Banking

The Story of that Overseas Check(s)

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Apparently one of my US banks made some error in interest calculations or something. I know this because they sent me what as of this writing is 4 separate checks with an explication. Each check has been for well under $2. Two of them for under 10 cents each.

This is noteworthy because they sent paper checks instead of just direct depositing money back into my account. This is of course a bank i still do business with. The biggest reason for calling this out is that the postage for each of these checks was $1.30 since they were sent internationally. None of the checks were worth more than the postage it cost to send them. That is funny as is. When one of them is 4 cents it gets into bonkers territory.

To Keep or Cancel the Apple Card

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When I moved my Apple ID to the United Kingdom I was prepared for the fact that Apple Cash as well as my Apple Card would stop working, or need to be canceled. I know that the Apple Card was only available to those in the US. I remember when I tried to sign up for it using my US Apple ID and the region on my phone was set to the UK it did not even work. I assumed then that the card would simply either not work or I would get forced to cancel it after switching my entire ID to be associated to the UK.

Knowing that I would likely run into issues I figured I’d be proactive and simply call to cancel the card before it became a sort of challenge. One afternoon right after switching my Apple ID to the UK I called Apple. I spent about 30 minutes on hold. Then I spoke to someone and got bounced around from person to person. Finally got someone that said they could actually help me. It turns out they themselves could not help me since in order to cancel an Apple Card a Goldman Sachs supervisor needs to do it. So I spent some more time on hold. In the end it was their own customer service representatives asking me if I wanted to keep the card. They knew that I had moved to the UK. I was confused however they said as long as I had any address I could use in the US, I can keep the card. They asked me if I had any families address? They said the only real reason I needed a US address is in case I need a replacement card or statements sent to me in an emergency. We still have plenty of friends and family in the states that will be happy to do that for us. I decided to just keep the card if that was the company issue I got its attitude. I decided to continue using the address I previously given Apple/Goldman and make no change.

I was surprised that Apple (Goldman) prodding me to keep the card. It did feel like they were pushing me to avoid canceling. It wasn’t very forceful however under the circumstances I thought it was a no-brainer that they would want me not to have the card. Retrospectively a friend suggested that in the current climate of Covid-19 they probably want to keep as many cards that are in good standing as possible. And I was in good standing.

I then thought maybe there’d be some weird technical issue with using or having the card on my phone. I had already removed it from my iPhone before I called. I then tried to add the card back to my iPhone and I was surprised when there was absolutely no issue in doing so.

I thought the byproduct of moving my Apple ID to the UK would be losing this Apple card however for now it’s business as usual with it. I assumed the same would be apparent for Apple Cash. I am pleased with the outcome even though I’m not sure what systems have interdependencies where they will flag an anomaly with my setup.

Wait, The Money is Different Sizes in England?

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One of things that turns out to be way more complicated than you would think when planning to move to another country is banking. Before agreeing to go to England we did a lot of research on what it would take. One of the big challenges everyone flagged was getting a bank account. Apparently the Catch-22 is you need to be there to get a bank account in most circumstances. To be there you need money to live. That’s hard without a bank account. Most banks want a local address before you can open an account however most places you want to rent from want a bank account. See the challenge here?

Other things that I’m trying to be smart about is keeping our US presence while were gone.

Then of course there’s the whole thing of English money might not fit in my wallet since it’s different sizes. It’s never a good sign when the company that makes the wall that I own “Bellroy” has a specific line of wallet they market to the UK. That makes me feel like what I own now isn’t going to really work. I might get lucky and maybe everything will be NFC payment. It might be better than the US but that’s wishful thinking.