short term & long term $ transfer solutions?

Hi all-

I have a headache, and it's money's fault.  I've been reading these helpful previous posts regarding the cheapest way to transfer (paypal, banks without ATM currency charges, credit cards without extra fees...) funds from US->UK, but many of the posts were 2 years old, and so I wanted to check to see what the latest methods are. 

Here's my situation:
I have a visa/debit from Wachovia which draws from my paltry US savings.  I'm planning on being added to my husband-to-be's Natwest account when I get to the UK.  How would you all suggest I access my US funds, which we'll probably need pretty soon on arrival for wedding expenses, apartment deposits, etc.? 

I'm fine with a short-term solution, like withdrawing money from the ATM or "charging" things to my visa/debit, and swallowing the fees if I need to, but if it's possible to transfer a larger amount through a US bank-to-UK bank transfer (with one set fee), then maybe that would be better than getting hit with small fees for every withdrawl?  Is a bank-bank transfer even possible (if those banks don't have any sort of "agreement")?   

Also, I leave in September.  If any bank is doing some incredible transferring/no fee deal at the moment that I should know about, I'd be so thankful for the tip so that I can sort myself out with an account before I leave.  (Does Bank of America still not charge if you withdraw from a Barclay's?) 

Thanks so much for any tips anyone can throw my way!

I really can't help you a whole lot, except that I know a lot of members on here use the XE service (if I'm not mistaken).

I can tell you that BoA still has free cash withdrawals from Barclay's ATMs!

wire transfers between bank accounts are definitely an option- pretty pricey (about $40+ to send) but if you're transferring a large amount of money and it's pretty much a one-shot deal, it's the easiest option and fast as well. I did it for my student loan money and it worked out great. As for other options... I've heard great things about xetrade on here, which is good if you're going to be transferring money regularly (like on a monthly basis, for bills and such.) 

But it sounds like you just want to get all your money over to the UK ASAP, in which case a wire transfer into your fiance's UK account is probably your best option (do it right before you leave and the money should be in the UK shortly after you arrive!)

Try this thread: http://talk.uk-yankee.com/index.php?topic=35675.0

It talks about transfering £'s to $'s but the companies mentioned do $'s to £'s conversions as well. 

XETrade works well and is probably the cheapest way to go, but it's a bit complicated to get an account set up, and the transfers are slow unless you pay for wire transfer. If you have the time to spare, it's great. For speed, a bank-to-bank wire transfer is probably the best, as andrea_m said. We did that for our first month's rent and deposit.

Besides the wire transfer fee from our US account, our UK bank charged us to receive the wire, even though they told us they wouldn't. 

For getting money in the UK will it just be alright to withdrawl most of the money from my US bank account and deposit the money in pounds into my new UK bank account?

I had a friend from the US who is now living in UK say that if your bank would issue you checks that if you sent a check to the US it was the lowest of the fees since your only charged once for the conversion of funds.