Making an International Bank Transfer

tech08

Hi

Basically I want to send some money to someone in Germany. The bank I am with is NatWest and I have looked up international payments on their website and it says there is a £10 charge for European transfers. Is there any way to get around this charge? As it seems a lot when I am only sending about £28 in total.

I have heard that if you are actually dealing in the countries currency (eg. the Euro), you don't get charged, is there any way to do this from the UK?

Thanks for your help.

Best regards.

(P.S. - I assumed this forum was the right place for this thread, if it needs to be moved, go ahead and move it).

Gers

Don't think you can get round it apart from asking that the person receiving the money pays the charge. There are usually 2 charges, 1 at each end! I've just sent some money to Australia and requested that each end pays the relevant charge.

jonesMUFCforever

Do both of you have a Paypal account?

theboylard

Moneybookers, nice and easy!
Do you have the IBAN and BIC for the account in Germany? You may be able to do a transfer via online banking, the only issue should be the exchange rate?

willo65

AFAIK since the new regs came in on 1st November payments for foreign transfers have got to be paid by the sender apart from receiving bank charges which have to be paid by receiver.

MrsTinks

paypal...

Maelstrom09

I managed to send the payment via PayPal. But for future reference is there any cheaper way of sending a bank transfer to someone in Europe using the IBAN and BIC codes? As I find that a lot of people from Europe dislike using PayPal and prefer the bank transfer method. But I don't want to pay this way if it entails a £10 fee from NatWest every time I want to send money.

moniker_2

Maelstrom09 wrote: »

I managed to send the payment via PayPal. But for future reference is there any cheaper way of sending a bank transfer to someone in Europe using the IBAN and BIC codes? As I find that a lot of people from Europe dislike using PayPal and prefer the bank transfer method. But I don't want to pay this way if it entails a £10 fee from NatWest every time I want to send money.

AFAIK there is none as the UK & its banks opted to stay out of those EU regulations. The UK only asked the banks, not the consumers. For the rest of EU, an intra-EU payment in euro must not cost more than a corresponding domestic payment (even if the country is not yet in the eurozone).

System

The regulations apply in the whole EU (plus Switzerland), including the UK, to transfers in euro or in Swedish krona. The UK gov asked the UK banks if the regs should apply to transfers in GBP, and the banks said no. The regs say that UK banks must charge the same to transfer euro from Liverpool to Frankfurt as they do to transfer euro from Liverpool to Manchester. Since UK banks don't offer (or don't publicise and are about to phase out) cheap transfers of euro via BACS, UK banks can in practice charge whatever they think the market will bear for transfering euro.

fantasy_dreams

I regularly get money from Germany (my parents live there).
UK banks actually charge the other way round as well. If my parents transfer the amount over in Euro, I pay another charge when I receive the money here. If my parents transfer the money in UK Sterling I don't have to pay that charge. The cost to my parents is the same either way. But trying to get the IBAN and BIC number from a UK bank through an indian call centre was an absolute nightmare. Apparently IBAN has been abolished, BIC doesn't exist and why do I need money from abroad anyway and another guy told me that a transfer from Germany to the UK wasn't an international transfer as both countries are in the EU and therefore the same, just like the US. :rotfl:

If I need to send money to Germany, I generally send cash. Not very secure, but tons cheaper. Germans do not have paypal as there is a big reluctancy over there to use CC cards or give bank details over the internet.

dzug1

fantasy_dreams wrote: »

Itrying to get the IBAN and BIC number from a UK bank through an indian call centre was an absolute nightmare.

If I need to send money to Germany, I generally send cash. Not very secure, but tons cheaper. Germans do not have paypal as there is a big reluctancy over there to use CC cards or give bank details over the internet.

Surely those numbers are on your statement? They are on mine. Several accounts, several banks.

But agree with cash for small amounts.