Chiff and Fipple Forums

Anyone know of good alternatives to PayPal for payments to/from the U.K.? PayPal’s currency exchange rates and few structure leave a lot to be desired. Is Google pay a good option? I’ve read mixed reviews....

Other options? Any suggestions info appreciated, thanks.

I have used wire transfers for multiple transactions buying from the U.K. Always works, but it's not very fast. Exchange rate is pretty much at the mercy of your bank; it will never be as low as reported on financial news.

Yes, a wire transfer will work but like you mention, multiple disadvantages. Basically, will cost the same or more than PP, plus far slower. Looking for a better options, in 2019 there have to be a few

I use XE.COM . Easy, better exchange rate, no other fees. May take a couple of days, not an instant transfer. You can go bank to bank, or have them issue and mail a local check to the payee.

kkrell wrote:I use XE.COM . Easy, better exchange rate, no other fees. May take a couple of days, not an instant transfer. You can go bank to bank, or have them issue and mail a local check to the payee.

Thanks Kevin, I wondered about xe.com, but hadn’t really heard from anyone using it. Will look into it some more.

Loren wrote:

kkrell wrote:I use XE.COM . Easy, better exchange rate, no other fees. May take a couple of days, not an instant transfer. You can go bank to bank, or have them issue and mail a local check to the payee.

Thanks Kevin, I wondered about xe.com, but hadn’t really heard from anyone using it. Will look into it some more.

I had to switch to it because my business bank (Wells Fargo) kept screwing up wire transfers (which are quite difficult to retrieve when things go wrong, BTW). Even with bank drafts to destination local banks (Bank of Ireland, for instance) in the destination currency by postal mail, charges were levied both sides, besides losses from the exchange rate. I recently used XE.COM to pay an auction house in the UK for a flute, at a much better rate than PayPal, and without credit card fees, with no wire fees either.

kkrell wrote: I had to switch to it because my business bank (Wells Fargo) kept screwing up wire transfers (which are quite difficult to retrieve when things go wrong, BTW). Even with bank drafts to destination local banks (Bank of Ireland, for instance) in the destination currency by postal mail, charges were levied both sides, besides losses from the exchange rate. I recently used XE.COM to pay an auction house in the UK for a flute, at a much better rate than PayPal, and without credit card fees, with no wire fees either.

Wells Fargo, yeah.......

Good to hear xe.com worked better for you. I will try them next time, had to go ahead and use PayPal this morning, just due to the time factor, ugh. At least I have a better option now, for next time.

Thanks again Kevin.

I gave up on xe.com because I would first have to transfer money to a UK bank, which adds back the fee I would save. So now I use Transferwise instead. I have a debit card which can be filled with whatever currency I want (several at the same time), at mid-market rates, so when I want to buy something from e.g. the UK I just pay with that card, in GBP. There's a small fee. And (in addition to the much better rate) it's better than e.g. Mastercard because I know, just before I add GBP to the card, exactly what the rate will be. With a regular CC the actual rate used is whatever it is a couple of days later. And I can fill up the card with a particular currency (e.g. JPY) at the moment when the rate is particularly good, if I know I will need it in the future.
They also have a direct-to-bank transfer which I haven't tested yet, but I will, soon.