Dollar account that I can pay dollar bills into?

sherpa_2

Hi all

Can anyone recommend a dollar account that I can pay cash into, that doesn't have a high fee/have my bank account with them? I have a transferwise account which has worked well for a transfer, but I also have dollar bills that I'd like to pay into an account, without having to convert them to UK pounds. Any suggestions?

colsten

You might get lucky with Barclays but you would need to have a foreign currency account with them

sherpa_2

Thanks Colston. I would need to have a current account with them. I guess that means I would need to pay my salary into it. Maybe not, I'll check it out. Annoyingly, HSBC do offer one, but I need to have a current account with them - I bank with first direct, owned by HSBC, but this doesn't count.

colsten

Especially with a foreign currency account, it would be more than bizarre if a bank required you to pay your GBP salary into it! Why do you think you need to pay your salary into the Barclays / HSBC account? They may have some minimum monthly deposit requirements (I haven't read the T&Cs) but those can be met by other means. I'd be more concerned about any costs these accounts might incur, or any minimum balance they might require.

sherpa_2

No, the requirement is to have a current account as well as the foreign currency account. The question is whether I would need to pay my salary into the current account. However, I don't see it specified and maybe that's not a common requirement.

For anyone else reading this, it seems that you can't pay cash into HSBC foreign currency accounts, so Barclays is my only option. I'll try it out.

Perhaps

It appears Barclays have a 2% fee (minimum £10) for depositing notes. In some circumstances it might be cheaper to convert at a FX bureau, deposit GBP, and then send using a FX service like Transferwise.

zerog

Barclays doesn't charge the fee for euros.

Citibank may have an account that accepts US cash but I think it has a minimum balance.

If you knew me personally, I would take the US cash and transfer you the money, but not in huge amounts.

Malkytheheed

Can you get a US social security number?