Converting large amount of Euro's

stphnstevey

Hi

My parents have sold a holiday home and excepted a very large amount of Euro's in cash. They want to use this to purchase a holiday home in France (obviously in Euro's) but not surprisingly the vendor wants a transfer of funds from a bank account.

They have tried opening an account in France and depositing the Euro's but again not surprisingly they were treated very suspiciously for having such a large amount of cash and were only allowed to deposit a relatively small amount.

Changing it into sterling will lose on the exchange rate/commision and we can't find any UK accounts that except Euro's without a commision.

PS - There also not very computer literate, so non-internet based accounts would be best

Any ideas?

Dagobert

I have tested this extensively as I am transferring a large € amount this week myself.

Transferring € into a UK bank account is free. You need to do several a Standard Euro Transfers, each up to €12,500 specifying BIC and IBAN.

I made test payments into a dozen UK bank accounts to compare conversion rate and transfer time. The difference between various UK banks can be as much as 1.2p per €. Barclays gives the best conversion rate. The transfer often only takes one day, at most two. The exchange rate makes a much greater difference than any interest you might lose through a delayed transfer.

The disadvantage is that Barclays only allow you to transfer £5K out a day.

A better receiving account is the Norwich & Peterborough BS. They use Barclays as a clearing bank and hence the exchange rate and timing are exactly the same. You would need to open a Netmaster Gold savings account (5.3%) along with the current account to keep the money there until needed.

Online you can only transfer £10K out but over the phone and with a little persuasion you can transfer out greater amounts.


As you noted yourself though, exchanging € to £ and back is less than ideal. Every UK bank I know of charges for € transfers out.

stphnstevey

Thanks Dogobert

You do lose out with the conversion factor. If only the French bank would take more.

digerati

They could open a bank account in Belgium or Switzerland (Euro deposit) easier and they might not be so concerned about the source of the funds. Just show the property sale documents so they know the funds are legitimate.

The French banks are overly worried by money laundering (usually by French politicians or their 'associates').

stphnstevey

Yeah, a Swiss bank account had crossed our minds, but the only one we knew with a Swiss Bank Account said that they needed to open theirs up in person - adding the cost of a trip to Switzerland. Also, it's cash, so sending it is bit hard

influence

Can you not open an Euro account from say HSBC/Citibank where you can use for your euro transaction? IN this case, you will not have issue about exchange rate. I think citibank offers free transfer between citibanks of difference countries.

Quite cool. Citibank has a competitive rate from what I tried. Not too sure about Euro. I tried it with USD and other currency.