US dollar cheque advice wanted

M0ney

I used to work for a company listed on the NYSE and I was fortunate in that I could by some shares at a discount and now that I no longer work for them I am receiving the dividends in the form of a cheque by post each quarter. My problem is that these dividends are very low in value (the latest one was $6.88) and they are paid in US dollars. Both banks which I deal with have said that the cheque is worth less than what they would charge to handle a non-sterling cheque.

I was wondering if anyone is aware of any way to cash or pay these cheques into a bank or getting the monetary value out of them without being hit with a big charge?

The only semi-viable option I have at the moment is opening an offshore account with Lloyds which would be a US dollar account but I would need to keep at least $3500 in it to avoid the charges.

Thanks for taking the time to read this.

kimbers84

Theres no much you can do to avoid these you could contact the company sending divies & ask them to collate them & send annually? Or alternatively my UK shares divies are reinvested in shares, might be worth seeing if they can do that as you wouldn't miss $6.88 quaterly!!

catokelly

I would suggest you ask the company who issued the cheque to wire the USD to you instead. However it's probably not worth the hassle of opening a usd bank account just for the purpose of receiving these low value payments... Have you considered using an international money transfer specialist? Most of them hold a client US Dollar account and can accept payments from USD accounts abroad which they convert into Sterling at much better rates than the banks. Once you agree a rate, they would transfer the Sterling to your nominated UK bank account... therefore you have the benefit of getting a better rate, and not getting charged outrageouscheque fees! I have used Thomas Exchange for this in the past (there isnt much info on the site regarding this service, so perhaps email them [EMAIL="enquiries@tefx.co.uk"]enquiries@tefx.co.uk[/EMAIL])

dzug1

This outfit will cash $$ cheques for a small fee - admittedly the exchange rate is not that hot but that's liveable with on low values

https://auctionchex.com/?file=mwelcome.html

M0ney

Just thought I should put in an update here, thanks for the input from everyone. It turns out Barlcays do not charge anything for depositing a USD cheque although the exchange rate is weighted in their favour so I have just got a savings account I can pay the cheques into. The only drawback is, it can take several weeks for them to clear but I can live with that it is just small change really.

Jjmmmoo

Hi - I was wondering if this was still working? I have a bunch of small value USD cheques but not sure where to begin in getting them deposited?
Many thanks

dzug1

Not aware of any changed advice to that given above