Lloyds Euro to £ exchange rate help

warehouse

Yesterday I received a payment into my Lloyds TSB account for €340. The amount received in £ was £264.43. This equates to 0.77p per Euro. The actual exchange rate right now, (and for the last week), is 0.80p per Euro.

My statement says 340.00 XR 1.28579

I rang Lloyds who were spectacularly useless, and the 3rd person I spoke to said that they use the Visa rate of exchange. I looked this up and it is currently 0.8. Using the Visa rate of exchange I should have 340 x 0.8 = £272.00

As I don't usually get payments from overseas I'm unsure what I'm missing here. Lloyds usually charge £1 for overseas payments if I spend abroad, but there is nothing on the statement to say why the rate I've received is so poor, nor any mention of a possible % taken?

Can anyone enlighten me as to why the amount I've received in £ seems light, as Lloyds cannot answer that question without referring to the Visa rate of exchange?

benjus

Most banks' customer service staff seem to fly into a state of confusion when you ask them questions about foreign exchange.

Whoever told you that they use the Visa rate was probably thinking about the case when you withdraw cash abroad using your debit card, in which case they do use the Visa rate (albeit with a margin added onto it).


When receiving payments in foreign currencies, banks generally use some internal exchange rate which they do not generally publish. Unless you have contacted your bank in advance to agree an exchange rate for the payment you don't have any control over the rate they will apply. This is why it's usually cheaper to use an FX broker to transfer funds between different currencies rather than using a direct bank transfer.

opinions4u

Page 11.

http://www.lloydstsb.com/media/lloydstsb2004/pdfs/banking_charges_brochure.pdf

Electronic payments received from abroad
Receiving a payment up to £100 – £2 fee
Receiving a payment of £100 or over – £7 fee

YorkshireBoy

...and your T&Cs...

http://www.lloydstsb.com/media/lloydstsb2004/pdfs/personal_banking_terms_and_conditions2.pdf

Specifically conditions 7.3(d) and 7.3(e)

warehouse

Thanks for the replies, much appreciated.

From Yorkshireboy's links:

We will use our standard exchange rate for buying the relevant currency that applies on the day we receive the payment.
You can find out our standard exchange rate by calling us on the number given in the contacts section at the beginning of
this document.
(e) We may take our charges for dealing with the international payment before we add it to your account but if we
do so we will tell you the full amount of the payment and the charges that applied.

There isn't a single mention of any charges, so I can only assume none were made?

opinions4u

warehouse wrote: »

There isn't a single mention of any charges, so I can only assume none were made?

I would assume your exchange rate calculation is pretty close to accurate and then deduct the £7 charge I referenced.

It gets coincidentally close to the sum received then.

warehouse

opinions4u wrote: »

I would assume your exchange rate calculation is pretty close to accurate and then deduct the £7 charge I referenced.

It gets coincidentally close to the sum received then.

I can't argue with that, it's very close. What concerns me is that this charge isn't noted on my statement, (T's & C's say it will be), and the staff on the end of the phone can't answer the question either.

I literally have no where at Lloyds to turn for the exact answer. Does anyone have an email address for Lloyds that has half a chance of getting a reply?

money-spending-expert

The best thing to do if you are receiving overseas payments is use a currency broker in my opinion, they get you the best exchange rates and offer a simple and free service - A good example of one is a company called Foreign Currency Direct

warehouse

money-spending-expert wrote: »

The best thing to do if you are receiving overseas payments is use a currency broker in my opinion, they get you the best exchange rates and offer a simple and free service - A good example of one is a company called Foreign Currency Direct

It's a payment from an Irish bookie, (I'm one of the matched betting mob). Every penny is accounted for with us lot, so before I use more European books I need to know how such incoming amounts are calculated, plus I need to be paid back to the method I used to deposit which was my debit card.

cautiousjon

It will probably say on your full statement. I presume you're looking at an online statement at the moment? I have always had more detail regarding foreign transactions on my printed paper statement than any online statement.