Hi,

Looking for some advice on the best way of transferring funds initially from UK bank account to Canada, and then Canada back to UK account.

I have seen various posts on here regarding moneycorp and hifx, do they both offer a similar service?

Any others anyone can recommend?

There are plenty of them around. I used moneycorp who were ok and had reasonably competitive rates. I kind of imagine that the others will all be pretty much the same given it's a fairly competitive market.

(if you know you need to transfer some back why not just keep the money in GBP rather than take the FX risk and pay the transaction costs twice)

Hi there. We used a guy called Adam Cotton of SAT Worldwide. Very helpful and no problems and have in fact used him on several occasions and will do so again.

Details are: www.satworldwide.co.uk

All the best.

I use Oanda they offer a much better rate than HiFx. In my opinion HiFx are only slightly better than M&S when transferring a large amount...

A guy from Moneycorp called me last week and asked me to use them and tbh they seem ok although I did notice at 1 stage they were offering 1.55 where as Oanda were offering 1.5512... but it all adds up at the end of the day - especially with larger amounts The guy at Moneycorp did also mention you could probably get a better rate when you call up and do a large amount

I did the copywriting for Corporate FX's website, so I know (as you do!) that they are all pretty much the same, and that you shouldn't read too much into what the blurb says. Instead, grab a good rate on the day, and make sure you like the person you deal with.
And I'd say go with personal recommendation, if you don't have anything else to go on.

I personally brought a few thousand in cash / travellers cheques and got a UK Credit Card before I left which I made sure I'd be allowed to use over here (Abbey Zero).

All the stuff I needed to buy here I then put on the UK Credit card and then paid off with my UK Bank account (there were no extra charges to do this with my particular CC deal).

When I had everything I needed I transferred the remainder from my current account into my parents UK account (online) and then got them to wire direct in to my Canadian account. I got a rate of $1.76 to the £1 at the time (the alternatives were $1.79) and no commision.

There may have been better ways but I was only dealing with about £13,000 in total so didn't have too much to worry about. Just thought I'd share how I did it.

I have been doing some research on the money transfer companies and as previously mentioned there are a lot of them out there!

Your best bet is to go on a recommendation but you should always shop around and find someone you are comfortable with. If you are transferring large amounts then it might be useful to have a single point of contact who you can build a relationship with. If you are doing smaller amounts then you might want to look for a provider where you can just do it all online.

Although most of the FX companies have lowered the minimum value they will transact to as low as £250 in some cases, unless you are exchanging more than around £2k then you wont save much by using a broker (as opposed to your bank) but you are likely to get a better service. So if service is important go for it!

It's also worth noting that the money transfer companies are now required to be FSA registered (by Nov 2010) so this is also worth checking before you decide on who to use.

Here's a list of the most common companies I have come across:

Axia FX
Currencies Direct
Currency Solutions
Ethical Currency
GCEN FX
Halo Financial
International Foreign Exchange
Mercury FX
MoneyBookers
MoneyCorp
Oanda
Orbit Remit
Rabbit FX
Smart Currency Exchange
TorFX
Travelex
UK Forex / OZ Forex
Voltrex FX
World First
XE.com

Hope this helps!

I just transferred £150k via MoneyCorp. Rates were competitive - though boy do I wish I transferred a few months ago ! - and process was very efficient.

Andy