Advice for my Polish friend who came to the UK to work

hello a polish friend of mine is hoping to come over here for work- he came for a visit last year. he is 27 and is a welder-he will becoming without friends or family my family and i and friends are to help him settle in here and he will be staying with us until he is established. he is coming here as work in poland for him is difficult to get so he has told us and he is uncertain of his future. he feels he will have better job prospects here. he is sad at leaving his family but he feels he has to . he does not speak good english and although he has made this decision he is apprehensive and needs lots of reassurance. i would like to know have anyone on this forum been in his situation and how did you manage what problems did you encounter or were things better than you feared and any advise i could give him?

I would recommend he learn English. Pronto! Without that he will have a difficult time finding a good job. Even in Chicago, where many do speak Polish. It's best if he comes on a B-visa, which is a work visa, then he will be here legally, for a while at least. Did he come on a tourist visa last year? If so, he was lucky, they are hard to get. The work visa is easier and quicker to get.
But since he's been here last year, he became familiar with the US a little, so he won't have that big of a culture shock. If he feels scared, you can assure him that he can go back anytime and that many people leave their home country behind for a different life, some leaving spouses and children. He's still young. A whole life ahead of him.

???

thread title misread? :D





nevertheless, the advice to learn some english is most certainly not wrong...

What?...Where am I?...
Ok ok, disregard what I wrote, but might be useful to someone else. Someday. Maybe...?

if he does not speak english then DONT COME. I bet it will be the british taxpayer who will support his bloody family

Muppet,he is coming WITHOUT family or friends,and no,the British taxpayer does not pay for his english lessons.....

yes we DO have to pay fr this scroungers english lessons


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I agree with noimmigration, as part of local community based initiatives to integrate foreigners, we fork out to facilitate this process. I'm not saying it's wrong outright but it's done almost without question. Local govt officials, in the comfort of their offices and with a 35k salary behind them, make these decisions rather hastily. However, the flip side is that the Poles offer the same here. 30 years ago, Poland helped many black would-be doctors by issuing free lessons. It just goes to show that there are 2 sides to every story.

are you still here you vile little glaswegion ponce? Why dont you get pished and fall in the clyde,do us all a favour.

yeah but seanus, are there nearly one million black doctors in poland. In my work every polish person gets free english lessons. do you know it costs the governemnt £2000. for each pole learning english

They perceive it as companies investing in their staff. Classes are conducted by volunteers in Poland so the issue of expenses hardly rises to the fore. If black doctors are in such great demand, u should stand by ur decision and prepare them in the best way possible. Take them on board and give them the linguistic tools they need. 2000 pounds is way too steep, do u have a link to prove this?

why is there such hostility to someone wanting to improve their life chances?
will my friend be faced with this when he comes here? has any polish person now in britain who is on this forum experienced these negative attitudes?

Esol funding to focus on long-term immigrants



Immigrant children "strain school budgets"



English a minority language in 1,300 schools






the hostility appears to be towards the belief that british are expected to fund this

Angel,it is very unlikely that your friend will face this in the UK,you will find that most of these angry idiots are cowards that wouldnt say boo to a goose.
He may well face some little resentment from locals if he is percieved as "taking their job" but as his english is limited it shouldnt spoil his day :)
You will find that the vast majority of Brits dont care either way as long as someone is "a good bloke",sure,I wont lie to you,there is an under current of resentment regarding mass imigration to these shores but the chances of your mate having this expressed directly to him are slim. Send him "Oop North" we are still more laid back compared to those anal southeners :)

aye but its grim up norf

well he is actually coming up north-i have posted a thread if anyone has work for him-up north-dont think i have had any advice gona check now.

wahts grim about it?

lol,tis an old saying :)the "north" used to be the industrial heartland of,well,the world,and therfore a bit grim n smokey...
(but the weather is a bit grim tday :) )

Sun is shining Mr B so it's all good up norf :)

tell him to learn english, the only advice

He needs to learn English, that's the bottom line.

It isn't just a case of getting a job and a place to stay. He'll need a bank account and in time will be offered credit by Visa or similar if he hangs around long enough. You can't deal with these sorts of organisations without knowing the language. Sure the local council may have a few leaflets printed in other languages, but every organisation he deals with will expect him to speak English.

I work for a credit card company and the customers we have (of all shapes, sizes and backgrounds) who can't speak English very well make a rod for their own back in the long run. Apart from anything else, they often don't know what they're actually applying for or how credit cards work. This isn't because they are daft, I just think that credit cards are not part of Polish culture really so it is a steep learning curve for them.

Unfortunately, no one is going to sit down and explain it in any language other than English.

I can't believe anyone with real serious notion of trying to move to another country would do so without speaking the language of that country.

And people wonder why the British are getting so wound up by all this.

wonder how the Spannish feel then when faced with brits who have lived there for years and still shout loudly " HAVE YOU O GOT O A NICE O BOTTLE O BEER O"

BubbaWoo wrote it's grim up north, it's pretty grim down south too. Anyway, this is tit for tat. Just do ur research and think ur options through carefully. Do learn English as we are not the Dutch and will expect English to be spoken. It's just like here in Poland when I must liaise with the insurance company ZUS. I've been helped out a lot even though my Polish is reasonable enough. They don't bend. The number of times I should have received documents in English in this country and haven't is incredible. People are just making their own lives easier without thinking about legal obligations and decency