Bureaucratic Hoops

In order to work around this catch 22 we had to pay 6 months rent up-front. Yeah, that was fun. Once you have the address secure, it’s still not that easy to get a bank account. You have to wait for a utility bill to arrive with your name on it as proof of residency. And not having a job certainly doesn’t make getting a bank account any easier. It wasn’t until the 3rd bank we went to that we were able to get an account without having an income. And even at that, it took several weeks for the account to be processed. In the mean time, setting up a phone (even a cell phone contract), for example, has to wait since you can’t do that without a bank account.

Then of course there’s lots of other fun stuff you have to do like sign up with the National Health Service, sign up for a tax ID number, and register with the local council tax office.

The old adage about how "the sun never sets on the British Empire" should be rephrased to "the sun never sets on the British bureaucracy."

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