Sending money overseas

PRAISETHESUN

I'd reccomend Transferwise or Revolut. Otherwise check out other options here: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/banking/foreign-currency-exchange/.

If you do end up trying PayPal, make sure to disable DCC, otherwise PayPal will use their own rate rather than the rate your card provider offers.

loraine22

Hi All, i need some advice . I sent a very large sum of money abroad for a property purchase using a recommend site, which my my partner registered with. On the Monday we set up the account giving bank details to where the money should be deposited abroad. Later that day we then transferred the funds as a faster payment to the recommend site. We had a message advising we were locked into a rate for 24 hours in which they must receive the funds. They confirmed receipt of the funds on the Tuesday, however since then, every 12 hours they have been asking for documentation. Since Tuesday the rate increased and as of today, it decreased. The last document they requested today was sent to them immediately and now they are only prepared to give us the decreased rate (Thursday) despite us being locked into the original rate of Tuesday when they received the money. We have been chasing them daily, there is no telephone number that works to contact them, only a messaging service. Even then they continue to ignore requests of a phone call to discuss the situation and they are still dragging things out to release our money. They now say they will only release the money on todays rate (Thursday) or we can have a full refund which will take 3-5 working days. Either way they still hold our money earning interest in their account for a minimum of 5days!!
We feel they are deliberately dragging this our for their own financial gain.
What can we do as they are regulated by FCA and this whole drama is frustrating and stressful but also delaying our property purchase.

dj1471

loraine22 said:

Hi All, i need some advice . I sent a very large sum of money abroad for a property purchase using a recommend site, which my my partner registered with.

This sounds like standard money laundering / KYC checks that all regulated service providers are required by law to carry out.
 As a new customer sending a large sum such checks are guaranteed whichever company you use.
 It is a bit mean not to honour the original exchange rate though, especially if they’ve not been very responsive during the checks. Make a formal complaint to the company, if you’re still not happy you can complain to the FCA.

dissstressed

Check cost at Transferwise and Currencyfair. I regular send money to Asia and Currencyfair beats Transferwise 7/10 times. Not by much, but still. All the other options I've looked at over the years cost significantly more.
Don't know about the US though.