FX COMPANIES
 

Please help me decide which FX company to use. There are so many! :confused:. My family and I are opening bank accounts in Spain next week ahead of making the big move and want to start sending our money over without losing it! :unsure:

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

This topic has been 'done to death'. Have a quick search on this site and browse the previous threads.

I think what you will see is that every one has their own, preferred, company.


For example, I use World First. I've never had to pay a fee and the rate has always beaten others that I have asked.

You must make sure that there are no fees levied by the FX company and also not by any 'intermediary' bank (head offices for example). I fell foul of this once when using Currencies Direct - they went via my banks head office in Madrid and I was stung quite a lot. Other FX companies (like world first) don't do this so I now do not get charged anything.

I usually ring a couple of FX brokers in quick succession just to make sure that I'm getting the best rate. I have even played one against another to 'up' the rate.

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

That's strange, I've been using them for a few years and never had this! In fact I did a 10K transfer last week and definitely no fees. Their communication is dreadful though and they can take ages to get back to you about anything. To that end I'm probably going to give HiFX a try as I know someone that works there :fingerscrossed:

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Thank you, sorry I am new to the forum and didnt really know how to look around much!

Ive made a list of some of the companies and might give them all a call and gage rates/service etc. So we shall see!

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

I use TORFX and have always been happy with the rates and service etc for more see here

http://www.whichwaytopay.com/compare...ge-summary.asp

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Recommendations are ok but it's not so long ago that crown currency was being recommended on forums and look what happened to them! There is no financial protection whilst they hold your money even if it is only overnight.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-11466272

A bird in the hand is worth two in a bush:cool:

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

http://www.xe.com/company/ ,Ive used them a lot and all okay , there's a lot of messing around proving ID initially because of anti laundering laws but straight forward there after , I`d stay away from new/small operators offering exchange services , they have a habit of going bust with your money, the easiest way is to do an electronic transfer from your UK bank to your Spanish one but exchange rates are poor compared with XE .

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

I would steer clear of XE - I signed up and went through all the ID requirements, only to discover that their rates are horrendous.

I use OANDA (received a transfer just last week, in fact). You get the same spreads on money transfers as you do on FX trading. I've never seen any other service that comes close. e.g their spread on EUR/USD is around 2 pips. A typical bank rate would be 400+ pips.

I think you'll be amazed.

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Horrendous ? but XE offer better rates than OANDA ??? maybe you were transfering a small sum with OANDA , our company accountant has been through masses of exchange companies and found XE did the best deals every time .

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Definitely not true. OANDA offers the same rate for any size transaction - although obviously you'd be silly to do very small amounts given the wire fee (from your originating bank) and OANDAs $25 wire fee.

OANDAs rates are shown publicly on their site. XE's (which you seem to have to log in to access) are significantly worse (by orders of magnitude). Note that the mid-market rates shown on xe.com are NOT the ones you receive when you do transfers!

I also have a lot of experience doing this stuff for corporates and have used OANDA in that capacity also.

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

I would be amazed if you could buy and sell Euro/gbp at a 2 pip spread.
That spread is usually for the professional interbank market trading 5 to 10 million euros at a pop. Not for small amounts. Are you sure they deal on the live prices they show on their screen??

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

It's within a few pips of that. You can get a quote here:
http://fxglobaltransfer.oanda.com/

As I said I use them regularly. It does make most of the other players seem like a bit of a joke.

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Companies I use don't charge this fee! and still give one of the best rates.

As I said before, beware of companies that charge!

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

On the contrary, I'd be very wary of companies that don't "charge fees". Where do you think their money is made? The best example, of course, being the "no fee, no commission!" money changers operating at airports and high street banks.

A SWIFT transfer costs money. They either pass this on, or claw it back through less transparent means.

Re: FX COMPANIES
 

Of course, it'd be far more fun to do a "if you show me yours, I'll show you mine" ;-)

OANDAs rates are public, and I can confirm they are exactly as shown in the link I gave previously.

I'd be very interested to hear if anyone's FX broker can do better, on any transaction size?

To do a comparison, compare the offered rate with the interbank rate (e.g what's shown on the xe.com homepage, or oanda.com's homepage).