Val W

Has anyone used Moneybookers to transfer money from the UK to Spain? We are looking at ways to transfer our company pensions each month now our current fixed rate contract with HIFX is coming to an end. Moneybookers gives a good exchange rate and a low fee to transfer, and it looks easy to do on line. Is it too good to be true?

jackytoo

Dunno, but Crown was.

Mitzyboy

I use Currencies Direct now since Sun Pay closed down. CD seem to offer a good r/ex and dont charge fees. You have to have a monthly d/d to achieve this though. Also they have waived fees in the past when I have asked to make an extra transfer

Mitzyboy

Err .... but before using Moneybookers google the name

bobd22

I used to use sunpay which I quite liked also till it closed down. Also have used a couple of different ones making regular trasfers but found that sods law took over and my transfers seemd to be on the down days for £/euro. Recently I have been using exchange4free as you can monitor their rate on line which allways seems competitive with others and then when you consider its the right time book your rate and make the transfer. I have found this has saved me a bit of money. I make the transfer by bank transfer to them they send you text mesages at each stage i.e when you book the rate, when the money has transfered to them and when they have made the transfer to your overseas account which is usually 1 to 2 days. Also no fees other than what is built into their exchange rate like all the others. Like I say suits me and a few extra euros per month mounts up over the year beter in my pocket than anyone elses.

jackytoo

I wouldn't trust any of them, a lot can happen in a day or two as we saw with Crown. There are so many companies now. If you have a good relationship with your UK bank they will give you a good deal. Many people transfer quarterly and it is a lot of money to put at risk. 5 euro in the hand is worth ten in a bush....or a frozen bank account

bobd22

i think we could see the problem with crown they were offering far too high an exchange rate to be true in the end. I mention my experience as it may suit some but not all i.e. having a set transfer date by direct debit either with your bank or other means can be very restrictive with the fluctuations in £/euro rate over the last couple of years. Why it suits me is I can monitor the rate online as it changes all the time and when I believe it suits transfer easily. Down side of course is you montor the rate but not dificult as we probably as has been mentioned before allready all monitor it fairly closely anyway.

Mitzyboy

The other exchange companies had apparently been reporting Crown for months, because it was clear they were offering impossiby good rates to their clients. However they were not fully FSA regulated so nothing could be done. They were also reported to HMRC who control currency movements but nothing was done. What happened therefore took a lot more than a few days - as someone keeps saying, if it seems to good to be true then it probably is!

Val W

If a company is FSA regulated what exactly does that mean to us if they go bust? Would we get our money back? Both exchange4free and Moneybookers say they are FSA regulated.

Mitzyboy

If they were FSA regulated they would have to provide documentation and systems to the FSA and work to a standard, and when the complaints started the FSA would have been able to send people in to investigate. As it was, they couldn't.

jackytoo

According to the newspapers, currency transactions are not covered by the FSA compensation scheme.

Chiclanagir

I have noticed that our money is fixed at that exact moment when the pound/euro dips. Funny that!