w_scott

Hi folks
Anyone tried before money transfer SAR between KSA and Barclays Bank PLC?


I tried transfer to various banks in EU and always they ripped me off with exchange rate and fees.

Any advice is highly appreciated.

FriendlyExpat

The following is how I do it, a major faff to set up but also very good value and once you've set it up it's super easy and I've never found anything as cheap.

- Open an US$ account in UK (HSBC will do this for free, if Barclays will let you open a US$ account, that's also fine).
- Convert your SAR to DOLLARS at your Saudi bank (at the mandatory pegged rate minus a tiny, tiny margin). Note this ONLY applies to US$, other currencies will have a big margin marked up (hence why you don't do it straight to GBP)
- Send the US dollars to your UK dollar bank account (HSBC charge $7 for receiving the funds, other banks may vary)
- Open an HSBC Global money account, and move the $ into that account (as you can send dollars for free anywhere in the world)
- Open an interractive brokers account
- Send dollars from UK to interactive brokers by transfer (free if you use the HSBC global money account) and either keep them there (earning 3.25% interest ish at the moment, if you feel like a bit of currency speculation) or use IBKR to convert to GBP at spot plus a tiny, tiny margin, and then send back to your UK bank account.

Interactive brokers is a very large US listed broker (possibly the second biggest available to retail customers) and you get the US equivalent of FSCS protection up to $250k for cash and another $250k for investments (obviously check for yourself, this is not financial advice etc.) If you do go this route, make VERY VERY sure that the money doesn't get converted at any point (e.g. if you send via HSBC, make VERY SURE not to convert the money into pounds by accident)

You can also use a specialist currency broker in the UK to receive the money directly, but typically they'll take a margin/spread/commission of at least 0.5%. Or you can also send the money direct to your bank from your Saudi bank, but expect a much higher fee for doing this (HSBC wanted to charge me £3.5k on a few hundres $'ks worth...!)

Also beware potential capital gains tax if you convert currency...

w_scott

Thanks FriendlyExpat

I noted when sending money in USD anywhere it goes first to an intermediate bank somewhere in the USA, where a commission is taken like $20. Have you ever experience the same?
If I open up an account at a broker in the UK in SAR, is it possible to send directly SAR and then convert to GBP? The idea of exchange twice means you are losing twice.

Pulaski

That is necessarily how international wires work.

A bank can only send money (a "wire") to another bank that it has an account with, and in all, or virtually all cases, this means that US dollars get sent to the US because banks around the world have accounts with one (or more) of a handful of large US banks - and the large US bank then either sends the money directly to the destination bank (large banks, say Barclays, Natwest, Lloyds, etc., typically have accounts with more than one of the large US banks that process wires), or pass the wire on to the big bank in the US that the destination bank does have an account with. For this reason almost all international USD wires pass through either Citibank, HSBC, Chase, Wells Fargo, Bank of New York, or Deutsche Bank (there are a few others but they're not major players), and sometime through two of them if necessary to make a chain from the sending bank to the receiving bank. If either you or the the recipient bank with a very small bank, then there may be an additional step in the origination or destination country, so for example if the recipient banks with a building society in the UK then the money may go to, say, Barclays, then on to the building society.

And yes, unfortunately this daisy chain arrangement can lead to fees getting deducted along the way. If you only got charged $20 then you were relatively lucky as the fee is often $35 in my experience.

w_scott

Thanks Pulaski for the information

Johnnyboy11

Transfer USD to Revolut, exchange for GBP then transfer to your Barclays account.
Tip: Make sure your Saudi bank uses the correct IBAN and BIC codes for your Revolut USD account, and send a small amount first to make sure the transfer works as intended.

w_scott

Thanks heaps

Do Saudi Banks allow transactions to Revolut?

Johnnyboy11

SABB to Revolut in USD is the default route for western expats where I work. The bank might hold the first transfer until it contacts you by phone to ask if you are dealing in cryptocurrency, then it proceeds. SABB to Interactive Brokers in USD is another good option. The key thing is to avoid the currency exchange occurring in a bank, both SABB and HSBC were skimming 3.3% on the SAR to GBP exchange last time I checked, plus various fees.

Newopps

I've found this to be a really useful thread in preparing for my move to KSA in a couple of weeks. I'm just trying to figure out the holy grail approach that will let me move funds quickly and cheaply from the Saudi account that receives my SAR salary, to a currency converter's account for low cost conversation. It seems like Friendly_Expat's HSBC route works well.

If I understand the above correctly, concensus would say that the first step is to convert SAR to USD with my local Saudi Bank. That is clear, but is any Saudi bank particularly better at that than another? I know the rate is pegged, but is this generally something that all local banks can do quickly, for minimal cost. How long does this take, is it instant and can be done in an app, or or does even this first step take a couple of days and a trip to the bank?

Next, do I then need a Saudi bank USD account to receive these USDs and from which to then remit funds to a UK USD account, or does the above SAR to USD conversation happen simultaneously as the funds are then transferred to a UK USD account?

And lastly, in terms of that interntational transfer, is there a particular pairing of banks which will expedite the USD transfer to a UK bank and not have me waiting several days for that to happen, so e.g is SABB and HSBC likely to be faster than SABB to Revolut because of HSBC's minority shareholding in SABB? How long does such a transfer take, and again, can that be done in an app? Or are other Saudi banks faster than SABB?

As always, all advice greatly received. Thanks.

chriscooke

While we're talking about banking in KSA, can you open a bank account on a business visa?

Johnnyboy11

In a word, No.
You need the Iqama, and usually a salary letter from your Employer/Sponsor.

KSAscot

Hi Johnnyboy11
Thanks for your excellent advice. Currently in KSA but moving jobs and no longer will have access to preferential broker rates. Can you confirm:
When you say transfer from SABB in USD - how do you do this online?
Can I open a Revolut account based in UK, but in USD to accept the incoming USD from SABB?

Mazza1008

Hi Scott,

How did you get on with this? Did it work for you? Any updates would be great