tonrob

Here's another one:

www.hifx.com

Was in a similar situation recently. Poised to move to U.S. and needed to transfer great chunk of savings (£30K) for house deposit over there... but could a broker I just found using Google be trusted? Well, I went for it and found them friendly, professional and efficient. Took 4 days in total, no fee charged for doing it and their rate was just 1 cent under the interbank rate, some 6 cents in the pound better than my bank, HSBC, were offering at the time (and then they were going to charge me a £20 fee for the privilige).

Lesley1020

Yep, I use paypal to transfer money all the time too, although for larger amounts, I would wire. Costs about 15 pounds outgoing from the Bank of Scotland(they tell the exchange rate before I send) and then $12 incoming into my account. I ALWAYS convert it before I send it to make sure I know what exchange rate I am getting.

BritGuyTN

It normally takes 3-5 days for me too - i use EFT at the USA end to have cash transferred into my bank account rather than wire (i think eft takes a day longer) soo i don't have to pay the $15 dollar fee

bottom line is that if you want the best rate and no fees and can wait an average of 4 days then xe is the best option by far (IMO)

I usually break larger transactions up into chunks just incase i mess up the online transfer or xe/my uk bank does - mistakes do happen, althought the only one so far in 3 years of using xe was complete user error on my part

TRPardoe

No need to be reticent about XE. By the way, their UK account is in Bank of America.

Once you are set up, which takes a few days as they try very hard to verify you are who you say you are, the transfer is very quick - basically the same day.

I sent my Building Society books to Bournemouth by UPS last Tuesday, they got them Thursday and the transfer happened the same day. The $$$ showed up in my local Credit Union on Friday morning.

Bloody Building society doesn't have on line banking. maybe they'll get bought out and I'll make a killing on the share option.

Dan725

You know, I ended up using my bank (Lloyds) in the end for the money transfer. Don't talk to the muppets in your local bank, phone up the international banking and speak to people who know what they are on about, and quote the rate to your local bank. I tried all those firms like Moneycorp and HiFX, surprisingly, the bank offered a better rate (admittedly on a large sum of money). Might not have been so good for small amounts, but worth checking nonetheless.

franc111s

I was with barclays and was transferring money for years.

First, get them to open a US DOllar account in your name in the UK. Many people don't know they do this.

You can transfer money into it and from it easily, same day and that days (prior night I think) spot rate or pretty darn close, no feem no comission. BTW - in case you didn't know, spot in this case = the inter bank trading rate.

Then, when you are ready, you can wire it to/from any stateside account for a flat fee like any other wire.

This illiminates percentages and a play on the rate which can cripple you on any transaction over $500.

I ran my business this way for 10 years whilst trading in the USA and UK and transferred significant and small amounts many times.

Talk to the Manager as someone is right, many bank employees are muppets.

There is no need to use an outside "service", you know no-one does it for nothing and you are paying over the top when you don't need to. I don't care how cheap they are, they cannot match "spot" rates and that's often how you get screwed.

With barclays have sterling *and* dollar accounts in your name, and then it's just a transfer between 2 accounts and barlcays are happy your money still stays with them and that's how they make there money. If I remember, you can get an ATM card on the barclays $$ account if you want it too.

Der

I had a HSBC UK account for years in UK (Previously Midland) and opened a NY HSBC account prior to coming to USA.

All Sterling transfers (any amount) gets transferred to USA at a standard £10 Charge in UK. From USA I need to send them a fax authorising any transfer..
Had no problems so far - takes 3 - 4 working days and money goes straight into USA acct.

Don't know about charges etc if I were to transfer in the other direction .. ie USA to UK

tonrob

Remember to always compare the rates from a broker before instructing your bank though. We got an almost 5% higher dollar amount by using hifx instead of our usual bankers, HSBC, and there was no kind of transfer fee. Probably not worth the trouble for smaller transfers, but if you want to convert a large sum (or convert more than once) then it's great. Once it's all set up you just trade on the phone with one quick call!

BritGuyTN

"I don't care how cheap they are, they cannot match "spot" rates and that's often how you get screwed."

I don;t think this statement is correct...

I looked at these accounts with both barclays and natwest

their rates were STILL below what xe.com provided me (maybe 1.5%) and there was still the fee to transfer the wire - unlike with xe...

I suggest for a proper comparison, have an xe account set up and then call the bank holding a dual currency account and ask what the current rate is.

I have on several occassion with different institutions and its nver as good as i get with xe

franc111s

I think what the other posted suggested was correct. You need to make sure you go through international.

The spot rate I was getting was just that, no % involved.

Maybe XE is doing better than spot which if they are 'trading' in the currency is possible.

Your right, people need to compare properly. I only know that as a business / personal Barclays account holder I used to make sure this was spot which is why I used it all the time. Maybe times have changed which is possible too....

Thanls.