Frank Edgley Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 Perhaps someone will tell me the secrets about the US banking system. It continues to be a series of frustrating experiences. It makes sense that since I reside in Canada, it would make sense to be paid in Canadian dollars. That does seem to be a problem for customers in England, Ireland, Japan or even Hong Kong. I have received bank money orders or postal money orders from those countries in Canadian dollars. However, it does not seem to be possible from our closest neighbour and trading partner. I have received postal money orders "Cashable in the US only" and "International Money Orders" in US funds, but payment in Canadian dollars, so I've been told is next to impossible. This seems strange to me as I can go into any bank here and get money orders in any currency. In fact, I can go to our local "party store" that has a small post office in the back, and get postal money orders in different currencies. Yesterday, I just received a cheque back from someone in the US. I had sent that person a small cheque for $35 to cover a charge mistakenly made by UPS. Their bank wouldn't cash it, in spite of the fact that it was a major international bank, and a US FUNDS account. Across the cheque was stamped "BANK OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL US." What goes here??? I have sent cheques to several people in the US without too many problems. It seems that it is a "crap shoot." If the recipient of the cheque happens to have one of the wrong kind of bank, your cheque is not acceptable. How is someone supposed to know??? I have no problem receiving US cheques. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DavidFR Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 Hi Frank, Since I work for a bank I can provide a slight insight into the US banking system. Part of the issue is that banks have different regulations governing them depending on their charters - federal or state, commercial bank, mutual bank, community bank, or credit union. Most commercial banks (Citibank, Bank of America, Citizen's Bank, etc) should be able to provide money orders and treasurer's checks in foreign currencies. They should also be able to accept checks in foreign currency denominations and from foreign banks. The latter is easiest if the check is in US funds payable from a bank with a reciprocal relationship with a US bank (often in New York). This is actually quite common for Canadian banks, to issue checks in US funds payable through a New York bank. Of course, there are usually fees associated with many of these services. The US Post Office, for whatever reason, only deals in/with US currency and the 48 continental states. For non-commercial banks, they are more limited in what they can accept and what they can issue. We can accept certain kinds of foreign checks, but can't issue any monetary instruments in foreign denominations. Some financial institutions, even if their charter allows it, may choose not to work with foreign items at all, in large part because it incurs signicant expenses and staffing requirements. A simple call or visit to the appropriate financial institution should be able to clarify the policy - of course I say that as an employee of a bank with good customer service. In short, your feeling that it is "hit or miss" with US banks is not far off the mark. Despite the fees involved, my recommendation is really the wire transfer (at least for larger amounts). My sister attends McGill University in Montreal, and that's the best way we've found to consistently get her money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alan Day Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 Our UK Banks have a policy of not working for their customers, but working for themselves.My personal Bank HSBC had four counters to serve you and even then normally at least one of these were closed.The Bank Assistant was there but chose not to serve you.There was never a time when you could go into the Bank and it was not full up with people.Their response was simple they got in the builders and halved the size of the counter so only two assistants could work at any one time.I was in the bank for half an hour today in a queue. I was reading a notice while I was waiting "Any Banking transaction after 3-30 PM will be dealt with the following day". Taking into consideration it takes at least four days to clear a cheque,it makes you wonder why we all put up with this. I am waiting for a new bank that works with it's customers and I will have great pleasure in telling them to depart. My only win was a suit that I purchased in London that cost me a lot of money,only to get my card withdrawn by the assistant with no explanation when I went to pay for it.The next day I angrily phoned my Bank Manager made an immediate appointment and he investigated it while I was on my way.I stormed into his office and he immediately apologised for the confusion and offered me compensation ,which by coincedence was the price of my suit. I then got him to contact the tailor with an explanation.When I went to collect my suit the tailor apologised and gave me fifty pounds off the price. No one messes with a concertinist. Al Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Charlotte Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 No one messes with a concertinist. Hmm. Would it help to bring along the concertina to the bank. Perhaps I should try...... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Theo Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 I am waiting for a new bank that works with it's customers and I will have great pleasure in telling them to depart. I'm in the UK and bank with Smile. It's an internet bank, no branches, so no queues! I can pay in cash or cheques at my local post office, or pay in cheques by post. I can request payments to banks in other countries for which they charge a flat fee or GBP8. I've not tried sending money to the USA but to France, Germany and Italy its straightforward. I've also found that XE.com does a good job of handling currency conversions. Its fees are lower than my bank and the exchange rates usually marginally better. Downside is that its rather complicated to sign up with them. Its a USA based company so should be good for US citizens sending money to all us funny people across the water. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Richard Morse Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 How about having people pay with PayPal. We do a lot of international orders that way. PayPal takes care of the rate conversion automatically. I also pay for items and can send friends money overseas that way as well. Easy and QUICK! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenferry Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 (edited) How about having people pay with PayPal. We do a lot of international orders that way. PayPal takes care of the rate conversion automatically. I also pay for items and can send friends money overseas that way as well. Easy and QUICK! Rich is right! I've used PayPal for purchases in various countries, and there's no hitch at all. And no charges associated with it, either. If the Buyer wants to pay in Canadian Dollars, when they type in the payment information, there is a pull-down menu that lets you choose which currency to pay in: US Dollars, Australian Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Euros, Pounds Sterling, and Japanese Yen. No transaction fee. Edited June 1, 2006 by greenferry Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m3838 Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 I vote for Paypal. I had two interesting experiences bying concertina from the UK. 20 button Lachenal from Chris Algar - no paypal. 10 replacement reeds from Concertina Spares, nearby Barleycorn Concertinas. - yes paypal. I'm really tempted to order my next concertina from Concertina Spares, who should buy it from Barleycorn first. Even for a small fee. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
JimLucas Posted June 1, 2006 Share Posted June 1, 2006 I've used PayPal for purchases in various countries, and there's no hitch at all. And no charges associated with it, either. No hitch and no charge for you! I'm pretty sure that if you were receiving the money, you would find a charge taken out. And if there's a currency conversion, PayPal's buy-sell spread seems to be about double what my bank charges. And for me -- I'm pretty sure I've mentioned it before, -- because my address is in Denmark, they won't allow me to either pay or receive in dollars, even though I have dollar-denominated accounts in both Danish and American banks. I understand that even in a transaction between myself and another Dane they would convert the amount from kroner to dollars (or pounds, or another of their few approved currencies), then convert it back, pocketing their buy-sell spread for effectively doing nothing. No thanks! ...there is a pull-down menu that lets you choose which currency to pay in: US Dollars, Australian Dollars, Canadian Dollars, Euros, Pounds Sterling, and Japanese Yen. Note that Danish, Swedish, and many other currencies are not included in that list. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chris Allert Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 I recently had trouble sending money to juergen suttner for a new concertina. i thought it would be a simple matter of going to my credit union and having them do an international wire transfer. unfortunately they said they were not set up to do this. I set up an xetrade account ( http://www.xe.com/ ), which can either accept domestic wires or electronic funds transfers. xetrade will then send either a wire or a bank draft to your beneficiary in the converted funds. there is a wire transfer fee of about $15, and your bank will also charge a wire transfer fee if you wire money to them. another option is to take cash to a commercial bank, and they can prepare a bank check in foreign funds. when i asked my local bank of america branch about this, they said there was a fee of $45 for non-customers for this, and then they tried to hard sell me on opening an account with them. and their exchange rates aren't that great. us postal service international money orders can be a maximum of $700 and can't be cashed in many countries (notably most of europe), though they can be cashed in canada, though i'm not sure what exchange rate the post office there gives. and there is a $3-$4 fee (as opposed to about $1 for domestic money orders) I told frank edgley that i would pay him with an aluminum brief-case full of small unmarked bills that will be thrown across the border from a speeding car in the middle of the night. He said this was fine and i think this is now his preferred method of payment from us customers. but you should probably double-check with him about this. one more thing... i think there is a paypal loophole. because paypal advertises "pay anyone with an e-mail address", you can use paypal to pay someone without a paypal account, and when they receive the e-mail they have an option to receive payment as a check. but it's buried deep under several screens of marketing material. anyway, it's very inconvenient for the person receiving the payment, so i wouldn't recommend it. i think all of the above is the reason that wim wakker has a us bank account and quotes us customers prices in us funds. i wonder if he would be willing to accept payments on behalf of frank edgley and other concertina makers from us customers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jody Kruskal Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 Frank, As an American, let me take this opportunity to apologize for your difficulties. Although it is no fault of mine personally, I deeply regret any inconvenience you may have experienced as a result of our mysterious bureaucracies. Jody Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
m3838 Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 No need to apologize, since Canadian bureaucracy is not any different. To Jim: I paid in GBPs to Concertina spares from the US. Doesn't seem to upset a recipient, perhabs the charge you are talking about, begins with a certain sum? And no charge was taken from my account for currency transfer. I don't understand your remark. Have you been charged the difference in the buy-sell? And why absence of small countries' currencies like Dennmark is an indication of badness of some financial institution? It's a private business, if you are upset, set up your own Internet bank, and include Danish currency in the list. It's just a bank, it's not supposed to cover every and all possible currencies. And why do people have their accounts in US Dollars, and not Mongolian Tugricks? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenferry Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 And why do people have their accounts in US Dollars, and not Mongolian Tugricks? Yeah. I have a trunk full of old Confederate currency, and I didn't see THAT on there, either! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlfinkels Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 No one messes with a concertinist. Hmm. Would it help to bring along the concertina to the bank. Perhaps I should try...... *snicker* I can see it now... "Fill the bag with all the cash or I'll play 'Tripping up the Stairs' repetitively until your head explodes!" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Helen Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 Hey Theo, You can send money to me if you want to see if it works out. I'll even tell you how I spent it! Gosh, this new payment plan to Frank sounds like a lot more fun than the way I paid him. Does the money have to have a visa? Oh no, that would make it a credit card. I wonder if I have a strong enough arm to sling it over. Hm, may have to practice. A new musical practice technique is born. I've used PayPal and liked it, but I am pretty sure the seller loses some of the money in fees. Probably like when someone uses a credit card. I assume part of the money goes to the credit card company. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Dirge Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 Paypal charge 3.4% of the transaction taken from the sellers side, so the purchaser never knows. This is before you get into foreign currency transactions where they have a few more bites at the cherry that was your money. Any seller takes a view whether to take this on the chin for a quick 'certain' payment. This is why many Ebay sellers charge a premium for using Paypal. Because Paypal is owned by Ebay, Ebay says you shouldn't do this. After all it might encourage people to use other, less profitable, forms of payment. To set up a Paypal account you have to provide credit card details. If the card was stolen and something is then bought with Paypal, apparently Paypal never hesitate to refund the credit card company by clawing back the money from the innocent seller who, by now, has posted off his item to the crook, never to see it again. It's never happened to me but it's easy to find such stories. So Paypal charge more than a credit card company (2% from the trader?) but avoid the losses that credit card companies swallow. Once you have done a certain amount of business Paypal insist that you go through a complicated business to prove who you are (verification). In my case that consisted of refusing point blank to give me about £1500 that I had accrued. I couldn't have had it if I had closed the Paypal account as far as I could tell, and I tried quite hard. They also wouldn't give me a name and address for their chief executive when repeatedly asked (getting through the automatic systems takes some doing in itself). As a result Paypal will now provide some protection for purchasers from me for up to £500. I suspect this merely means they would, again, snatch it back from me in the event of a complaint, no matter how unjustified. I have not found a way of saying that I will only do business with 'verified' Paypal types, which might make this a useful process. I can't see any positive value to me for jumping through their hoops. Sods. I use Paypal for small items; but they are pricey and, like Ebay itself, seem strongly angled to encourage new customers to the regular traders disadvantage. Paypal has its use, but I object to people saying unqualified nice things about them. Please be more careful! Rant over. Could you tell I don't like Paypal much? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greenferry Posted June 2, 2006 Share Posted June 2, 2006 I told frank edgley that i would pay him with an aluminum brief-case full of small unmarked bills that will be thrown across the border from a speeding car in the middle of the night. He said this was fine and i think this is now his preferred method of payment from us customers. but you should probably double-check with him about this. I vote for the quick delivery method. Use a cardboard box with bubble pack to save on the aluminum brief-case. Frank, have you established a drop-off location in some suitable wooded area along the Canadian border? With all the American Liberals sneaking across the Canadian borders these days, it might be hard to find a spot that's not patrolled! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Frank Edgley Posted June 3, 2006 Author Share Posted June 3, 2006 At the base of the Great lakes, maybe money in a bottle would work better than a cardboard box. It may even float over to where I am! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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