transferring money from UK to France

ac0rn

Can anyone suggest the cheapest way to transfer money from a UK bank account to my French bank account? I make a regular monthly payment of about £400 and am charged £27 each transaction (2 days) or £10 (says 4 to seven days but always takes a week). I need the money to transfer quickly but £27 seems excessive. thanks

noh

Take a look at transferwise.com or currencyfair.com

jonesMUFCforever

Cheapest and fastest do not match as you have seen.

You need to decide which is more important to you.

stephane_2

I have regularly sent money to France with First Direct & Halifax....the cost each time was about £9.00 and the transfer took 2 days at most. No need to pay £27 for it...

benjus

jonesMUFCforever wrote: »

Cheapest and fastest do not match as you have seen.

You need to decide which is more important to you.

Possibly not cheapest and fastest, but Transferwise is both cheap and fast, especially when compared to the banks.

trailingspouse

I have the same problem with regular payments to a bank account in Ireland - it's not possible to set up a standing order (?really?), so instead of forking out for the charges every month, I send a lump sum every 3-4 months or so, and that saves a bit. Depends on why you need to make the payments, and whether that's a reasonable way to do it.

anydroid

trailingspouse wrote: »

I have the same problem with regular payments to a bank account in Ireland - it's not possible to set up a standing order (?really?), so instead of forking out for the charges every month, I send a lump sum every 3-4 months or so, and that saves a bit. Depends on why you need to make the payments, and whether that's a reasonable way to do it.

Apologies if this hijacks OP's thread, but I make regular payments to Ireland for free using Danske Bank (previously Northern Bank NI and National Irish Bank ROI, but now integrated island-wide).

I believe Danske have a cashless branch somewhere around Bank in London, alternatively you could hit up Newry the next time you cross the pond...

Transfers between own accounts are free, managed online and executed within 20 minutes. They take a margin of a couple of percent on wholesale forex rates.

catokelly

The banks do charge terrible fees and the exchange rate is usually bad along with the transfer being pretty slow to arrive.

I now use Thomas Exchange UK they charge £12 transfer fee, transfers to Europe & USA arrive on the same day, no fee on transfers over £5k. Pretty easy to set up email [EMAIL="enquiries@tefx.co.uk"]enquiries@tefx.co.uk[/EMAIL] for form.

jonesMUFCforever

catokelly wrote: »

The banks do charge terrible fees and the exchange rate is usually bad along with the transfer being pretty slow to arrive.

I now use Thomas Exchange UK they charge £12 transfer fee, transfers to Europe & USA arrive on the same day, no fee on transfers over £5k. Pretty easy to set up email [EMAIL="enquiries@tefx.co.uk"]enquiries@tefx.co.uk[/EMAIL] for form.

SEPA payments from my LTSB account to Europe using IBAN and BIC take one day and if I do it online cost £10.

catokelly

jonesMUFCforever wrote: »

SEPA payments from my LTSB account to Europe using IBAN and BIC take one day and if I do it online cost £10.

What kind of rate do Lloyds usually offer?

jonesMUFCforever

catokelly wrote: »

What kind of rate do Lloyds usually offer?

If I had made a transfer today the rate would have been 1.1259 Euro to pound.