Occasional sums of money to French bank account

[Steve]

Did look for this but everything I found seemed to refer to regular or large amounts!

We need to pay money into our French bank account occasionally to pay utilities, grass cutting etc. No more than 1K euros at a time and maybe only 2-3 times a year. What is the best (cheapest!) way to accomplish this?

Many thanks!

 

 

[Mersons]

We set up a thing called TAPS before we left the UK six years ago, I think it means Trans Account Payment System or something like that.  It's a bit like paying a bill, but into the account you specify.  It costs nothing and you get the bank rate.  It was our bank who suggested it and we used to pay £5 per transaction, but they did away with the charge at some point.  We move money into our french account as and when we need it and it takes five or six working days to transfer.  There's a transfer limit of £10,000.

Sheila 

[Gluestick]

There isn't really a "cheap" way to achieve this!

It's really a case of the least expensive!

It would really be better if you could transfer just one tranche of money per year.

Mrs G is an ex bank employee and is fortunate enough to enjoy a range of preferential services, which include no serve charge for setting up a electronic transfer: there is also no charge for foreign exchange dealing, excepting, naturally, being ripped off on the rate!

All those advantages taken into account, once the transfer hits Credit Agricole's regional centre, we get clobbered to receive the funds!

You could try Hifx for example. 

www.hifx.co.uk

Failing that, you can look at drawing local currency from a debit card and simply paying it into your French bank when you are there. Expensive way of doing it though.

 

[Juswundrin]

We use, and would recommend, moneybookers.com; if you do a search, it's been discussed here before.

[AnOther]

Assuming you're visiting France from time to time it sounds like an ideal use for a Nationwide A/C to me.............[;-)]

Just put what you need into it in UK then draw it out from a Fench ATM to pay into your bank. Bank rate and zero charges.

Due to bad planning on my part I had to do just what you are asking about a while back and sent €1000 by HiFX. I got a (relatively) shi**ty rate because it was such a small sum and paid the fee too, can't remember offhand what it was but £20 seems to ring a bell.

[AnOther]

TAPS

Suggests that it's more of a business tool than for individuals but worth investigating. Apparently UK HMRC use TAPS to send tax credits and such like to non UK bank A/C/s.

"Transcontinental Automated Payment Service (TAPS)

Bank of Scotland's TAPS service is ideal for businesses that make regular, low value, high volume overseas payments, such as salaries, pensions and dividends, to overseas beneficiaries. TAPS enables payments to be credited direct to personal bank accounts in their local currency at a low cost.

More information

For more information on our international payment services, please call our Product Information Line on 0845 604 4499"

[Pads]

We just take a lump sum in pounds or dollars and pay it straight into our bank account each time we go out , they are happy with this and we always get a good exchange rate. 

[AnOther]

Dead simple of course but I doubt you get as good a rate as through Nationwide, plus you can avoid carrying all that cash around.

Next time you do it make a point of checking on the bank rate for the day on HiFX or somewhere similar to see what you got in relation.