Changing Bank

[The Soup Dragon]

I would be keen to know members thoughts on which banks they use. We are with HSBC and export Worldwide. Whenever anyone pays us by bank transfer from overseas HSBC charge us £6 no matter what size the payment in is. They also make other charges too and we are currently coughing up about £10K a year. I have thought about changing bank a few times but it is not a small matter. Id be keen to know who others bank with and if they are happy with the service.

SD

 

[fisicx]

Keep HSBC and use Wise for international transfers.

I also have Revolut as this works better for some clients.

 

[Newchodge]

You might like to look at Starling. I have found them really good. They have US$ and EUR accounts, but I am not sure about charges.

 

[Ozzy]

I'll add an extra +1 for the Wise recommendation above to use for receiving international payments.

 

[The Soup Dragon]

I'll add an extra +1 for the Wise recommendation above to use for receiving international payments.

Thanks Ozzy,

So you receive the money into your Wise account then it can be transferred to your regular account?

 

[Ozzy]

Thanks Ozzy,

So you receive the money into your Wise account then it can be transferred to your regular account?

Yep

 

[Paul Kelly ICHYB]

Another +1 for Wise

 

[DontAsk]

Thanks Ozzy,

So you receive the money into your Wise account then it can be transferred to your regular account?

Depends how it's setup. My dollar payments go straight to my business bank account. Others stay in the individual currency accounts (e.g., EUR, AUD) until I move them.

You open a Wise account and then you can open individual accounts for the currencies you want to receive. You will get local (to the purchaser) account details for each currency, so their bank sees it as a purely domestic transaction. Wise's fees to transfer to GBP are very competitive %, not fixed fee. Another potential advantage is if you also buy in other currencies you can keep funds in those currencies. Doing that does expose you to exchange rate fluctuations, of course.

 

[PentechMoulding]

You might like to look at Starling. I have found them really good. They have US$ and EUR accounts, but I am not sure about charges.

We also recently opened a business account with Starling so far it's been good they offer multi-currencies

The only issue with opening a business banking account in the UK takes more than 5-6 weeks compared to when we opened our 1st business banking account back in 1989 it only took days.


Starling is an online banking account they do not have brick-and-mortar branches but you can deposit cash transactions at your local post office and if you receive a cheque of more than £1000 then you will need to post it to their head office, small cheques can be scanned to APP

 

[DontAsk]

We also recently opened a business account with Starling so far it's been good they offer multi-currencies

The only issue with opening a business banking account in the UK takes more than 5-6 weeks

Are you referring to Starling? It was nothing like that with Wise. I suspect it's nothing like that with the other on-line "challenger" banks.