madsad

My mate's missus is a bank manageress and she has offered to transfer our money for us thus waiving the bank charge and meaning she can keep an eye on it for us. (she works for same bank our accounts are held with)

i am not i financial expert does this mean we will end up with a poorer exchange rate?

Any advice/thoughts much appreciated.

Malcolm.

Fiona&malc

Hi Malcolm,
usually you get a better rate if your are transferring through the bank..you normally get a higher rate than the one you would get if you were only buying foreign currency or travellers cheques from them, but your friends wife will be able to tell you what rate the funds would be sent at as she would need to call the treasury dept in the bank to 'book' a rate for you. first. Before you go ahead wth that though, its probably worth comparing the rate with a currency broker such as HIFX first before you make your final decision..

hope that helps you

fiona

parkhigh

Hi Malcolm
Definately check out comparison rates with currency traders first. A difference of a few cents on alot of money can make quite a lot of difference. The advantage would be that your friend would be keeping an eye on your money.

Further to my thread earlier about currency traders, I spent alot of the day ringing around getting quotes. hifx originally quoted me 2.51 for 100k and i ended up with 2.5432 for a 2 month forward contract with the possibility of a rollover if house sell goes bellyup so i think i got a good deal. I kept going back to hifx stating what the others were quoting including elynchfx.com and they beat them too. Alot of thanks to a particular trader i hasten to add. he was very pleasant and when I need to change some more i will definately go back to them. If anyone wants to know particulars please pm me and I will let you know name and extn nbr. i did say i would post a positive post about hifx as they have had a few poor ones lately.

Anyway we are both pleased because I think its a good rate and in comparison to recent times it will make a big difference.
Anyway I hope this may provide some help to you.
Irene

Bunny007

Hi,
Please, please will you pm me with all your highly secret information! I need all the help I can get with transfering money as am a bit hopeless.

Rgds Bunny

Kiwipaul

I've always used banks to transfer money and a couple of weeks ago I decided to try Tranzfer but couldn't get it set up in time so I used National bank (NZ) to transfer money to Oz. On checking what rate I got from tranzfer against what I got from National the difference was only 0.25% in Transfers favour, so on a $NZ1000,000 transfer I'd have only got an extra $250. Also National charged me $25 for IMT and Tranzfer would have charged $15.

The pain with using Banks is that they need the request in writing on one of their forms so i had to download a form fill it in and then fax it back to them (a real pain).

The beauty about tranzfer and HIFX is that once the account is set up you can do it all by the internet, the pain is setting it up in the first place.

Wished I had waited now as the exchage rate has improved by 3c since I did the transfer

ABCDiamond

When I moved funds over, I did it using the Manager at HSBC, who gave me the best rates he could do, (about 6 points higher than the tourist rate, if I remember correctly) and I am sure it was as good as any of the other options available at the time.

Having a "relationship" with a Manager, could be a useful benefit.

Ghostface

Cheers ABC, the fact she can keep an eye on the money is what appeals to me.

OwenT

As I have mentioned previously, I work in fx for emigration.

Like most areas, competition is the main driving force for banks to improve their offerings to their clients.

In your case, you have the added advantage of a personal interest by your bank.

A has previously been mentioned, look at alternative fx providers as the charge you describe will probably be the £30-£50 transfer charge. If the banks rate of exchange was poor in comparison to the market, the saving may be miniscule compared to the loss on the fx rate.

parkhigh

hello geordie georg and kakadu chris have sent you a pm as requested.
cheers
Irene