Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

please help! i terminated my BC pension and received a lump sum cheque. my bank in UK ( HSBC) if refusing to cash it. I am under 55yrs and non-resident of Canada.
I need the money and dont know what to do! do not have a bank account in canada or returning to canada soon!

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

Contact the issuer and ask them to wire transfer.

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

they can only wire transfer within canada

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

That seems strange. Wire transfers are international . Are they confusing 'wire transfer' with 'interac online', by chance?

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

How about Tim cards then?

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

How about opening an account in a different bank?

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

Not true. Anyway, why are HSBC saying they can't cash it?

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

Most banks won't "cash" a large cheque, if you mean give you the money immediately.

But they mostly will accept the deposit of the cheque and allow you to access the money after a waiting period that can be as long as 10 days ............ thta allows them to actually get the money in their little hands!

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

I was confused by the OP saying that HSBC wouldn't cash the cheque as I often get cheques from Financial Companies which I deposit with HSBC in UK.

Scilly has highlighted that 'cashing' into immediate cash is maybe what the OP meant so I now understand why they wouldn't do that.

All cheques go thru' some sort of clearing system...here is what UK does....https://www.bis.org/cpmi/publ/d105_uk.pdf

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

I think the OP wants to access the cash right away rather than deposit it and wait for the cheque to clear. I get a pension cheque quarterly in pounds sterling which i pay into my RBC acount there is a 25 day with holding period before i can access the cash, i would presume its the same in the uk for cheques drawn on a Canadian account in $CAN. Express presentation (quick clearance) may be an option but not many banks do that these days and there is usually quite a hefty fee.

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

We've hit that waiting period before cash is available when paying in or sending cheques to banks in the UK, Australia and Canada ...... which is what made me re-read the OP and wonder if "cash" meant take out the money immediately!

Fortunately, it's never been a very large amount, and we've never been so desperate that we couldn't wait the 10 days or whatever the waiting period was.

You can understand the bank's attitude ............ what a wonderful way to get money that you don't have!! Pay in a cheque, take the money immediately, and then the cheque bounces ..... and you are thousands of miles away!!!

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

It's many years since I worked on the foreign desk at a retail bank but we regularly 'negotiated' foreign cheques. You wouldn't be able, as people have stated, to cash the cheque like a UK cheque, it would be sent through for negotiation to the foreign holding bank and would take a couple of weeks to go through the system. HTH.

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

Good luck with this. My wife and I waited two years for our 2016 tax refunds but because the the cheques were in Canadian dollars my bank here in Spain wouldn't accept them. So as advised by the CRA I returned the cheques and asked them to resubmit in euros or pay directly into our accounts. That was three months ago. This week I telephoned and was told that there was no record of them being issued or received back. Nighmare.

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

CRA can cancel the cheques, there is/was no necessity for you to return them. Best of luck, hope you get your money in the end :)

Re: Help! canadian pension= cheque for lump sum
 

CRA get a taxpayer to sign a form confirming the loss and will re issue the cheques. As far as I know CRA do not make payments in a foreign currency. There is a form for direct deposit, but it is for Canadian banks. There will likely be wire fees if you can get them to send to a foreign bank account.