UK Bank Account With (International) Online Wire Transfer Facility

ProsperTogether

Hello, I am newly registered here and I have visited these forums for many years to find useful information. Hopefully I will be able to contribute some of that myself

I am looking for a UK Bank that allows its customers to do International bank transfers, including but not limited to SEPA payments. Basically, I find it frustrating and unnecessary to have to phone my bank up each time I need to transfer money to another country when they already have the data stored, even though they have this from previous transfers I am asked to confirm this which can be lengthy as most of you will know, having to read all the details again. Usually though, they only ask for the IBAN again and not all beneficiary and address details which is half a mile long and tedious to get correct over the phone.

I noticed that Barclays allow SEPA payments online even with basic accounts? My memory of this is pretty vague now as I was only testing an account I have with them to see what is possible.

Preferably I am looking for a UK bank account that does not require a minimum monthly deposit with them in order to have access to International online money payments/transfers. I notice that HSBC and some other major UK banks offer this to their premium customers that will deposit 100K or more or ones that are formally called expat accounts that allow different currency deposits. I will be dealing mostly with GBP, USD, EUR so probably won't need anything else but having online transfer facility is most essential.

I don't want to have to open an offshore account or incorporate a company account or anything like that unless I really have to and if I do I would probably boycott all the major banks then because they obviously don't want my business.

I do not mind paying a monthly fee of £10-£25 if this is in place of having minimum deposits and the account has what I need.

Citi bank caught my eye as they do offer multi-currencies but I am not sure if they would be suitable or have online International transfer facility. Also, my credit rating is not that great, but is getting rebuilt better now and I have a few more lines of credit to help build this. I don't need to go into detail as to why my credit rating isn't as good as it was years ago, I had a good rating and now I don't is not exclusively my own cause but the cause of banks/creditors breaking rules/law. I will be addressing this at some point before the 6 year period ends, no doubt I will share my story on here if successful.

Appreciate any help with this as I do not want to have to apply for an account unnecessarily to find I am refused or to see they do not offer the service I need. I do not need any overdraft, credit or anything either as I already have that.

innovate

Most, if not all, UK banks offer facilities for international payments. Though that isn't necessarily to cheapest or fastest method. You might be better served by a specialist currency transfer service, there's dozens of them about.

PeacefulWaters

TSB, Bank of Scotland, Halifax and Lloyds offer online international payments and retain historic detail.

The Halifax fee is £9.50 a pop. Exchange rate was competitive when I last used it a couple of years ago.

Porcupine

Citi do a fairly wide range of international payments (free SEPA for instance), but mostly you have to phone up to make them. It's possible some can be set up as saved payees and then subsequent transactions done online, but I haven't tried that. Payments to Citi accounts abroad seem to be less restricted than others.

Most UK banks are a car crash as far as international payments go, so I've yet to see anyone who does this usefully (ie online with sensible fees, a tenner a go isn't).

[Deleted User]

Natwest offer this too on even their basic current accounts, supports all countries, you do have to pay for the payment though.

Porcupine

I've just checked Citi: with the new web interface you can now make transfers to Citi, SEPA and SWIFT payments on the website. It's a 3 stage process and I've not done all the steps, but the comments at the bottom suggest there's the usual process of sending a security code to your phone to authorise the transaction. So it does appear they can now be done online. Citi and SEPA are free, SWIFT is £25 (I think, fees table)

If you're just making payments rather than holding cash in your account, there's a loophole. Citi charge a £5 monthly fee each month your account is in credit. But if the account has a zero balance on the first of the month, there's no fee. So as long as you make sure your account is empty on the given day it doesn't cost anything.

gt94sss2

ProsperTogether wrote: »

Preferably I am looking for a UK bank account that does not require a minimum monthly deposit with them in order to have access to International online money payments/transfers. I notice that HSBC and some other major UK banks offer this to their premium customers that will deposit 100K or more

HSBC offer international online money payments/transfers to all their customers - not just their premium ones.

Transfers appear to be free to *any* HSBC account (not just your own) or £4 otherwise if done via internet banking. Details at http://www.hsbc.co.uk/1/2/international-money-transfer

Seems they have lowered their charges substantially since I last looked.

Regards
Sunil