Foreign company opening a UK bank account.

Joben_2

Hello,

I am acting as a UK agent for a foreign company that want to open a business bank account in the UK. They are not a registered company within the UK as they will have no presence in the UK but they wish to employ staff in the UK. The difficulty is in finding a bank account, I have approached several banks and so far they have been either uninterested or confused as to their own procedures and practices. If anyone can offer me any advice on this topic it would be much appreciated.:)

1jim

How odd, why would they appoint an agent who has to resort to consumer forums to find out how to complete their role?

DCFC79

Joben wrote: »

Hello,

I am acting as a UK agent for a foreign company that want to open a business bank account in the UK. They are not a registered company within the UK as they will have no presence in the UK but they wish to employ staff in the UK. The difficulty is in finding a bank account, I have approached several banks and so far they have been either uninterested or confused as to their own procedures and practices. If anyone can offer me any advice on this topic it would be much appreciated.:)

1jim wrote: »

How odd, why would they appoint an agent who has to resort to consumer forums to find out how to complete their role?

You would think they would employ someone who had experience of this.

Joben_2

Sorry I should of made it clearer, I am not employed as their agent, I am merely in partnership with them and am trying to help them this end. In essence a friend helping another friend, so as I said, any help would be much appreciated.:)

innovate

You might get more help on the Small Biz forum but I doubt you could open a company account in any country when the company is not registered in that country. Money laundering legislation for one would stand in the way.

Atidi

Joben wrote: »

Sorry I should of made it clearer, I am not employed as their agent, I am merely in partnership with them and am trying to help them this end. In essence a friend helping another friend, so as I said, any help would be much appreciated.:)

OMG, they've actually gone into partnership with you as opposed to simply employing you? :eek:

Tell us please, what investigations did they do of you, and you of them, before you both agreed to enter into this partnership, a business that you are now even seem to refer to as a friend.

Are you getting any ringing in your ears .... because I can hear the alarm bells sounding from here!

Edit: I've just seen in your later thread here:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4830084
where you now describe what you originally described as an agent and/or partnership role now as "a friendly, non-professional capacity"
:cool:

jonesMUFCforever

Joben wrote: »

Sorry I should of made it clearer, I am not employed as their agent, I am merely in partnership with them and am trying to help them this end. In essence a friend helping another friend, so as I said, any help would be much appreciated.:)

Won't happen in any shape or form.

jimjames

Joben wrote: »

Hello,
They are not a registered company within the UK as they will have no presence in the UK but they wish to employ staff in the UK.

They WILL have a presence in the UK as they are employing staff here!

Isn't the easiest thing to setup a UK registered company to handle the transactions? If they are employing staff here then why don't they want to do that? Apart from banking issues there may also be employment law issues.

I'd suggest you advise your friend to get some professional advice as it seems you are way out of your depth here.

pmduk

If they really want an account here they'd be best organising it via their existing bank who will probably have a corresponding account here. However without UK company registration I don't think it'll happen.

Having written the above I suspect co registration elsewhere in the EU would suffice. Although without senior people from the co in the UK it will still be a problem.