Thanks everyone for the suggestions. Please keep any coming.
Have you checked with the State Department?
I assume that they can tell you what your options are. Their employee credit union issues chip and pin credit cards, fwiw.
We are waiting to get info from the Management Officer at the embassy. On vacation right now. We do know there is a standard bank that everyone uses locally.
For phones, I am more likely to switch to a Swiss local plan and try to forward calls to my existing number to Skype. I generally don’t like when people call me…
Are you taking Cellar Tracker with you Eric? Do you get to fly on AF1? or #2? Wow what an adventure, enjoy it immensely - i know I would. What a great base for exploring Europe with no jet lag worries. I would be on a train/plane every weekend. I guess your leaving the majority of your cellar behind as well?
Eric,
You should be able to take advantage of USAA now. Give them a call and see what your options are.
So who’s watching your wine while you are gone?
Best part of all…
Hello Eric,
I moved to basel, Switzerland for work in January from New Jersey. I went with Swisscom for a local cell phone, UPC cable com for fast internet. I’m pretty sure you can buy a samsung galaxy s4 with a dual sim although I just stick to the one Swiss. Google hangouts is great for free phone and video calls back to the states. UBS is one of the few places that would open a bank account for an American(and I had to go to a specific branch!). They wouldn’t even talk to my wife who was with me because she did not have a Swiss residence permit yet. You can open two checking accounts, one in chf and one in usd. This way you send usd to usd and don’t get surprised by poor exchange rates in the middle. See if your existing credit cards will give you a new card with a chip and pin as that is by far the norm here. Some places don’t even have a swipe available for cards with no chip. Feel free to reach out if I can help answer any other general questions.
Regards,
Brian
Eric,
I live in Geneva and am in Bern very often. Finally a chance to share some Chateauneuf 
We should discuss what you need, I know a bunch of Americans here and everybody has a different setup. Maybe we can do a Skype call or something like that? Any sense of the the timing?
Cheers
Christian
Do not invest any money in foreign mutual funds - and if you are forced to file taxes in both countries then you should hire a very experienced tax advisor, who may tell you to sell you US mutual funds as well. The US and most European countries charge punitive tax rates on foreign mutual funds.
Cheers, I look forward to it!
I will be visiting for a week starting June 2nd when my wife moves over. The kids and I will then return to Seattle to finish up school and final packing. We will then move on June 27th. Once we are settled, I would love to get together!
If you want to keep a US credit card- Recommend the Chase Saphire Preferred. high annual fee, but has no foreign transaction fees. However you will likely want to get a European credit card with Pin # so you don’t have to keep annoying folks by having to sign.
More importantly, how do you move the wine over?
The diplomatic pouch works well for some at a time but I’m pretty sure the Embassy secures wines for diplomatic dinners out of what I suspect is a decent budget. The LeVines are going to have one great adventure in the years ahead and their children will hopefully share in all those future adventures.
That’s a new feature in CT: Virtual Wine Shipping. You create a new cellar location called say “Switzerland”, then move the wine in CT. The wine is automatically transported from one cellar to the other using this new technology that Eric has developed. Of course, it’s only in beta:
As far as I can tell, the budget is actually not that decent. However, if I move wine there for the personal use of the Ambassador, there is a process to use that at events at our own expense (it may differ based on whether it is an official or unofficial event). Needless to say, I want us to pour interesting American wines at our embassy events that would still appeal to a palate that is most accustomed to old world wines.
As far as getting wine there, I am working with an expediter here in the US who is working with a agent in Switzerland who will be working with the Embassy to do all of this in totally proper fashion.
If he had half a brain he’d leave his Quilceda Creek home, serving that crap would damage relations in a hurry.
Apparently I do not have half a brain. I do have Quilceda Creek in my collection (and SQN and lots of others). Those are all “interesting” wines, but I do expect that all of those would be rather jarring to someone who is used to drinking old world wines. However, anyone who knows me is likely to have a good idea of the American AFWE wines that I would find interesting and would like to share with our friends across the pond as a typical set of “house wines” for us to use regularly.
Just curious, who’s paying for the shipping of your wines to Switzerland?
Me. The relocation package is simply not appropriate for wine, so I am handling that myself.
The concept is really pretty simple. If I want to pour better wine, I am welcome to do that at my own expense. That includes buying the wine and transporting it.
Cool, as a taxpayer I’d hate to see your wine listed as personal items.