Coming as an International

Con­grat­u­la­tions! You made it to Cam­bridge. If you are an inter­na­tion­al stu­dent, mov­ing to a new coun­try can be daunt­ing. Please check out this page and the links in it to help you set­tle into the UK a bit more eas­i­ly.

Before you start, read the Inter­na­tion­al Stu­dent Guide for Pre-arrival and ori­en­ta­tion infor­ma­tion: https://www.internationalstudents.cam.ac.uk/files/international_student_guide.pdf

Things to organ­ise in advance:

  • Visa (if required) — find out what types of visa exist and which you need through the Visa Advice depart­ment in the Inter­na­tion­al Stu­dent Office: https://www.internationalstudents.cam.ac.uk/immigration/visa-advice
  • Accom­mo­da­tion: Cor­pus offers post­grad­u­ate accom­mo­da­tion to all first years (you should have been con­tact­ed about this pri­or to your arrival), so no need to wor­ry about find­ing a place to live. If you choose to live out­side of Col­lege Acco­mo­da­tion, the Acco­mo­da­tion Ser­vice can help you find a place: https://www.accommodation.cam.ac.uk/

Things to organ­ise when you arrive:

  • Bank account: most big UK banks have branch­es in Cam­bridge, and you can vis­it them when you arrive to set up a bank account. They are used to pro­cess­ing many requests at the start of the aca­d­e­m­ic year. Exam­ples are: Bar­clays, HSBC, Lloyds, Metro Bank, NatWest, San­tander and TSB. Check the Inter­na­tion­al Student’s guide (link above) for more infor­ma­tion on where to find them. Often you will need to bring the fol­low­ing doc­u­ments: your pass­port, UK visa (if applic­a­ble), and a let­ter from your Col­lege.
  • Health care & GP reg­is­tra­tion: health care in the UK is pro­vid­ed free of charge by the Nation­al Health Ser­vice (NHS) or through pri­vate health care for which you will need to pay. The NHS is free to use for EEA and Swiss nation­als as long as you have an Euro­pean Health Insur­ance Card, where­as Tier 4 stu­dents com­ing to the UK for 6 months or longer will need to pay an immi­gra­tion health sur­charge as part of their visa appli­ca­tion fee. Upon arrival, you should imme­di­ate­ly reg­is­ter with a GP: most Cor­pus stu­dents reg­is­ter either with Newn­ham Walk Surgery (https://www.newnhamwalksurgery.nhs.uk/) or the Trump­ing­ton Street Med­ical Prac­tice (http://www.trumpingtonstreetmedicalpractice.co.uk/). Find more info here: https://www.internationalstudents.cam.ac.uk/arriving/healthcare-uk

Use­ful tips:

  • Super­mar­kets: the main super­mar­kets in the UK are Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Coop, Wait­rose and M&S. The largest super­mar­kets in town are Sainsbury’s on Sid­ney Street and M&S on Mar­ket Square (near Cor­pus Old House), but there are small­er shops near­er to the sta­tion (Sains­bury Local on Regent Street, Tesco and Coop on Hills Road) and near Leck­hamp­ton (Coop on Bar­ton Road).
  • Eat­ing & drink­ing — Lunch: In the UK it is as nor­mal to buy lunch as it is to bring it your­self. If you are based in town, it is easy to stop by Old House for a hot meal or sal­ad in Hall, or alter­na­tive­ly vis­it the Pel­i­can Bar for a sand­wich or wrap. If you pre­fer to get food else­where, shops like Pret a Manger and EAT offer a wide selec­tion of ready-to-eat lunch­es. Super­mar­kets also sell these! If you are based in town, vis­it Mar­ket Square for fresh­ly cooked (and often inter­na­tion­al!) food.
  • Eat­ing & drink­ing — Pubs: Your UK expe­ri­ence isn’t com­plete until you’ve vis­it­ed a tra­di­tion­al pub: a cosy estab­lish­ment where you can grab a drinks and usu­al­ly some food. Order a clas­sic ‘pint’, the stan­dard 568ml size in which beer and ciders are served, or try out any of the oth­er alco­holic or non-alco­holic drinks on offer: there will for sure be many! In most UK pubs (as well as cof­fee shops and lunch places), it is com­mon to order and pay at the bar — so if you are not served with­in the first ten min­utes of arriv­ing some­place it is wise to go up to the bar to place your order!
  • Tip­ping: tip­ping is not as essen­tial in the UK as it is in coun­tries like the US, but it is cus­tom­ary to leave a 10–12.5% tip when eat­ing out (espe­cial­ly in large groups). The tip or ‘ser­vice charge’ will often already be added to the bill as an ‘option­al charge’ — always check if ser­vice charge is already added before adding it your­self!
  • Trav­el with­in Cam­bridge: Most stu­dents walk or cycle as their main mode of trans­port in Cam­bridge. You can buy a bicy­cle from sev­er­al shops in Cam­bridge, at the Fresher’s Fair on Parker’s Piece in your first week, or buy one sec­ond-hand from a stu­dent that is leav­ing town. Always make sure the bike is in good con­di­tion, the price is rea­son­able and don’t for­get to reg­is­ter it with Col­lege if you intend to park it at Leck­hamp­ton! There are also bus­es and taxi ser­vices: the two main taxi com­pa­nies are Pan­ther Taxis and Cam­cab.
  • Trav­el with­in the UK: Trav­el in the UK is eas­i­est by train or bus. Excit­ing Lon­don is only a 45–50 min train ride away, and there are many oth­er excit­ing places to vis­it near­by. Con­sid­er apply­ing for a Rail Card (https://www.railcard.co.uk/) to get dis­counts. If you are under 25 you can apply for a 16–25 Rail Card, but for old­er stu­dents a let­ter from the Cor­pus Grad­u­ate Office will often suf­fice. If you pre­fer to take the bus (or ‘coach’ as they say in the UK), ser­vices like Nation­al Express offer afford­able trans­port across the coun­try too (https://www.nationalexpress.com/en).

Oth­er use­ful links: