atlasthemonk

On reading previous posts, many here have used wise.com to transfer money from UK to Portugal. I checked the padlock on wise.com, gave my name, UK address date of birth, PT phone number and clicked continue. My name address and recipient iban number and a button to continue appeared BUT I hadnt given any bank account details and the iban shown started DE (assuming Germany). I am a tecknophobe and this freaks me out. Anyone experienced this ?

Alan PT

Maybe your browsers autofill entered the last details you used? You'll find it under Settings, Autofill in Chrome

Wise used to use a DE account for Euros, but they have now changed to a BE account

RichardHenshall

If you are transferring directly from your UK sterling account to your Portuguese euro account through Wise, those are the only account details you need apart from the GB account Wise will have you send your Sterling to. If you are adding funds to hold in your Wise Borderless (multi-currency account) you would normally transfer Stg to Wise's GB IBAN to hold in so that you can then choose the moment to convert the currency to euros. If you have chosen to transfer into a euro balance at Wise you will be given a BE IBAN but you would normally do that from a euro denominated account.

Wise may be confused about which direction you are sending funds (UK address & PT phone), so make sure you have the origin and destination accounts the right way round.

You need to ensure that you don't end up transferring from your UK Sterling account to a Wise euro account, as in that case it will be your bank's exchange rate & fees rather than the much better Wise rates & fees that are used.

Loafing Along

If you use a UK Debit Card to transfer sterling to your Wise Borderless Account ( BE IBAN ) the Wise fee is slightly higher ( you can see the option on their dropdown menu when you start the transfer ) but the exchange rate is the Wise rate and the service is almost instantaneous .

RichardHenshall

Fair comment, I've never used a debit card for this purpose (I was referring to bank transfers) but in your scenario the Sterling payment is collected by Wise and they obviously handle the rest. If I was adding Sterling funds to my Wise account I would (bank) transfer it to my (Wise) GB IBAN as I still think it's better to hold the funds in Wise in the origin currency - once it has been exchanged it might as well be delivered on to the destination account (in Portugal). Or vice versa.

Loafing Along

Yes agree but I go this route as I use the Wise debit / credit card, based on BE account, a lot when travelling outside of the UK and EU and my UK bank has made it almost impossible to set up a new transferee from abroad.

RichardHenshall

Does this not potentially mean that you might add funds in GBP to the EUR account and then spend it in USD or other 3rd currency, for example, thus incurring two currency exchanges?

Loafing Along

Yes you are right but all super convenient so see that as a small price to pay.

atlasthemonk

The spending limit on a wise transaction is £10,000 when using a debit card. When buying a house that is a lot of transactions. does anyone know if their is a spending limit on bank transfer transactions / transaction or / day.
Almost all my transactions have been halted. Early on there were security issues with the bank as I don`t normally transfer these large sums but now I have no idea why they are stopping me. upper limit breach may be a possibility.

Alan PT

No limit that I'm aware of on bank transfers ("faster payments" transfers are capped at £250K though). In fact, when we bought our place it was paid 50% Wise (which went through quickly, no problem) and 50% internal Portugal bank-bank transfer (which was delayed and required a phone call and a higher payment charge to release!)

RichardHenshall

Most banks have transaction limits, though they don't always publicise them or apply the same limits to everyone. You may find lower limits apply to the sort of transactions (online/card) that could more easily be fraudulent. Furthermore, these institutions have an obligation to check the source and destination of funds for anti money laundering purposes.

I found the best thing was to speak to both to explain what I was trying to do and why time mattered. I was asked to share copies of purchase/sale contracts etc. They may be applying a squeeze to your limits because they're unsure what's going on and are trying to 'protect' you.

You may then find that you can do both card and bank transfers to each limit simultaneously or that you can make a single (CHAPS?) payment from your bank to Wise by arranging it in person.

Alan PT

Found a list which gives some rough guidance, seems that different banks take a wildly different approach: https://www.fasterpayments.org.uk/ab...al-transaction

As RichardHenshall says, best thing is to talk with your bank. They will likely have some manually authorised route for the rare situations where very large amounts do need to be transferred

SgtTroy

At least a while ago CGD had an excellent transfer rate (previous day ECB) for £ to € transfers.

The transfer was done in £ to CGD UK sterling account, and the next day it was credited to the respective CGD € account in Pt.

Worked fine then, no fees, the rate was the same for the whole day, so one knew exactly what one would get in €.

But those were the times when CGD still did not have any charges for account maintenance for balances of over €5,000, which is no longer the case.

SgtTroy

At least a while ago CGD had an excellent transfer rate (previous day ECB) for £ to € transfers.

The transfer was done in £ to CGD UK sterling account, and the next day it was credited to the respective CGD € account in Pt.

Worked fine then, no fees, the rate was the same for the whole day, so one knew exactly what one would get in €.

But those were the times when CGD still did not have any charges for account maintenance for balances of over €5,000, which is no longer the case.