Mike Mahoney wrote:
Thanks again for the replies .. in particular the overseas answers as I had no idea that the European payment process used wire transfers so much. Here in North America virtually all invoices are paid by cheque.
What are the SWIFT, IBAN, BIC codes?
Mike
BIC = Bank identification code (interchangeable with SWIFT)
IBAN = International bank account number (to identify your account)
I get all my payments via wire transfer as most of my clients are foreign. It's not a problem. If you are worried you can simply open an account just for transfers and then move any money into another account as soon as it is deposited. That way the account is always empty.
My only suggestion is to include the bank fees for international wire tranfer with your invoice. I do this all the time with international clients that do not draw funds from a US based bank. Like this the $15-20 fee don't come out of your pocket but are additional. Otherwise, i barely wrote or received checks in Germany, maybe a bit more in France in the 80-90's, the US are way behind with direct payments to bank accounts (BTW, Conde Nast is just in the process of changing that).
best
Mark
Three thousand invoices and you have never heard of Paypal? Every customer always pays with a check? This seems a little old-fashioned. Checks are insecure because they have the bank account number written right on them. They also provide little or no security if they get lost in the mail (especially from Europe) and you have no insurance against a bounce. I think a wire transfer is OK, but perhaps you should look into an escrow.
I checked with my Canadian bank and there is no charge to receive the transfer and they set me up the the SWIFT code, institution & transit numbers which I forwarded to the client. So I should be good to go.
Now that I know it's a common payment method overseas I'm not as concerned.
mdude85 wrote:
Three thousand invoices and you have never heard of Paypal? Every customer always pays with a check? This seems a little old-fashioned.
I live on planet earth so yes I've heard of PayPal but have never had a commercial client pay with anything other than a cheque. Ever. And I would expect that is the experience of the majority of North American businesses. And I agree it is old-fashioned.
I try to do as much of my own banking payments as possible electronically .. prefering to use a bank EFT or online bill payment.
I personally write very few cheques myself, but do pay all my commercial invoices with a cheque.
Mike
I have 3 checking accounts.One is strictly for sending and receiving wire transfers. I think that it is the safest way to transfer $$ and with minimal costs.
The Federal E system that wires travel over here in the states is very secure. The funds go from point A to B passing through nodules that are like one way trap doors. They can go one way but not backwards (can't be recalled - unless a bank makes a mistake or there is fraud involved), and they don't 'bounce'. Once the funds are in your account - they are there - period. As an additional precaution, you can then quickly move those funds to another account or withdraw them...leaving an empty account. So even if someone has your banks routing # and your personal account # and want to attempt something fraudulent, there's nothing to remove.
As another post mentioned, whenever you hand or send anyone a check it has all your account info on it as well, but nobody seems to worry about that.
Checks can be lost, stolen, and forged. As can Money Orders, Postal money orders, and Cashiers Checks. People have a false sense of security with these.
Paypal charges high fees and soon so will Google checkout. Why pay them?
Bank wires are GREAT! I wish more FMers would get used to using them.
My bank doesn't charge me for outgoing wires and they have a nominal $12 fee for incoming wires - very fair IMHO.
Paypal is fine for small purchases..but on big ones the fees are silly. And plenty of people have problems with Paypal. Having personal control and doing it yourself with bank wires is the teets.
Try it...you'll like it!
Most banks will allow you to open additional checking or savings accounts for free...so it's very easy to get set up.
The Nigerian scam artists have really given bank wires a bad and undeserving name recently - and that's what comes to mind for a lot of people.
In the US, all the info you need to send someone $$ is their banks "routing" number and the individuals "account" number. To send outside of the US, the routing number is called a SWIFT number.
Hope this helps.
Cheers,
Scott
Anon Moss wrote:
Paypal charges high fees and soon so will Google checkout. Why pay them?
Bank wires are GREAT! I wish more FMers would get used to using them.
My bank doesn't charge me for outgoing wires and they have a nominal $12 fee for incoming wires - very fair IMHO.
Paypal is fine for small purchases..but on big ones the fees are silly.
At a 3% incoming rate for payment on Paypal, a $12 fee would be applied to a transfer of $400. I suppose it depends on how much you use Paypal but I consider $400 to be a pretty large transfer. So in that respect I don't consider the fees to be *that* silly compared to an incoming wire fee. Is this $12 fee on all incoming wires regardless of amount? Imagine paying a $12 fee on a $12 wire!!
I'm surprised, no shocked really. What kind of insecurity is there in the US in letting others know your bankaccount info? It's like a phone number, really. People can wire you money, but there really is no way for anybody else to take money out of it, realistically. In Holland, companies typically include banking info in their letterheads, together with their address and chamber of commerce registrationno.
If I want to wire money to anyone in Europe, I log into my bank account through a secure internet connection, provide the details and boom, it's done. Nationally it takes seconds, within Europe it takes 1 to 3 days. For almost no charges at all using the IBAN (international bank account number, replaces the BIC/SWIFT-account number combo) - nationally outgoing payments are something like € 0,01, with the first €100,= free.
Come to think of it, my bank stopped using checks altogether a few years back. It's either cash, credit/debit card or wire transfer.
Hey Dude :-)
Yes, my bank's fee is $12 per incoming regardless of size. Outgoing is free, so since I have about an equal amount of incoming and outgoing...the average fee for me is around $6...again - quite reasonable IMHO. Of course, the person on the other end of the wire may have to pay a fee as well, and that has to be taken into consideration.
Obviously, I wouldn't need or want to use a wire for a $12 transaction. Paypal is fine for those...and yes, transactions of $400 and below would be a wash.
I've had approx 20K in transactions in the last few months, and find that the bank wires work well while saving me 3% third party fees that I view as completely unnecessary. I also feel safer and better using MY bank and the people that I personally know versus a faceless and distant Paypal wherever possible. Besides, some of the faces at my local branch are quite nice!
Cheers,
Scott
Rijsberman wrote:
I'm surprised, no shocked really. What kind of insecurity is there in the US in letting others know your bankaccount info?
It is absolutely silly. Stupid even!! The standard line is that it is due to security; which is the same excuse that is being used for everything these days. And when there is a change, they see it as another opportunity to charge more fees ever though more often than not it is actually reducing their operating expenses. It's an embarrassment.
My second bank requires a paper form for each transaction (to complete an electronic transfer), plus a photo ID. I need to find a new bank - This is the stone ages!!
mdude85 wrote:
At a 3% incoming rate for payment on Paypal, a $12 fee would be applied to a transfer of $400. I suppose it depends on how much you use Paypal but I consider $400 to be a pretty large transfer. So in that respect I don't consider the fees to be *that* silly compared to an incoming wire fee. Is this $12 fee on all incoming wires regardless of amount? Imagine paying a $12 fee on a $12 wire!!
Most people aren't being paid across national borders for jobs of $400 and under. The average wire transfers I've been receiving from clients are in the $10,000 to $40,000 range, and I'd rather pay a flat fee on that than a percentage fee.
It's also nice being able to send a wire in the destination currency. As my vendors in the UK are billing me in GBP, it's better to wire out GBP than write a check for USD and attempt to do my own currency conversion.
I wouldn't even bother charging a $12 fee. It isn't worth the time it'd take to process the invoice.
Rijsberman wrote:
What kind of insecurity is there in the US in letting others know your bankaccount info? It's like a phone number, really. People can wire you money, but there really is no way for anybody else to take money out of it, realistically.
Maybe time to rethink that .. identity theft is becoming a large problem in North America, and a bank account number is a prime piece of information to identity theives.
Basically they build a profile on you from many different sources of information (including garbage cans) and then assume your identity for a brief period of time to use your credit and withdraw money on your accounts without your knowledge.
Probably the biggest growth in white collar crime is in the areas of identity theft. Hence my initial reluctance to part with my account numbers.
And even though all our bank account information is on the cheques we mail every day, it is important to note that we choose who we send these cheques to .. often a utility or other institution with no motivation to steal any of our banking information.
Mike
Mike,
When you "send a cheque" even to someone that you "choose", it can easily be intercepted, lost or stolen. If it does arrive at it's destination (which granted most of them do)...the "utility" or "institution" could easily have unethical employees who grab a little personal information here and there. Like a restaurant employee who goes in the back and swipes all of your card information while you are paying the bill. In my mind, the wire transfer system is much safer than cheques, all things considered. I still use checks, and don't plan on giving them up any time soon...but for the bigger ticket transactions, wires are great.
My 2 cents...
Cheers
Scott
The main problem as I see it is not the giving of your account numbers but the email that perishes you into giving them your code to access your account,
what I have done is set up a separate account for just such transactions and keep it separate from my main account, I also link my PayPal account to that checking account, and try to keep very little in it.
I once gave my password to a email that sure looked like eBay cost me about 100.00 before I found out. If you get a email from anyone saying your account will close unless you send them your information, no matter how legit it looks report it, it’s a scam.
Just my .99 cents
I do a fair amount of international business and have also had requests for wire transfers, and was very paranoid about giving my bank acct details to a stranger. In the end, a simple solution was this: Open a new account with your bank and put $100 in it. Use this account for incoming wire transfers, and know with certainty that the absolute worst that could ever happen is that someone would scam you for $100 (unlikely), but still a warm/fuzzy feeling. After receipt of the transfer, simply move it to your main account. It has worked like a charm for me since I started doing this. Good luck.
but have never had a commercial client pay with anything other than a cheque. Ever. And I would expect that is the experience of the majority of North American businesses. And I agree it is old-fashioned.