Best UK bank account for receiving foreign currency?

eDicky

Anthorn wrote: »

Not strictly true. in the case of Starling bank at least incoming SWIFT payments for example should be automatically converted to GBP using MasterCard rates and with no fee applied. But foreign currency has to be converted to GBP somewhere in order for it to be deposited into a GBP account.
https://community.starlingbank.com/t/swift-currency-conversion/890

That information is mistaken (SWIFT does not involve conversion or MasterCard) and if you look at the next post there is a correction to say that conversion of incoming funds is done by Natwest at their exchange rates. However this is apparently also mistaken - it was confirmed to me twice today by different Starling CS agents that only incoming transfers in GBP are accepted and any payments in a foreign currency will fail and be returned to the sender. Andrew and Lola told me this, responding instantly on the chat, but someone can always ask again to check.

wadbanage

eDicky wrote: »

....... that only incoming transfers in GBP are accepted and any payments in a foreign currency will fail and be returned to the sender. Andrew and Lola told me this, responding instantly on the chat, but someone can always ask again to check.

This is also my understanding of Starling, they do not currently accept SEPA payments either.