Quote from: James-Cryptonomics on February 28, 2014, 03:10:00 PM

Quote from: Vortuarackne on February 28, 2014, 02:49:59 PM

I dont know what you are trying to do but you could try speaking to GigaTux, he has a registered UK business trading BTCBTCBTC so may be able to offer advise... Unless you would be competing with him Grin

OK. I ~~want~~ need a bank account in the UK that my customers can send money over too, so I can sell BTC. That simple really.

What I am trying to achieve here is more though. I would like to get UK bitcoin users to start discussing our predicament and get a little better organised. As original stated I'm not asking for much. I have no problems in doing the donkey work - just I will need limited support.

My current ideas are:

send an open letter to a basket of MP's - asking when politicians are going to have an open debate about the subject like we have seen in other western countries.
put more pressure on HMRC to confirm their classification of BTC
start an e-democracy petition - which if recieves 100,000 signatures politicians will be forced to discuss.
send an open-letter to the banks from a confederation of BTC business owners, demanding explanations towards there current stance on bitcoin

These are just preliminary ideas, but it would be useful to have a group of people who don't mind signing things, forwarding emails, discussing ideas etc.

HI,

I appreciate you're looking for practical solutions.

Let me make a few points though:

(1) All UK banks are extensions of the government, even if they are not directly owned by the government. AT some point then, even if not immediately, they will have to accept the government's line on bitcoin.

(2) For this reason, I think your best approach is to start at the government level not the bank level

(3) I would follow up by suggesting you meet the bitcoin group of supporters, based in London. There is a meetup group called Bitcoin London, I would suggest maybe talking to them in order to organize a collective effort.

(4) Finally - I would say that it will require huge action to get a UK bank to operate with a bitcoin exchange . Why ? Because it needs change at the government level, and that is not forthcoming right now.

Im not saying its impossible, but it is going to be quite a task.

Honestly, if I ws you ? Just buy bitcoin and hold. The time will come when the government is forced to take bitcoin seriously. Until then, it will continue to be hard to operate a bitcoin-related venture in the UK.

PS. in the interm, I appreciate that means it's perhaps more difficult than it needs to be to acquire bitcoins. However, at least you can (still) buy them.