Jo Cousins

How are people getting their savings across to Oz? Jolyn (who has been v.v. helpful) suggested using Halewood – a currency broker, but I was just wondering what other people were doing as well. I am planning on setting up an online HSBC account next month and then an ING Direct for my savings.

sundarize

We were going to pay cash into our Commonwealth account in London and convert it to AU$ on transfer to our account in Adelaide.

How much better is a deal with Halewood?

arlene

have i missed something, savings, what are they

i wish!!

arlene

keith (UK)

I'm just intending to do a straight transfer between my First Direct account here and my HSBC Online Savings Account in Australia.

They charge £10 to send it from here as a foriegn priority payment in AUD$, and $10 to receive it in Oz.

The exchange rate offered by First Direct is quite close to the rate published on www.xe.com, so it looks ok to me!

Keith.

Ben.M

The brokers such as Halewood and Currencies Direct *should* be able to give you a better rate than the banks but it is definitely worth shopping around and getting quotes from them all on the day. Once you register with Halewood you can see the quoted rates online and watch them as they get updated every 10 seconds.

Depending on how much you're transferring, a few points difference could pay for your shipping and flights!

I just opened an ING Direct account last week to pay the proceeds of my house sale into. 4.3% gross is a good rate but it's probably because it's new. I'm sure it will be reduced shortly, probably to around the 3.85% to bring it in line with Cahoot. The only downside is that you're supposed to be UK resident to keep the account open but as long as you have a UK current account and an address in the UK they'll be none the wiser. At the end of the tax year you can submit a form R105 to the taxman to reclaim the tax paid on your interest.

Ben

dracupg

Agreed. Don’t concentrate on the charge for the transfer. Look at the exchange rate being offered. We used http://www.ozforex.com.au/ and found them really good. Can do everything over the Internet from wherever you happen to be. Changed my current account in the UK to smile, which is an Internet bank, which I found pretty useful too. Its amazing how difficult and time consuming it is to tie up all the UK financial lose ends. Use the Commonwealth Bank for my cheque account and ING for my savings. Wouldn't really recommend the Commonwealth Bank, I think they are all much of a muchness though.