If you ever transfer money internationally, then this deal should help save you some good money (even if you use it for just one transfer).
It's basically $5 for 5 international money transfers, so $1 in fees per transfer, so around 96% off what you're average bank charges (which would be around $25).
Note: First transfer to be carried out by the 17th of Jan, 2013. Remaining four transfers have no expiry.
Damn, beat me by 9seconds…. ;-)
First transfer by Jan17th 2012 ??
I want a free DeLorian with this and a stretch of road where i can go 88 miles per hour.
Hehe delorian
Oops… fixed that! I meant to type 2013 :)
What are your rates like? It's no good if you charge $1 fee and the exchange rate is worse than the banks.
I've just shot the merchant an email, so I'll post here when I hear back ;)
Please post today's rate for few currencies so that we can compare with other money transfer service providers
Your the Rep and you don't know what the exchange rates are???
I have Au$ & need to send a specific Au$ amount to a HK-based bank.
I have their bank & account details, including a Swift # for the bank.
Can these guys guarantee that the amount I need to send will get to that account?
(Some banks charge a "receiving fee" we're told.)
Here you go. The merchant has sent this to us:
"The link bellow will also show a break down of our fees compared to the bank.
http://www.1stcontactforex.com/money-transfers/bank-comparis… "
That link just shows an example of a transaction not the actual exchange rate we will get. Do you have page with the real time rates you are providing?
Unfortunately I wasn't given this. I assume the rate difference would be comparable to the examples in the link though. Would be happy to offer a refund if you found the rates not to your liking.
well taking one example from it
AUS -> CAN
XE.com says the current rate is:
1 AUD = 1.00674 CAD
their website has a rate:
1 AUD = 0.9862 CAD
so less than 2% difference (so technically not 'free' but depends on the spread of the comparable services)
That's pretty good if <2%.
Should indicate that it is not just $1 for ALL countries.
No receiving bank fees when transferring to UK, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Poland and Eurozone based accounts.
A money transfer business which does not provide an exchange rate??!!! That's an irony
your rate is pathetic.
Uh-oh…
I can only get my transfer if I take it in 2 stages, ie:
(Say, does anyone here do AU to HK transfers regularly, ie, into bank accounts, not via PayPal, etc.? If so, what's your best suggestion for how to get a specified Au$ amount into a HK-based account, without paying huge fees? TIA)
I tried to transfer Monopoly Money to Greek Drachmas…it gave me an error that I cannot tranfer into a currency that has no value.
Isnt Drachmas Monopoly Money ?
I thought Drachmas were Malakias Mouni :)
How much would you get going from Monopoly Money into AU$ or US$, then?
xe trade looks like the winner of my ten minutes investigation. Thanks for the tip.
have you checked HSBC rate yet? I don't think even xe trade can beat it.
As far as I can tell xe trade whups HSBC at the amounts I will transfer. HSBC's exchange rate would need to be 2.5c better than xe trade on a $1000 transfer to equal the $25 fee, and it's not. Nowhere near.
Make that $15 HSBC fee.
I've been waiting for a deal like this. Unfortunately the mighty AU$ has dropped 10% while I've waited.
PennyTransfer is free.
I hadn't heard of that service. Are there any catches? Have you used it? It's a bit light on information, and asks me for my email to find out more, so wondering if you can enlighten us?
Thanks
I have, they use Westpac and it worked well.
It may be free but does the exchange rate "cost you" more than it should?
FYI: Just read this in the FINE PRINT for PennyTransfer:
"Your bank, the Correspondent Bank and the Beneficiary Bank may charge bank fees in relation to the transfer. These fees are not covered by us in the provision of the Service. You and the Beneficiary are responsible for informing yourselves of any applicable bank fees prior to arranging the Transfer."
your service is the same, there will be recipient bank charge.
You can't really make a judgement on what's the best deal unless you know the exchange rate offered by all the different providers. Wish there there was a comparison thingy that told you, like rate city
Thanks!
And I see, using that nifty comparison, that the good old Commonwealth is trailing the field, offering an extortionate rate + a big fee- outstanding. It staggers me that they've got even one customer, yet they are the biggest bank.
I live in a constant state of wonderment.
That Penny Transfer rate looks acceptable to me- 98c now for USD- that's only half a cent below official rate, and no fees.
Citibank is offering 98.14c now and no fees, in theory.- I just got a Citibank Plus debit card.
Penny Transfer is free, there is no catch. We transfer few times a months without any problem ever since it has been introduced. You can found out their daily exchange rate before transfer by log into your account.
Despite inadvertently advertising PennyTransfer instead of our deal, it's good to know this! No third party fees?
NOTE: Just read this in the FINE PRINT for PennyTransfer:
"Your bank, the Correspondent Bank and the Beneficiary Bank may charge bank fees in relation to the transfer. These fees are not covered by us in the provision of the Service. You and the Beneficiary are responsible for informing yourselves of any applicable bank fees prior to arranging the Transfer."
So it appears our deal is still a good one :)
PennyTransfer didn't charge any fees so do our bank in AU, but we can't stop it if the Beneficiary's bank charge a fee to receive the amount (about 3-5 USD/transaction), unless BizzBuzz is different will cover all fees even the Beneficiary's bank? :)
No, Bizz Buzz doesn't cover any fees, as the service is offered by 1stContactForex, not Bizz Buzz. I believe the recipient fee would still exist.
NOTE FROM THE MERCHANT:
"The main difference is that PennyTel does not hold an AFSL (Australian Financal Services Licence)
AFSL's are only issued to companies and individuals that hold relevant accreditation's and have the necessary experience to deliver the type of financial advice applicable to the product they deal in. Working with a licenced company provides:
Protection for the client
Security for the client
Guarantee of delivery of service for the client
Credibility of the company you are dealing with
Also Their T's & C's indicate bank charges. 1st Contact does not charge any receiving fees.
Finally, clients must register with PennyTel as their phone provider first in order to create an account for transfers. 1st Contact only requires your to register for a money transfer account."
We get certificate errors when we open their web site (PennyTel.com…)
That's very odd… and suggested a big risk.
NOTE FROM OUR MERCHANT RE PENNYTRANSFER:
"The main difference is that PennyTel does not hold an AFSL (Australian Financal Services Licence)
AFSL's are only issued to companies and individuals that hold relevant accreditation's and have the necessary experience to deliver the type of financial advice applicable to the product they deal in. Working with a licenced company provides:
Protection for the client
Security for the client
Guarantee of delivery of service for the client
Credibility of the company you are dealing with
Also Their T's & C's indicate bank charges. 1st Contact does not charge any receiving fees.
Finally, clients must register with PennyTel as their phone provider first in order to create an account for transfers. 1st Contact only requires your to register for a money transfer account."
PennyTel registration is free, no sure what you are moaning about there?
I don't… SSL certificate is valid.
We see (in the error message):
"The server's certificate did not match its hostname. Accept?
Server name: ssl.GoogleAnalytics.com"
Perhaps your security settings are allowing this mismatch to go through without warning messages.
Did you try www. and just the domain? Same error?
XE is showing 99.02c- has the Aussie staged a recovery today?
Best comparison site that I have found is: www.bestexchangerates.net
Sorry to burst your bubble Bizzbuzz but this website would prove that 1st contact is far behind by likes of :
ozforex.com.au (easiest, does exotic currencies such as INR, PKR as well)
hifx.com.au (have not used but is very competitive)
worldsfirst.com.au (does not do exotic currencies online, can use trading over phone)
have you heard about Citibank Plus?? Your deal is nothing special and I do believe that you are like PennyTransfer make money from crap exchange rate.
Citibank Plus account allow you to transfer money oversea FREE even in AUD, their exchange rate is also the 2nd best in Australia.
The best bank for exchange rate is HSBC, they have live quote and the spread is only 30pips (don't ask me what this is, google it). But HSBC has a fee of $25 + they remit the fund using oversea HSBC (i.e HSBC USA for USD transfer) and they slug an extra $20USD. So if you need to transfer a large amount then the rate difference will outweigh the charge of $45 ($25 + $20) but for small amount then Citibank is better.
The only catch with HSBC is you can only get rate and transfer within Australia business hours and sometimes the better rate happens outside Australia business hour.
This offer if from a site that offers deals, they don't have anything to do with money transfers which is why the rep is vague.
The $5 quoted seems to be the standard rate for www.1stcontactforex.com
Whilst this is a good deal compared to the banks, most of the other forex websites seem to have similar rates (and some with no fees), so is this a deal or an advert.
Admittedly I didn't know about some of the above options, so its still a great post.
It would be interesting to see a side-by-side comparison of all the above websites for (say) US$ and/or GBP, so I guess it changes so rapidly (adn some of the above require sign-ups) so this would be tricky.
This is junk.
What? Expired in UNDER 3 hours?!? Suspicious.
lol expired already
I used Western Union to tr money to uk account. Online fee was $15. Can't remember exchange rate but as it was a small amount I was transferring (couple hundred pounds), fees wre more significant than exchange rate. They call you and ask you loads of personal questions though. Almost decided to give up but was quite simple in the end.
Some people I know have tried to do the same thing but were refused by Western Union, without being given a reason. WU were very secretive about their reasons. Weird.
Do you know if they have a protection system such as paypal buyer protection.?
Only morons will buy this deal without knowing the rates..
You know today is 22nd of May, 2012 right?