After a rather lengthy search on the subject, I gave up and decided to start a new tread - sincerest apologies, if my question below has already been covered.
For background: I recurringly receive GBP/USD bank checks for small amounts, and sometimes need smallish amounts of cash in GBP/USD. I live in Switzerland, and I do not have bank accounts in the UK or the US. I've heard that many Swiss banks including Postfinance offer GBP and USD accounts with a possibility to deposit bank checks. However, I don't know if they offer cash withdrawal from these accounts, or what are their fees for depositing the bank checks.
So, back to my question. Is there a way to convert, for example, a bank check of 345 GBP to 345 GBP of cash in Basel? Or, failing that, at least to (345 − X) GBP of cash, where X is some reasonably small number?
Many thanks for your response, Wallabies. I am certain that immediate cashout of a bank check in foreign currency will incur a very high fee in any country, with or without modern banking. Hence I am seeking to divide this transaction to several parts to bring the cost down, and would be very thankful for advice on any of these parts, for example
- What is the lowest fee you have observed for depositing a bank check to a Swiss foreign currency account?
- Do you know any banks that allow withdrawal of foreign currency (other than EUR) from a foreign currency account with no or small fees?
The big cost is not because it's in a different currency, but because the check is issued by a bank in a different country. [So, eg if you had a GBP check from credit suisse switzerland and presented this to ubs switzerland it is straightforward]. The check will most likely be sent to a corresponding bank in the country of issue who will cash it and then transfer the money to your swiss bank. Also it will not be immediate you will have to wait a long time for it to clear and a big fee as mentioned.
Withrdawing from a foreign currency for no fee - you can transfer from the gbp account to your chf account and withrdaw swiss franks - no fee except the exchange rate you may get may not be ideal. Withdrawing directly from GBP account in GBP cash - a quite large fee, typically a percentage of the amount. But what will you do with the GBP cash anyway?
By far the best solution will be to take a plane for ~150chf and go to UK and open a 'basic' UK account with online banking (you will need proof of address so a CH utlitly bill required). Then you either post the checks to them, or take a plane once a month to deposit them yourself. With 5-10 checks at a swiss fee CHF 50 each, it is by far cheaper. If you need to take money out, you can then use uk online banking to transfer the deposited amounts to switzerland.
Good luck with that is theses days of money laundering, I am a Brit with existing UK accounts and needed another for a specific purpose and I tried my own bank ( ), Lloyds, Barclays (UK and International) RBS, Halifax, and Santander (UK and International and all said the same thing, "no way for a non UK resident".
I paid a Euro cheque into my UBS euro account and they charge me CHF 35 for the privilege, bless em'. You can have a GBP denominated account here, and to save losing a chunk in bank admin fee's can the people sending the funds just make a e transfer to that account?
The cheapest option I have found so far has been Postfinance - I was told by their representative that they charge 1% of the amount plus a fixed sum of 5 CHF for postal delivery of cash from your personal GBP account. However, this option remains to be tested, and having frequently been ripped off by banks in the past, I won't believe it until I see...
To my understanding, a person residing outside the UK cannot open a bank account in the UK. However, if anyone knows an exception to this rule, I would love to know. (My PM box is wide open for suggestions, if necessary.)
Umm...what does one usually do with cash? :-) I travel to the UK fairly frequently, but all Swiss credit card companies charge abominable fees for foreign transactions, plus have a GBP/CHF spread straight from hell.
Papa Goose: that's a great suggestion! I would certainly prefer transfers to bank cheques - too bad it does not suit the other party in this case :-(
On a related note...does anyone know if UBS or other Swiss banks offer USD accounts? I sometimes received cash payments in USD and would like to deposite these in a bank and not keep all the cash on hand.
Then best to deposit them with a UK bank, and use a UK debit card when you visit UK. No CH, no fees.
It is possible to open a UK account for non-residents, though the biggest problem is proving who you are and where you live to their satisfaction. You need to visit big central branches who will know. Also the range of accounts is smaller (eg all e-savings accounts say 'for uk residents only'). Two possibilities, there may be others, google for more specialised forums (like UK expats). Also info was ok about 1.5 years ago. Barclays International (now 'Wealth'), a branch opposite Harrods. They offer sterling current account (with chequebook and debit card) and foreign accounts, with a choice of Barclays UK or Barclays isle of man. Small monthly fee, waived if you transfer over 20-30k or so (can be in Eur or Chf). HSBC - they open an account but give you a 'certification form' which you have to take to your local (non UK) hsbc branch have the manager attach it to your utility bill copy and certify that this is genuine.
Yes USD current account costs 3 chf per month. Cash deposits at the counter of USD into a USD account are charged at 2% of the value up to 1000, 1% thereafter. It's on their website.
Just had an interesting experience: having carefully kept my UK current account with cheque facilities when I went abroad to work 15+ years ago, using our ongoing family home in UK as the address (my wife and kids live there and I visit regularly) I ran out of cheques this week and asked Santander for a new cheque book. It was refused on the grounds that my credit score was insufficient - nothing has changed in my circumstances except that last October I passed the magic date of being oit of the UK for 15 years on which date I finally lost any vote in the UK. That fact seems to have been passed to Experian etc and was enough to trigger - on the routine check now made before a cheque book is issued - awareness that I was 'not on the Electoral Roll'. I have not been on the normal Electoral Roll since 1998 but was still on the Register of Overseas Electors until last October. Coming off that seems to have triggered a drop in my credit score and a block on a new cheque book despite nothing else being different and Santander happily sending me cheques all these 15 years past! So don't assume that even if you have managed to get or keep a UK account that it is stable and safe from being changed.
FYI the carriage return key is over on the right of the keyboard.
But I'm interested, as I'm just a couple of years off that myself. Can't remember the last time I wrote a cheque, mind, but I still have a couple of S/Os on the account, and use it for electronic payments in the UK from time to time.
Where I differ, though, is that I changed my address with the bank at the time I moved, so they're quite aware that I'm not a UK resident, whereas in your case it may have seemed like you were falsely claiming to be so.
I managed to open a Lloyds account in the UK by using a friend ́s address in the UK. Full story in German >>here<< .
If I were you I ́d try to open a basic current account in the UK and lodge the cheques there.
If you want to send money from your UK-GBP account to your CH-CHF account, use currencyfair.com (or the like).
That should cover your UK-issue.
About the US I have an idea, but not sure if it ́s a good one: I have a free USD-account with www.dab-bank.de (they also do GBP!). They charge moderate fees for cheques, and you can convert USD (and/or GBP) into EUR, which you could then transfer into CHF via currencyfair, or use as EUR locally in Germany/the rest of the EUR-zone. Considering you live in Basel, this could be quite attractive. (I hate not knowing fees - I say "moderate" because I lodged some US-cheques a long time ago, and I didn ́t feel totally fleeced. Don ́t remember how much it was though.)
How did you manage that? I tried, but I was refused without local residence :/
I had assorted old cheques too, some from banks since taken over by Santander, and they honoured them but this week all cheques - old and new - ran out, hence the current situation.
The Santander current account started as a Giro account in the mid 1990s and transited through Alliance and Leicester to Santander: Giro were well aware I was non-resident and happy for me to continue using the Liverpool address (where my wife who has not followed me around as I have worked my way around the globe was still living) because post to Kazakhstan in 1997 was totally hopeless. We also have a joint account with Santander and I specifically went into the branch to tell them that I was non-resident and so they should stop deducting tax at source and filled in the relevant forms to that effect. I was not asked to provide an overseas address.
Since nothing else in my situation has changed in the last 18 months, I suspect that what has triggered the vanishing UK chequebook is indeed the Electoral Registration Office in Liverpool finally removing me from the Electoral Roll after they sent me the usual postal vote request form and I wrote back saying I couldn't submit it this time because I had been non-resident since Oct. 1998.
Just also heard that my bank in the Isle of Man is being closed down by the Coop in its current rationalisation exercise. Never rains but it pours, it seems .....
Probably because I moved 25 years ago and I'd had a Lloyds account for about 15 years before that.
Oddly one of the conditions of doing ebanking with them is that you are resident in the UK and one of the verification methods for opening my Lloyds ebanking account was to phone me in Switzerland in about 2000! But that's the way they have always operated, if that's the corrected word.
Also when making a payment online their automated dialler calls my Swiss landline to verify the conformation onscreen number...
Funny. I gave them my UK mobile number. Thanks to www.togglemobile.co.uk I have free incoming calls in Switzerland.
I wonder why they have so much trouble in dealing with non-residents? Whatever the matter - it ́s doable, and the OP could otherwise use www.dab-bank.de for both UK and US-related cheques.
I visited my bank in London last week, because they said they'd sent a cheque book weeks ago. They even told me they'd sent a replacement and yet another replacement. I didn't receive one though.
Turns out they are not allowed to send cheque books out of the country, but my bank took half an hour on the computer to find that out, as noone seemed to be aware of it.
Their cental depot told them they'd dispatched the chequebooks, but they were in fact defaulting to an old address of mine in the UK, even though they knew my new one.
Hope your bank is a bit more efficient and doesn't impose regulations they don't bother to make their overseas customers aware of.
I haven't lived in the UK for 25 years but kept my UK account with Nationwide. Never had any problems and they've sent me chequebooks to all of the four European countries I've lived in.
I've always given them my current address and it's never been an issue. I was on the register of overseas electors initially but nothing changed even when I was no longer eligible.
I endorse this. The staff there are very friendly and the website is designed to be easy to use. You just need the two bank accounts and the initial setup of the CurrencyFair you will need to show some utilities bills to prove your address.
It is super transparent because you know exactly how much of the other currency you get and how much the transfer outward costs.
If you don't like the offers currently on the marketplace, you can put up your own and wait to see if someone converting in the other direction will take it.