So wait, I work all week, then the bank will treat me as a potential criminal and some financial parasite will suck off 20% of my salary as a consequence? And the people I worked with just shrugged it off. Except, they said it wasn't a big deal: you just go to a shop, give them the check and they give you 80% of your salary. I couldn't believe what they were telling me, so I asked the people I worked with who confirmed it.
It was one of those things when I first got to the UK that I just couldn't comprehend.Īnother one: when I got my first check from my job at the time (working at a warehouse) I went to the bank to collect it and the bank said I had to wait for a week to make sure the check wouldn't bounce and I think to ensure I wasn't money laundering. Do you know how common this is in London, or the rest of the UK, nowadays?Īt the time I had found it at the very least a huge hassle. Some friends of mine who lived in London had an electricity meter that they had to recharge with cards they got from the corner shop.
If you had one of the coin ops, chances are your electric and gas were on coin operated meters too - with the landlord of your flat or bedsit setting their own markup on that meter.
