regular transfers CAD to GBP

abundantia

Does anyone know a Canadian-based currency broker who has a local (in Canada) account in CAD and a UK local account in GBP? This would be for converting CAD to GBP and moving them from a Canadian bank account to a UK bank account on a monthly basis. The goal is to avoid SWIFT fees.

I've checked HiFx, Worldfirst, and TorFX, none of them works this way. I've also checked Transferwise, but their currency account is based somewhere in Estonia... so SWIFT fees can't be avoided.

abundantia

PS. Oh, and I checked Currencies Direct too (the peer to peer service). It doesn't work either, they don't have a local account in Canada, so SWIFT fees are payable.

grumbler

abundantia wrote: »

PS. Oh, and I checked Currencies Direct too (the peer to peer service).

Are you sure it was Currencies Direct? IIRC it's not peer to peer.
Have you checked Currencyfair?

For other options check fxcompared and mycurrencytransfer.

abundantia

Ah sorry yes I checked both Currencies Direct and also Currency Fair (the peer to peer). Found them on fxcompared.

They do not have a CAD account in Canada, so on top of their posted fees on fxcompared, I need to pay SWIFT fees to get the CAD transferred from Canada to Europe. This is why I'm looking for a Canadian broker firm, so that I can do a local transfer of CAD rather than international.

benjus

Quick google threw up a couple... haven't compared their rates though:

http://www.canadianforex.ca/our-services/transfer-money/europe/uk

https://www.hyperwallet.com/consumer/international-money-transfer/send-money-to-uk-united-kingdom.html

abundantia

Thank you benjus! Looks like the first one would be a good solution, canadianforex (or actually their UK counterpart ukforex) as they do regular transfers at no charge (NB: one offs are $15 so about £7-8) AND they have bank accounts in both Canada and the UK.

The problem is that Canadian banks charge even for local transfers from one bank to the other (they call that wire transfer). However, it looks like Canadianforex can do preauthorized debits, so they can debit Canadian accounts at no charge.


PS. Hyperwallet is in the US, I think going through a UK or Canada regulated company works better for me.