Life can be so IRRITATING! It should be straight forward, but when time is against you - GREMLINS appear!
Well, what an absolute 'shit' of a day! I am trying to arrange transfer of Sterling to Euros to purchase my house in Spain. I had to provide the Transfer Agents with certain documents to prove my residence, etc. I had been advised that today would be a good day to exchange; it seems Friday, the 'moneymen' sell so the rate of exchange reduces. Firstly though, I had to prove who I was.
They required a pdf copy of my bank account statement in England, so I set to. I do online banking so, that part should be simple.....not so! Firstly, my laptop is connected to the Internet, but not the printer. My stand alone in the bedroom/workroom is attached to the printer but not the internet, its an old computer and not wifi enabled.
I detached the printer and brought it through to the laptop. I needed to do this as I am having problems with the laptop's wifi too and have it connected through a short cable which wont reach through to the bedroom/workroom! So, I connected the printer to the laptop and.....printer not recognised! I had to go online and find the driver for my printer and download that. This I did and managed to start printing off the bank statement; then, a power failure for one hour! By now, I am tearing my hair out. Finally, the power went back on and I completed the printing.
Now to scan in the document to save as a pdf which the Transfer Agency required. Guess what? The software for scanning was on the stand alone computer. So, unplug everything, reconnect the printer to the stand alone and scan in the bank statements; rocking now! Scanned in the documents, saved as pdf files onto a stick and came back through to email the said documents to the Transfer Agency.
Contacted by the Transfer Agency, not the pdf they wanted. The pdf had to be done straight from the bank's site not afterwards; otherwise, it would not be acceptable to them as I could alter the document in some way! The bank though (Lloyds), does not have that facility online so I cannot do it. What can I do? Nothing.
Proof of residence? Utility bills? Lets take proof of residence first. I have an accommodation address in England for my Bank, but nothing else. My tenancy agreement for the Cortijo I am renting here has a different postcode to the one I have been using, and had given to the Transfer Agency - out by one digit! Stupidly, I had used the town postal code and not realised that living 5 km outside of town would change the code slightly. So my only proof would be my Spanish bank account but I have not set up online banking yet, and difficult to get a bank statement in a few hours. No branch locally. No utility bills either - mobile phone on 'pay as you go', power bills sent to owner and I pay him. Scream!!!!
In the end, I sent off an email explaining my error with the postcode........and they accepted it. Yeh. Rate locked in and my sterling to euros will complete tomorrow. Phew. Thank you Excel Currency.
Moral to the story.......don't leave everything to the last minute!
I know I did this to try and wait for the best rate. However, I should have set up the account much earlier. I will know better next time, I hope?
From 'sunny' Almeria Province, Spain 
Adios Amigos, until the next time! X
I agree with your sayings - Leaving something to the last minute is the worst! Thanks for sharing this great post, @get-baking. Easy to read and interesting.
Upvoted & Followed you as well.
Thank you so much for your kind words, and the following. I am suitably grateful for your appreciation. It goes without saying I will be following you and look forward to reading your work. Difficult to find new work without it being fed to your area. Although I do try to spend sometime on the new feed daily. X
Dang! I hope your blood pressure and overall sense of wellbeing has recovered from that marathon of misery!?
Congrats on the new house purchase! 😊(And additional well wishes for making it through the current exchange nightmare, lol!)
Thank you so much for your kind words. The last thing I have to do is get my money transferred to the agents by 2pm tomorrow. Will do it later I think. Then contact Spanish bank and check that I have online facilities working so that I can access the funds on Tuesday. So fingers crossed. X
Wow , this is like from some of my storyes - The technic hates me !
Hope you fix everyting :) About the proof of adress ......... its a big stres . I rent a hous so i dont have any bills on my name , my banc acount have me main adres but not the one where i live ............ really STRESSSS
Thanks for your reply. Not generally a problem until you come to have anything to do with money! Day 2 has been a nightmare too...I will be blogging about it later after I have recovered. My smoking levels have tripled in the last two days! X
For me it was a problem i use to trade in some sites and when i try witdrol my money i face this proof of adres thing . Spend more than a month going on institutions until got this fixed .....