How To Send Money Internationally Online in 2020?
Tips And Tricks For Sending Money Abroad Cheaply
Digital payments have become a natural part of our lives. Especially nowadays, in the age of globalisation, with customers being not limited only to services from their country and businesses noticed that they are now able to market to literally anybody in the world. You can have a good delivered to you within 5 days, even if it’s shipped from another continent, which is really incredible if you think about it for a while. And the global economy is thriving because of this opportunities.
While online money transfers enabled people to use services from all over the world or even set up their own business. There are still some costs involved, especially for international transfers. While banks are significantly overpriced charging even up to $30, you can easily order an online transfer at a dedicated platform for as little as $5.
But if on each transfer you can save an additional $1 or so, it can add up to great sums at the end of the year and the impact on the savings is really huge.
So, what can you do to choose the best available money transfer platform and also save money while using it?
1. Do Your Research Thoroughly
We read reviews before going to a fancy restaurant, going on vacation or simply buying some products online. That’s why it’s also important to look around and dive into other customers’ feedback and some overview articles before trusting any company with our money.
What are features of a good review? The author can’t be biased. It should cover both good and bad sides and most importantly be informative and transparent. For example, in this TransferWise review the author of the article covers obviously the basics like how to sign up, their fees, exchange rates etc. but also quotes some of the popular negative TransferWise reviews and explains the most common problems. There are also limitations of the platform covered. That way after reading such article you get a full picture of how to send money with this particular company. Now, simply look around for few of the top positions and decide which one offers features which suit your needs.
2. Foreign Currencies = Markup expenses
International transfers in most cases require you to convert the currencies. Most of the platforms offer this service automatically, however keep in mind, that whenever there is a currency conversion there are some costs that you might not notice but actually affect your transfer.
A markup on exchange rates doesn’t necessarily add up to the “transfer costs”, but leads to your recipient receiving less funds that you wanted to send him.
For example if 1USD=109JPN, then a $100 sent should convert to 10900JPN. Now what if the transfer company puts a margin on the exchange rates and calculate the rates as 1USD=90JPN. Now, a $100 transfer yields only 9000JPN, which is 1900JPN less that you wanted to send…
Always check the exchange rates before ordering the payment.
3. Play Around With Different Currency Pairs
It may also be worth to try different currency pairs, as they could have different exchange relations to each other. It also depends on the location you send the transfer to. A basic example: it is cheaper to send EUR within European Union than to send USD transfers. In such case, it may be worth to exchange your dollars quickly to euros on your own before sending the money. EUR to other European currencies might also have better exchange rates in particular transfer provider if it’s based in Europe, so it may be worth checking what works where.
4. Try Out Locally-Oriented Money Transfers
There are various companies which offer very limited services, however they might offer much better prices for it. For example Remit2India, as the name indicates provides transfers solely to Indian region. There are also companies such as Funcik for example, which provides transfers only between UK and Poland. Depending on what country you need to send the money to, maybe there is a local-oriented provider for your transfer, which will save you some money.
5. Compare Best Options
Finally, if you have any doubts you can try and use some free online money transfer comparison tools. How they work? It differs from site to site, but usually it’s as simple as typing in how much you need to send and to what country and the algorithm will simply compare the costs at all of the available companies and display you a list sorted by price. You can then either choose the cheapest available option or investigate few of the top positions if you like features of some companies more.
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