Keeping US bank account when in UK

I have a question about maintaining a US bank account, and maybe a Capital One credit card too, when living in the UK.  The bank account is a joint account between me (UKC) and my USC boyfriend, and it is at a local credit union, and we also have a joint savings account at ING.  The Capital One account is my boyfriend's.

The issue is that we need to sever ties with Massachusetts when we leave, in order to avoid paying state taxes in the future.  Unfortunately my boyfriend's family all live in MA, so we can't use their address for our accounts when we leave.  Has anyone had any luck with banks accepting a foreign address for their accounts?  Or maybe we're better off just closing them.  It would just be nice to keep it open for convenience, and so that we can transfer our money when the exchange rate is optimal.

Yes, my credit union in Rhode Island happily sends statements to my UK address. It is a credit union associated with a corporation I worked for, though.

Not sure about keeping it open but
DW had an account with PNC in NJ, she was using her sister's address in Connecticut.
However, her sister moved to Vermont a year or so ago, and this last week DW realised that her card was due to expire and that the new card would have been sent to the CT (is that the right code?) address.
She phoned the bank up last night to find they've closed down the account when the card got returned to them and they had no forwarding details. Fortunately there wasn't much in the account as they couldn't reopen based upon a phone call. I think it's probably too much hassle for DW to try to get it reinstated for what is in it, just that she would have liked to maintain an account.
DW wasn't upset about it, she was quite philisophical about it saying "it's just part of her life in the US shutting down"! After 3 years she finally feels settled here.

I've still got an account with BofA. BofA had no trouble w/ an international mailing address.

Great!  Thanks for your replies, this sounds promising, much more so than I had expected.

She phoned the bank up last night to find they've closed down the account when the card got returned to them and they had no forwarding details.

Eep, you just sent me into panic mode! I needed the kick up the backside though!

I've kept my bank account open because the company I pay my student loan through will not take an over seas account. There was a problem when they tried to change my address in branch before I left and I ended up keep it at my home address. A couple of years later I'm talking to my dad and he says, 'You've got a new debit card, do you want it?' I say yes but he decides that I don't really need it anyway. Fast forward three years and I DO NEED IT! Can't get ahold of my dad of my dad due to some family problems. Good times!

I've got a checking account with Wells Fargo (was First Union, whiched merged with Wachovia which is now merged with WF)  Right before I moved to the UK I told them my new address here and now all my statements and new debit cards come to me in the UK.  Now that I don't need the paper bank statements for things like ILR, I can switch to only online statements.

BUT, if you have a retirement account, like I did, they may tell you they can no longer service it (or whatever the right term is).  This was a real pain in the butt.  I found a different bank who would (Janney Montgomery Scott), but did lose a bit of money during the transfer from Wachovia to JMS.

There are some kind of legalities of which I still don't understand, which make some banks leary of letting you keep a retirement account when you no longer reside in the US.  JMS obviously didn't have a problem with it.

I still have my account with TD Bank and they send my statements to my UK address.  I've had to contact them a few times as ever 6 months or so it seems to default to my old NY address (yeah, that's safe...).    I have to keep the US account for the same reason as Clobbersaurus - mainly student loan company that will only accept payments in $$ from a US account.

I also maintained my Capital One credit card.  They had no problem changing my address to London, but they are not allowed to send new cards overseas.  They're willing to send a new card to a third-party address in the States, but not overseas.  So in theory, they could send it to my mother and she could forward it on.  But as I now have UK credit cards, so having some emergency plastic isn't as much of an issue, I think it might be time to close the US credit card account.

Based on my experience and TykeMan's DW, I'd say it's important to monitor those accounts even if you rarely use them.  Make sure they always have a current address on file.

I can confirm bank of america is fine with switching to a uk address.

We have a Wells Fargo account after a previous bank (and I cannot remember which) closed down their overseas account options.

They have just written to us to say they are also closing their overseas address account options.

I still have my CA drivers license renewals sent to my uncle but that's once every 10 years and I can renew online, as he is not very good about remembering to send on mail!

Has anyone opened a US bank account recently while already having a mailing address in the UK? I used to have BofA before changing to (forgotten name of bank!) before Wells Fargo. But I seem to remember there was an income deposit requirement (or at least to avoid paying). We may not be able to avoid that though...

We still have some business in the US which would be really difficult without a US bank account, and we have till early November to open a new account... help!

I can confirm bank of america is fine with switching to a uk address.

Will it show your uk address on your statement, or just the envelope?

This is a great thread. I plan on keeping my US bank account(s- I have several) and at least my Capital One credit card for the time being. I figured it'd be useful to be able to make purchases (ie. having Christmas gifts shipped from amazon.com to my family) and of course the ol' student loan. I should start checking into which ones will let me have statements sent overseas. I was also planning on transferring my Teacher's retirement account to a regular bank. I hope it's not a problem!

You can still pay for things on Amazon.com with a UK credit card.

We decided to open an account with BofA but they have rejected my application (and won't tell us why unless we go into a branch in the US, which we can't do right now).

So, we went with Citibank who allow you to have a dollar and sterling account alongside one another.

So, we went with Citibank who allow you to have a dollar and sterling account alongside one another.

How easy is it to transfer money between those two accounts? Is it basic exchange rate or do they charge additional fees? Is it all listed/managed on one online banking website?

We use a small local bank here in the USA for checking/savings but need to maintain a USA account until our darn house sells so the mortgage, electricity and insurance can be paid from it. My retirement fund payout will be going in there to take care of that but once the house sells we will want to transfer the remainder and close the American accounts.

Our mortgage and credit cards are with Chase if anyone knows how easy it is to work with them? I know they will change address to UK addy but I am still trying to work out the best way to transfer money between accounts.

I've used a UK address for our accounts with BB&T as well as for my IRA and some other retirement accounts.

Major banks should not have a problem with this at all.