Moving money

[Rawlos]

Evening, moving to Australia next month. What’s the best option in transfer money to an Australian account from Uk account to get the best rate.  
 

thanks in advance 

[Marisawright]

5 hours ago, Rawlos said:

Evening, moving to Australia next month. What’s the best option in transfer money to an Australian account from Uk account to get the best rate.  

Most people here seem to use Wise.

[rammygirl]

I am registered with two fx companies. One is fee free, the other (wise) charges a fee. I check both and usually paying the fee gets me more dollars in the end. When moving large sums a tiny difference in rate can make a few hundred dollars difference overall.

Register with more than one and see which works best.  Some allow you to set a rate or do regular transfers. Depends on what you need. 
Just using your bank will lose you money. 
 

[Ausimi]

The rate at the moment is good…

is there a limit on how much can you transfer whir wise ? 

[Ausvisitor]

On the app it's around £40 or £50k - can't remember exactly. I have no trouble pushing over $50k chunks (about £28k) anytime I want to (other than having enough money to do it).

 

You can do more but you have to arrange that with a person.

You can do multiple transfers in a day that as far as I can tell has no limit. (Except for the per transfer limit above on each transfer you do)

The fees are a percentage of amount transferred so doesn't matter if you do it as one bulk sum or a few smaller ones

Edited March 25, 2023 by Ausvisitor

[Ausimi]

Im thinking to cash an Isa and move it now as the rate is the best I’ve seen this year… is that a good move? Or do I wait a bit longer? 

[Ausvisitor]

Cashing in an ISA is never a good idea unless you need to, the tax benefits (whilst possibly negligible by now) grow every year.

Depends if you think you will ever move back to UK

[Ausvisitor]

It's also not as good a rate as it was 15 months ago, so it could get better

[InnerVoice]

6 hours ago, Ausimi said:

Im thinking to cash an Isa and move it now as the rate is the best I’ve seen this year… is that a good move? Or do I wait a bit longer? 

I wouldn't do that, unless you really need the money.

[rammygirl]

No advantage to an ISA unless you plan on returning to UK. The interest will by taxed by the ATO. Assuming you mean a cash isa. 

Edited March 26, 2023 by rammygirl

[InnerVoice]

9 minutes ago, rammygirl said:

No advantage to an ISA unless you plan on returning to UK. The interest will by taxed by the ATO. Assuming you mean a cash isa. 

We don't always know what the future has in store for us, or the circumstances of others. If the OP doesn't need the ISA funds then it makes sense to transfer money over from a regular savings account first.

[rammygirl]

1 hour ago, InnerVoice said:

We don't always know what the future has in store for us, or the circumstances of others. If the OP doesn't need the ISA funds then it makes sense to transfer money over from a regular savings account first.

True but they should realise that there is no tax free advantage to an isa in Australia. It depends on so many things …..

[Steve Elliott]

As a general rule, monies going into pensions/super in the UK are not taxed on entry but are taxed when you draw your pension. In Australia, it's the other way around. So, sometimes it is worth taking a hit in the early years, in order to maximise the benefit in your later years. This is a very general observation and there are exceptions. I'd strongly suggest talking to a specialist in this area. 

[InnerVoice]

 

On 26/03/2023 at 11:34, Ausimi said:

...the rate is the best I’ve seen this year… is that a good move? Or do I wait a bit longer? 

 

On 26/03/2023 at 15:43, Ausvisitor said:

It's also not as good a rate as it was 15 months ago, so it could get better

It's the best it's been for 12 months and won't go up forever. If I was moving to Australia next month I'd transfer some money now, and some nearer the time - I like to hedge my bets!

[Ausvisitor]

1 hour ago, InnerVoice said:

 

 

It's the best it's been for 12 months and won't go up forever. If I was moving to Australia next month I'd transfer some money now, and some nearer the time - I like to hedge my bets!

Which is exactly what we are doing, but moving over about $1.5m to pay for a house, so even a tiny difference makes a huge impact.

Like if we'd done the transfer at the peak of the Liz Truss debacle we would be nearly $200k worse off (and that's only 4 months ago or thereabouts)

[Manrug]

Hi we are exactly in the same situation, looking to move our money from the UK to AUD. I agree Wise rates are very good, I managed to negotiate exactly same rates with TORFX, who will match the best rates on the market.

[mxh]

I moved some money over recently and also used TorFX, but as Manrug did, I spoke to them and they matched the dollar amount that Wise were offering.

However, the main issue that I found was getting the money into a position to transfer - my bank only let me transfer £25k per day, so I had to make a decision up front as to who I was going to use, then spent several days doing transfers to get it all into the TorFX account. If you're moving $1.5m worth, then that would take you a month or so of daily transfers to get it all in a position to move - I think there was an option to do a larger transfer, but they wanted me to go into a (UK) branch - not very practical from Sydney!

[InnerVoice]

5 hours ago, Manrug said:

Hi we are exactly in the same situation, looking to move our money from the UK to AUD. I agree Wise rates are very good, I managed to negotiate exactly same rates with TORFX, who will match the best rates on the market.

 

2 hours ago, mxh said:

I moved some money over recently and also used TorFX, but as Manrug did, I spoke to them and they matched the dollar amount that Wise were offering.

Then why not just use Wise in the first place if their rates are better? The guys who set it up (Taavet Hinrikus and Kristo Käärmann) did so because they were fed up of getting ripped off by the banks every time they wanted to transfer money back to Estonia, which I think we can all relate to. The user interface on both the Wise App and PC is excellent and really easy to use. I promise I'm not on commission here! - I just think it's a good service.

Any business that states "we'll match any price" won't ever get my business. It's just another way of saying "we'll charge you more if we can get away with it!"

[mxh]

21 minutes ago, InnerVoice said:

Then why not just use Wise in the first place if their rates are better?

a) I already had an account set up with TorFX, had used them before and felt comfortable with depositing a large sum of money in their account. Not saying that Wise aren't trustworthy, but would prefer to deal with a company I'd already had a good experience with

b) Trying to set up a transfer with Wise turned out to be a frustrating experience. They wanted to see all sorts of documentation to approve a transfer and wanted me to put the money in their account first. Only then would they review the documentation to see whether they'd approve the transfer - and I'd seen a few online reviews where this process had taken weeks. 

[ramot]

9 minutes ago, mxh said:

a) I already had an account set up with TorFX, had used them before and felt comfortable with depositing a large sum of money in their account. Not saying that Wise aren't trustworthy, but would prefer to deal with a company I'd already had a good experience with

b) Trying to set up a transfer with Wise turned out to be a frustrating experience. They wanted to see all sorts of documentation to approve a transfer and wanted me to put the money in their account first. Only then would they review the documentation to see whether they'd approve the transfer - and I'd seen a few online reviews where this process had taken weeks. 

We have used Wise for a very very long time, transfer every month, as all our income comes from UK. Have never had a complaint and the money is almost always in our account in 24 hours.

can’t comment on how long to set up as it was too long ago. 
I’m not on commission either

Edited March 28, 2023 by ramot

[mxh]

3 minutes ago, ramot said:

We have used Wise for a very very long time, as all our income comes from UK. Have never had a complaint and the money is almost always in our account in 24 hours.

can’t comment on how long to set up as it was too long ago. 

I'm sure that once you've set up your account and know the process then they're fine, especially for smaller, regular amounts. But as I was trying to move a relatively large sum of money with my first transfer with them, maybe they wanted a bit more detail around it? 

But the big 'fail' for me was them not even reviewing the documentation I supplied until I'd put the money in their account - can't see why they couldn't do a 'pre-approval' to make sure they were happy that everything was in order before I go to the trouble of moving it into their account.

[InnerVoice]

6 hours ago, mxh said:

a) I already had an account set up with TorFX, had used them before and felt comfortable with depositing a large sum of money in their account. Not saying that Wise aren't trustworthy, but would prefer to deal with a company I'd already had a good experience with

b) Trying to set up a transfer with Wise turned out to be a frustrating experience. They wanted to see all sorts of documentation to approve a transfer and wanted me to put the money in their account first. Only then would they review the documentation to see whether they'd approve the transfer - and I'd seen a few online reviews where this process had taken weeks. 

Fair enough, I'd also want to feel that I trusted the company if large sums were involved. I recall when I set up my Wise account they asked for ID documents etc but I think that's standard practice these days to stop money laundering. I recall it only took a couple of days but then I opened my account a few years ago when they were still TransferWise, and I guess less popular.

When it comes to making transfers they give you a number of options. You can deposit funds in your Wise accounts first if you wish (and they also allow you to hold it in different currencies), use a bank card, or you transfer the money to their account with a reference number, which is then transferred straight to the recipient. Never had to wait longer than 24 hours for the funds to arrive, as @ramot said.

Edited March 28, 2023 by InnerVoice

[rammygirl]

Initial set up takes a while with all legit fx companies now as rules have changed. I have moved large sums with wise no issues.  You can always set it up with a small transfer anyway so you have the option in the future.  Their travel card is also good.

[ramot]

21 hours ago, mxh said:

I'm sure that once you've set up your account and know the process then they're fine, especially for smaller, regular amounts. But as I was trying to move a relatively large sum of money with my first transfer with them, maybe they wanted a bit more detail around it? 

But the big 'fail' for me was them not even reviewing the documentation I supplied until I'd put the money in their account - can't see why they couldn't do a 'pre-approval' to make sure they were happy that everything was in order before I go to the trouble of moving it into their account.

 

21 hours ago, mxh said:

 

I was making the point that even if we were  only using them to send ‘smaller regular amounts’ the company has never ever let us down since we started with Transferwise in 2016. That’s what has given us the confidence to actually send far larger amounts over the years with complete confidence. 

Edited March 28, 2023 by ramot