely not be as attractive an opportunity as she might think! I hope that they’ll help her find accomodation because going in June without having that arranged is going to make it very difficult to find something until after the Olympics are over.</p>

15

<p>The time to negotiate is before she says yes.</p>

16

<p>Negotiations will absolutely be before she says yes. She has giving no indication as to whether she will take the offer other than to say she wants to see the offer on paper. From past experience with another coworker, moving expenses will be covered and income will account for the cost of living and the dollar. Whether she will be offered enough to live in an area she likes, and live like she does in DC remains to be seen.</p>

<p>Finding housing is my concern as a mother. I have heard rumors of taking months to find a place to live; not going in a weekend a finding nice housing. Hopefully her company will provide at least a month of temporary housing.</p>

17

<p>some times the company will provide housing for the duration of the assignment.</p>

18

<p>Housing is easy to find in London.</p>

<p>She might have a hard time with bank accounts thanks to a new American law- the us is demanding foreign banks hand over information on imperial citizens. Many foreign banks just don’t want the hassle.</p>

19

<p>It sounds funny to hear a couple of posters referring to themselves as “expatriates” when what they were really doing was a ‘stint’ overseas – not denouncing allegiance to their homeland – but I suppose it makes them sound more interesting/romantic, sort of like the expatriates of the “Lost Generation”. lol</p>

20

<p>leanid - that´s how my firm refers to us. It is exactly what it means that we are not denouncing our allegiance to our home country´s position. We are still technically employed by our home country, our benefits are aligned with our home country, not with the country we are secondment to. If someone is hired with a local term, that person would not be an expat, he/she will not get any of those benefits, and that person would not be “guaranteed” a job back home later on. There is nothing romantic about it. We don´t refer to ourselves as such to make ourselves sound more interesting. That´s why I asked OP if her daughter is going to be an expat or local.</p>