The Lemon Fool

Want to transfer money from a UK Bank to the US and from past experience do not want to be screwed over by the Banks. Appreciate a rec for a reliable source who stick closely to the rate at the time. Was informed by HSBC(my bank in the UK) that if I opened an HSBC acct in the US, there would be no charges but quite frankly, they are still going to do me over with the rate and there also are restrictions anyway for keeping a certain amount in the US.
Thx.

i use https://transferwise.com

Instead of transferring in destination denominated currency, open a sterling account at your destination.

It is often a much better rate that is offered for conversions that occur in the destination country.

I do not have an HSBC account where I am resident but my UK HSBC account charges me £4 per transfer via internet banking. The exchange rate here is consistently 5-8% more favourable for me.

Appreciate the replies.

Roger I don't follow you. Have an HSBC account in the UK and want to transfer Sterling to dollars into the US. Now I can open an HSBC account in the States and there wouldn't be any charges but convinced the bank rate would be substantially higher. Why would I open up a sterling acct in the US?
Perhaps I am missing something which is not unusual for me
Also I believe they have a daily minimum for transferals overseas, which is on the low side..at least HSBC did the last time I looked, which was sometime ago.
Thx.

Sorry Nimnarb,

I should have explained I live outside the UK and transfer my UK based pensions to my account here in Sterling and then convert to local currency.

If you intend making regular transfers to US then I believe HSBC will open a Sterling account for you. They opened an account for me while I was in UK, before I moved to this island in the Indian Ocean.

I havent tried it but I seem to remember that the best solution for larger amounts is to open an Interactive Brokers account.
Please let us know your final conclusion.

HiFX worked well for me and gave competitive rates when I lived in Australia. I plan to continue to use them when I relocate (again!) to Canada.

SDN

nimnarb wrote:Want to transfer money from a UK Bank to the US and from past experience do not want to be screwed over by the Banks. Appreciate a rec for a reliable source who stick closely to the rate at the time. Was informed by HSBC(my bank in the UK) that if I opened an HSBC acct in the US, there would be no charges but quite frankly, they are still going to do me over with the rate and there also are restrictions anyway for keeping a certain amount in the US.
Thx.

Revolut works exceptionally well for this.

Load the money onto the card via faster payment or debit card, carry out the exchange which they claim is at interbank rates, and then you can pay it out to a USA account via ACH transfer. I have a capital one account in the US, and have carried out many small transfers this way, it has been completely fee free.

One thing to note with Revolut, there is a £25k per year limit, which I understand can be increased by negotiation with them. There is also a £5k per month limit, above which there is a charge of 0.5% on the transfer. Also at weekends they add a 0.5% charge.

I have now tried the Interactive Brokers solution and it seems to work.

Just revisiting this subject again and can confirm that Transferwise have the best rates. If you want to say transfer Pounds into Dollars, its easy to do and there are no international wire charges involved in the US. You send the money to their UK Bank and they convert it into dollars(24 hours guaranteed rate) and send it from their US Bank direct to you. Depending on when you transfer the money, from start to finish, usually takes 3 days. You can also set up a Borderless Acct and transfer money when you want. Hope this helps.

Oh and meant to say, if you have larger amounts to send, try and negotiate a 0.3% rate.