No return ticket to show UK Customs...HELP!
 

I am planning to travel around Europe starting in July. I am beginning in England and staying with some friends for a couple months. Also, I will be carrying a lot of cash and no bank statement. Am I going to get interrogated if I tell them I planning on staying with friends for a couple months, continuing on traveling throughout Europe and that is why I do not have a return ticket? The reason is because I do not know what country I will be leaving from. Are they also going to want to see a bank statement even though I am going to have all my cash on me? Thank you in advance!

I responded on the other thread - why are you carrying so much cash - that does look weird given the ease of finding a bank machine...

Do you have a ticket out of the UK? They dont care when you leave Europe per se - they care when you are leaving the UK - so if you show them that ticket they will likely be fine with it.

Why not bring a bank statement if you know they may ask for one...all of this with the cash makes you appear suspicious as thats not how the average person travels....

Carrying cash is very risky. Why not open a checking account and use an ATM card to get cash as you need it.

You have two problems:

1) You fit the perfect profile of someone who is planning to be an illegal immigrant: no ongoing ticket, staying with friends rather than in a hotel, no proof of financial stability - and I bet you don;t have health insurance either.

2) Carrying all of that cash is the height of foolishness - you could lose it all in a single careless moment

PLEASE put your money in your checking account, where it belongs - so you can draw on it when needed over the course of your travels. And bring the paperwork for the account with you.

If you want to play it safe buy a low-cost - and if possibly changeable - ticket out of England for a month or so after you arrive - that may help avoid any problems.

You don;t want to be turned back at the border.

You haven't said what nationality you are. If you are a non-EU citizen then a return ticket and back account won't help you in any case. That one flags up every time.

If you are carrying a load of cash, is that because you do not have a UK bank account or Bank card for drawing cash on your travels?

What you are trying to do doesn't make much sense to me, given the information you've written above. Just curious and somewhat suspicious.

On the other hand, if you have a bank account somewhere, with a Mastercard or Visa bank card you'll always be able draw cash anywhere in Europe. We have loads of ATMs. As another poster wrote buy a cheap one way ticket back into UK and you can get them for as little as £20 if you look. I once got a ticket on EasyJet Budapest to Geneva for less than 1 Swiss Franc. I kid you not. Cheap enough to throw it away if it serves the purpose.

One thing to remember when dealing with cash, an old saying probably from a movie..."a fool and his money are soon parted". Be careful. I was ripped off by a taxi driver in Istanbul last month, but then met many helpful and kind people in that very same country.

Good luck and have fun.

:)

First of all, you need to learn the difference between Immigration and Customs.

Second, only an idiot would travel around with all his worldly cash on him. The money needs to go into a bank, and you need to get an ATM card to withdraw from that bank as you need cash.

Third - no ticket home is a major red flag. Buy a cheap ticket you can change later if necessary.

In your current circumstances, you are at considerable risk.

To me, the OP description fits a profile of a terrorist, a money launderer, or somebody on most wanted list.

I don't believe you.

The days when one could backpack around Europe for multiple months-to-a-year are long over. Do a search here for "long-stay visas" and you will see you should have been planning for this much before now.

I was with a woman who lost $10,000 in traveler's checks somewhere between Heathrow and Victoria Station. They were traveler's checks, we got them back.

What would you do if it was your cash? (Sitting down and crying would be your only move and that's not going to help)

Regardless of WHAT you are trying to do carrying "lots of cash" is just plain dumb!

Waldo, me too. Smells like another troll or someone who needs a reality check.

If not a troll, perhaps they are laundering the money. And, just so you understand, many countries have a limit on the amount of cash that you can import or export from the country. Although I have a sneaking suspicion your problem will be not that - but running out of money long before the end of your trip.

So. It sounds like you closed out your bank account, taking all your savings with you to spend as you wander around Europe. You don't have much of a plan, probably spent a ridiculous amount on a one-way air ticket and obviously haven't investigated the rules regarding length of stay in England or the Schengen countries or likely any other countries in Europe.

Adios and good luck. You're going to need it. Then again, you may not make it out of Heathrow/Gatwick, but you will have learned an expensive lesson in travelling. Research, research, research.