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Q: Why is it so damn hard to send money home? Any advice?
Incompetent desk staff at Bank of China first offered me an internet bank account when I created one last year, but I declined and chose the basic account instead. Mistake. When I later wanted to convert it to internet banking, I got the "foreigners can't" stonewall. I believed they were mistaken, but even the head office in this city followed suit with this 'rule'.
I tried other banks with good rep among expats: ICBC is reportedly the best for exchanging currency, because it doesn't require everything to be converted into dollars first. Surprisingly, ABC bank seemed like the most workable, as they're the one with the Western Union desk. Last time, my wife accompanied me, and she could easily transfer cash to a pal back in Holland. But they advised me that if I go there alone, I'm only allowed to send $500 per transaction (so, laowai are forced to pay the $20 fee for every $500, while locals only have to pay $20 for sending up to $1000).
My wife has internet banking accounts with ABC and the others, but when we searched for my bank in their massive drop-down list (Rabobank, #1 in Netherlands), it wasn't there.
My pal recently told me that he isn't able to pick up Western Union remissions for me every month or so, and I can't blame him. So, I need a way to transfer money directly to my bank in the Netherlands. My wife is expecting our 2nd child, so I'd rather not drag her to a city bank again unless it's one-time-only and I know exactly what I'm doing.
I don't live in a bigger city, so I don't know many expats locally, and small-city bank staff may be a tad more inexperienced/incompetent dealing with foreigners (though the customer service in Chendgu seems equally dismal). If you guys know what's best to do, please let me know.
10 years 9 weeks ago in Money & Banking - China
Try China Merchants Bank. More info on CMB:
http://answers.echinacities.com/question/laowai-friendly-bank-china
coineineagh:
CMB is different from MCB?
http://space.echinacities.com/112794/blog/detail/1591
Anyhow, I don't have 50k to put on it, so that doesn't help.
icnif77:
At CMB you can open Gold account with 1000 Rmb deposit, and ATM card with Visa/Mc logo. One of the futures of the account is 'if balance on the account is lower than 50 000 Rmb, there is monthly fee of 50 Rmb'.
You can hold minimum balance, but you must pay 50 Rmb monthly fee. You can add your Dutch account to your CMB online banking account, and transfer money online.
coineineagh:
So, I'll be paying 50/month. And then? Easy online bank transfers?
Try China Merchants Bank. More info on CMB:
http://answers.echinacities.com/question/laowai-friendly-bank-china
coineineagh:
CMB is different from MCB?
http://space.echinacities.com/112794/blog/detail/1591
Anyhow, I don't have 50k to put on it, so that doesn't help.
icnif77:
At CMB you can open Gold account with 1000 Rmb deposit, and ATM card with Visa/Mc logo. One of the futures of the account is 'if balance on the account is lower than 50 000 Rmb, there is monthly fee of 50 Rmb'.
You can hold minimum balance, but you must pay 50 Rmb monthly fee. You can add your Dutch account to your CMB online banking account, and transfer money online.
coineineagh:
So, I'll be paying 50/month. And then? Easy online bank transfers?
I think I have explained this twice already but with newer forum members it's worth another submission.
I opened a Chinese Paypal account. I opened an account in China with the Construction bank.
I already had an Australian Paypal account that was connected to my Australian bank account.
I Send money through my Chinese Paypal to my Australian Paypal. That transaction links me to the Construction bank account and the transfer is done through the Chinese Paypal.
Within 15 seconds the money is in my Australian Paypal.
Then I transfer from there to my Australian Bank account. The money is in My Australian bank account within 2 - 3 days. From there I can do what I like with it.
Yes, there are some minor fees and exchange rate profits by concerned parties but you are going to get that anyway doing it any other way. The fact that I don't have to leave my apartment and bang heads with people working in Chinese banks makes it well worth my small costs.
This works in both Canada and the USA by the way because we have a group of us doing that!
Any questions - ask me!
coineineagh:
Thanks, I'll look into this. My old PayPal account with my Dutch bank has some ID issues to clear up, but it's worth solving them.
Shining_brow:
I need to add to this - I've been trying to use PP for a while now, and had very mixed success. When it works, it works well! I managed (once) to transfer out about $3000AUD in one go!
However, on other occasions, Paypal has automatically reversed the transaction - NO REASON WHY! When complained about, still no answers! They even LIED to me about it, saying the 'receiver' did not accept the payment.... I sent from one account, logged off, logged into my other account - and it was already done! Still no explanation. And certainly no change of the reversal!! Paypal just does NOT give a damn about its customers!
So, deal with Paypal very very cautiously, and try to find a different way!
WanderingTeacher:
You are a genius!
How do I connect a chinese paypal to my chinese bank account. The only information I have on my bank account is my ICBC debit card.
DaqingDevil:
That connection is done online through your Chinese Paypal site. When you want to connect to your Chinese bank account you will be given only 3 or 4 options in the drop box - all of which are Chinese banks. You need to know the Chinese characters for your bank's name ok?
A coupleof things I have noticed in the threads and comments that I will clear up for you all.
1. DO NOT use your VPN to transact through Chinese Paypal and Construction Bank.
2. You will need to download the Taobao browser because the Construction Bank put some sort of stoppage on Chrome, IE and Firefox accessing their banking site. Downloading the Taobao browser might require a little help from a Chinese friend.
I just spent 5 weeks in Australia and the Philippines and I used this method to shift money around in all my accounts. Takes me no more than 3 minutes for this transaction.
OK, so I finally got my Dutch PayPal account fully reactivated, but the PayPal staff warned me that it will likely be restricted again as soon as I log in from China. How do you guys do it? VPN?
coineineagh:
My Dutch account wasrestricted the first time I logged in in China. Took me ages to fully reactivate. you need VPN in China if you have a foreign PayPal account.
This PayPal thing is taking bloody forever. Finally got my and my wife's PayPal accounts up and working, only to find out I'll need a credit card to put money on it (old card is expired). I looked at the Green Dot MoneyPak thing, but aside from getting my hopes up for a while, it seems to only be available in america. Does anybody know if WalMart sells them in China?
You've confirmed my own reservations. Just another thing that should be chucked into the too hard basket.
Why not just buy a house?
Actually I have transferred money before...from bank to bank. Just needed lots of numbers and proof I was legally employed in China. And quite a bit of time.
Next time I'm going to put money into a Chinese person's account and then they can transfer it to my Australian account with only one fee and no amount limit.
This might not work.
We went to ABC bank and send out 24.000 Euros to my account in Cz. no one question nothing. My wife was the sender, my account in Cz is private account. It took 3 hrs to delivery them in my acc ...
the fee was about 180rmb
This may not help you, but it may help others.
In my city, there's a branch of a bank we have back home. So, I asked them all about transferring back home, and I've been told there are lower fees for transferring to the same bank back home, slightly higher fees if it's a different bank, and not sure about other countries. Apparently, no limits on sending either (odd!), and opening the account would be easy. Even had an English speaking staff member!!
As far as fees were concerned, if I'm sending back amounts over about 18,000 RMB, it becomes cheaper than Paypal.
So, while it might not work for you, see if there is one of your banks somewhere (Shanghai, Beijing, etc), and save up and send in 1 go.
China Construction Bank or Bank of China will help you. I got the "foreigners can't do this" stonewall as well, so I went to another branch and opened another account.
coineineagh:
Do CCB and BoC both have English websites for us to use? BoC is the one that originally stonewalled me, but they may have forgotten about their 'rule' if I try to open a new account...
Hulk:
I don't know, I always went and just wrote broken Chinese for them.
coineineagh:
I'm applying at the CCB, and they seem receptive to offering me a credit card. I enlisted the aid of my boss, who made some headway with them, and will help me meet their criteria. Hopefully I'll finally get a creditcard, then all my efforts with PayPal won't be in vain either.
Hulk:
That's great news! Glad to hear things are going well for you. 
I don't knw which country you want to transfer.
Can you say ?
Does anyone know if HSBC in Shanghai is any good for sending money home?
And do you actually have to have an account yourself to wire money from say a China Construction bank to Europe for instance?
Thanks
I decided to resurrect one of my oldest Questions rather than start a new one for this. I tried and tested 3 money sending methods now, so I can offer the results.
1 WESTERN UNION: Rules differ per bank office you step in to, but in my little city, they said $15 per $500 I send. In practice they send max 480, as the fee is incorporated and they also stay $5 under the 500 mark for whatever reason.
Keep in mind that the fee is doubled (arbitrarily because I'm a foreigner), and guidelines for Chinese nationals is $15 fee for up to $1000. Money exchange is done quite favourably, so I'd estimate that the costs are around 3-4% for expats, and 2-3% for nationals, assuming you send the max amount. One remission per day allowed, but if you bring a friend, two senders sending to one receiver *should* be acceptable.
For my family, travel time and cost should be taken into account, because there is only one office in the whole city and our house is in the county, an hour's drive away. Also, there is only one worker who randomly leaves for Chengdu, so it's best to call ahead and make sure she'll be there. Apparrently nobody but her is allowed to do the work. Or maybe she's the only employee in the bank who gets paid by Western Union to maintain an office there. Either way it's mega customer unfriendly. Oh and bring your passport - police may accept a colour photocopy as ID, but not banks.
2) PAYPAL: This method was mentioned here on eChina. After attempting it, I quickly regretted it. We sent a sum of 1500 euro from my wife's Chinese PayPal to my Dutch Paypal while I was in Holland (don't try to acces your PayPal account in China without VPN or it gets locked and you need to jump through hoops to prove your identity). Upon receipt, the money can then be transferred to your bank account, which I believe was free.
Anyway, my wife calculated that the total of fees taken away, by the banks and mostly PayPal, amounted to 912RMB. I received 1422 of the 1500euro sent in transit. It's possible that there may be some form of family account linkage method that we overlooked, but unless we overlooked such a thing, this method is way too expensive. It cost us around 10%, to send the money as a payment from one non-commercial account to another.
3) ALIPAY: This is China's form of PayPal, and you'll need a Chinese partner or at least some ability to make use of this as a foreigner. AliPay sends a transfer directly to your bank. It takes 1-5 working days to be processed, which was 2 days in my case. I received 1038 of the 1050 euro my wife sent, which together with AliPay's basic fee, amounted to 129RMB.
Keep in mind that this method is completed online, meaning it also saves you time and money traveling.
In conclusion: If you have a Chinese partner, definitely get them to send money via Alipay. Otherwise WU is probably your best option.
The PayPal method is the only one where the CCP can't track the money flow, but you pay a high price for this anonymity.
Anyone have other methods worth mentioning? Remember that this topic is about regular people like teachers sending moderate amounts of money home, so don't tell us we're doing it wrong because you could send $50.000 home free of charge with your business account...
icnif77:
I'll suggest China Merchants Bank Gold Debit account with Visa/Mc ATM card. I believe, you can make transfer to your Dutch account for much less fee, but I'm not in the know of the fee amount. Bank to bank transfer is much cheaper than all Ali-transfers.
On CMB Gold you can hold any currency you desire, and exchange is done by 'spot exc. rate' no fee applies. Limit for exchange is US$50 000/year.
CMB Gold account impose 50 Rmb monthly fee, if (total) balance on the account is lower than 50 000 Rmb.
See thread 'laowai friendly bank' for more on CMB Gold account. You could also visit CMB, and ask about funds transfer. They have an English speaker anywhere I've visited them.
I told that already once! LOLOL
Shining_brow:
Icnif - how much are they paying you?? CMB and HedgeZero... I suspect, at wumao per post,you'll be on close to a million by now... :p
Coin - I've tried a couple (but not WU). NB - to Australia, not Europe.
ICBC charged about 400RMB in fees IIRC, and I knew the exchange rate. No commissions (just the fees). Took hours to do on my own, and was limited. Having a local do it still took just as long, and as much - but I could send more.
Paypal is my preferred at the moment. Extremely quick - out from my Chinese PP account, linked to my ABC card, and in my Aus PP account in seconds (ie, by the time I've logged out of Chinese and into my Aus account, the money is there). took about a week to get from PP to my account in Aus. Cost me about 3% (I had a rough idea of exchange rates... 10% is way high, and never was that bad!) I had a couple of issues early on, but after some complaint emails, and talking to a customer rep (who I proved didn't know what he was doing -"you can't transfer from a credit card"... "It's not a credit card!" - I think he had 3 reasons not to accept the transfer - I countered all 3 reasons with logic and looking at ToC) I don't have issues now. I haven't found a limit to how much I can send in 1 go. (I think the most so far was about $6000 Au/30,000RMB in one transfer).
andyinshenyang:
An alternative to Western Union is Moneygram. I've used them a couple of times for sending money in both directions and they were cheaper than WU for me. You can send them from Bank of China and a couple of other banks - maybe CMB and China Everbright.
coineineagh:
Well, I suspected PayPal had some problem. You managed to set things straight, but my wife doesn't want to go near it anymore.
icnif77:
@Shining: 'if you'll pay me more (not to post it anymore),
I'll reconsider.'
'0H' had 'can't access server' message yesterday. I was afraid 'great wall' block it, because of 'real time' reporting from Chin-ex, buTT.....today is open again.
Now, I'm afraid c&p button on my puter will get burned, because I want you all to know the things, and as you say 'my written Englo has issues'. O2, o2 = 'lack of oxygen in my area'.
Once somebody said: 'doesn't matter how you turn, your arse is always behind (you)'.
I'll might suffocate today.
Englteachted:
Please do not give this information out in the open. Think
icnif77:
@tits: which one? about '0H' block? It looks like it was problem with US server.
Few years ago, somebody asked here about porn sites. We exchanged few links and all get blocked the same day. So, we had to readjust our warning about posting web links on Public.
I miss Bloomberg and 'Jesse's Cafe Americain' in China. It was my read in US and EU.
icnif77:
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-07-08/what-first-world-cyber-war-looks-global-real-time-cyber-attack-map
After a series of cyber failures involving first UAL, then this website, then the NYSE which is still halted, then the WSJ, some have suggested that this could be a concerted cyber attack (perhaps by retaliatory China unhappy its stocks are plunging) focusing on the US. So we decided to look at a real-time cyber attack map courtesy of Norsecorp which provides real time visibility into global cyber attacks.
Used CCB. Got girlfriend to send it. Was really easy and no problem She used her Chinese ID. Can send up to 50,000 USD per year. Gotta pay 100 yuan transaction fee and 0.01% of transaction amount. Not quite sure why you're having problems.
icnif77:
And Ali add fee most likely to the existing bank's fee. I don't know much about Ali, but fee is large, IMO.
It's not 'beloved CMB'. Their 'currency spot exc. rate' is lower than the lowest HK's exchange for cash Rmb, not only to HK$, but to any other currency. That's enough for me!
Imagine: ''the 'smartest' thing is to travel to HK with cash Rmb, and exchange it in the city, not Luohu.'' I travel only with CMB ATM card, and get better exchange than all of you just by running my card for purchases. I rarely do cash withdrawals.
Same in EU and UK. If you'll travel to UK with cash Rmb, you'll most likely bring back to China whole Rmb wad, because of the exchange rate. Me: 'spot exchange rate' by using CMB ATM card.
Heathrow Jan. 2015 exchange rate Rmb to UK P(ound) = over 11 Rmb for 1UK (I can't recall the exact number). Me through CMB Gold account: 1UK = 9.1 Rmb. A bit less than 20% difference. 'u sheep, me not'
dunno why you have so much trouble. I send out many times and big amount of cash through BoC and ICBC.
I transfered to my wifes acc first and then to overseas - took about 3 days. Fee has to be paid in both countries - china is cheaper
