Exchange rate - changing € and $ to £!

spencey7

Hello all,


Not 100% sure that I'm posting this query in the right forum, but any help or advice would be hugely appreciated!


Long story short - my partner and I got married recently and received around 2,500 EUR and 800 USD in cash as gifts from various family members. Now we're back in the UK we're looking to put the money into our account. I'm with the Clydesdale Bank, but want to make sure we're getting the best exchange rate (or at least make sure we're not getting ripped off!).


Does anyone have any experience of this..? Would I be likely to get a better rate from the Post Office in converting the money beforehand then deposting the GBP into my Clydesdale account? And where would I be able to find this information?


Thanks very much in advance - I'm pretty clueless on this subject!

jumperabv3

You can exchange the money at many banks, even if you don't have an account with them ... for instance Barclays would exchange the cash for you. Now, you're asking if Barclays for instance would offer you the best rate? I'm not sure ... but I used them before to convert cash that I had to Pounds. The rate is OK.

Say if you now look at Forexpros.com or XE.com that 2,500 EUR is 1,975 GBP then if Barclays is offering you anything above 1,920 GBP for that amount I'd say it's okay. I mean no one would give you the rate you see on websites like XE.com, they always take commissions (or say they have NO COMMISSIONS just offering you a !!!!!! rate).

For 2,500 EUR at today's rate, anything below 1,920 GBP - I would call it a bad deal.

Edit: I see PayPal is offering approx 1920 GBP for 2500 EUR, so I'd say that's the fair amount for exchange ... the more you can get the better, anything below 1920 GBP is a bad deal for me, because it's over 60 GBP from the real value of it.

jumperabv3

By the way these figures relate to the current exchange rate that I saw on the screen today. It always changes, so my rule of thumb would be to allow up to 50 GBP of difference from the value of the money you see on the screen when you come to exchange (at websites such as Forexpros.com or XE.com).

spencey7

Thanks very much for your reply! I find it all mightily confusing. I've just checked the rate on the Post Office website, and it seems to state that "selling back" €2,500 would equate to just £1,736, which doesn't seem like a great deal at all.. [http://www.postoffice.co.uk/travel-money/sell-unused-currency]

PeacefulWaters

Have you got any friends off on holiday in the coming weeks?

jumperabv3

Yes, it's a terrible, awful rate - don't take it.
I looked online and found this:

http://travelmoney.moneysavingexpert.com/buy-back/

Some places in London would give you 1960 GBP which is an excellent rate, almost like what you see on the screen!

benjus

Unless you can sell it to family/friends/colleagues who need it for holiday money, your best bet is to get it to one of the places in London from jumperabv3's link. If you can't easily get to central London, you can post the money via Special Delivery and they will credit the agreed Sterling amount into your bank account.

runningben16

Unless you're desperate for the cash in GBP, can't you just keep it in a drawer until you next go on holiday? I never convert Euros back, just use them next time

jumperabv3

runningben16 wrote: »

Unless you're desperate for the cash in GBP, can't you just keep it in a drawer until you next go on holiday? I never convert Euros back, just use them next time

I personally prefer not to keep cash at home, even if that is kept inside a safe (and I'd rather not have a safe in my home neither).

As mentioned above he/she can exchange the funds easily using some providers which can be found here:

http://travelmoney.moneysavingexpert.com/buy-back/

The GBP-EUR exchange rate these days is not bad at all ... even the GBP-USD is okay (1.60 currently) ... I was never a big advocator of the Euro anyway ... and now with the US formally announcing yesterday they stopped printing money ... and with Europe printing money and banks which don't pass stress tests - my take would be to avoid holding Euro in all forms... it would probably just lose value and maybe a few years down the line Germany would finally do the right thing, which is to kill and demolish the Euro and let each country return to its own currency (G. Brown was smart to not allow the UK to adopt this !!!!!! currency).

paddyrg

This isn't a recommendation or not, but have a look at https://www.weswap.com/en/

Basically you're doing a direct deal with someone who has GBP and wants EUR/currency

jumperabv3

paddyrg wrote: »

This isn't a recommendation or not, but have a look at https://www.weswap.com/en/

Basically you're doing a direct deal with someone who has GBP and wants EUR/currency

Cool website ... but note the OP has cash and this website doesn't work with cash ... under "How it works?" it says "Load" ...
"Load your WeSwap account with the amount you want to exchange. You can do this instantly with your debit card or by bank transfer."


So you can't load your account with cash, but yet it is still a cool website, thanks!