£100k into € - best method?

[MarkGArgyle]

As above really, when we hopefully sell the house I will need to transfer the above so we can buy our new home in Ireland.

What would be there most cost effective way to minimise losses on forex & admin etc?

I have a euro bank acct so straight transfer is an option but I suspect not the best one.

Cheers,

Mark

[Sir Bagalot]

Correct the banks will want at least 1.5% but you should ask the question.

I've used www.transfermate.com before several times.

Be warned that do the transfer through a bank and your money is protected at all times. Do it through a currency transfer firm and it isn't.

If you do the transfer in the morning then they should transfer the same day. I used TM when transferring ~ €27K from Ireland to UK.

[Bat28]

I've used HiFX when we transfered some funds to buy a house ... actually did 3 different transactions and all went well without any issue
Rates were much better than doing it by the banks only.

[The jiffle king]

I usually use UKforex going from Euro to pound if you need another option

[grumbas]

I used CaxtonFX a year or so ago and were pretty good, you can do smaller amounts online between nominated accounts too.

Re the post above about money not being protected, I'm 99% they'll be a regulated business and obliged to keep client money in a trust account.

[QBee]

A client of mine uses Baydon Hill for millions of pounds of Euro transactions.

[alfa aficionado]

I've used Moneybooker.com in the past...they've rebranded themselves as Skrill.com since I last used them. I found them good for smaller transfers as you could essentially organise a transfer for a few GBP (allowing the receiving bank - mine didn't charge, to deal with the exchange rate). This was better than paying HSBC or Santander £20-30 on top of their exchange rate!

[HootersGsy]

The best rate you will get is with a bank that does actually trades, not some third party who will just put your trade with a bank and then add their own margin.

So, that leaves you with the likes of Barclays, RBS etc. unfortunately £100k as a one off isn't enough to get anyone's attention and a great rate, though you should be able to do better than their 'standard' rate for the day.

We book trades for clients in £10m+ deals and generally use their primary bankers as they're willing to trim their margins to keep the business in house and will almost always out do any of these 'specialist FX brokers' - unless the FX broker is willing to take a loss on the first few deals to win the business, which they do try from time to time.

[MarkGArgyle]

Thanks for the replies i will look into the options.

Hootergsy - I understand the £10m+ deals and the attention they get as opposed to a smaller sum however is there a way to harness economies of scale and piggyback said deals to achieve a benchmark rate?

Thanks,

Mark

[Stu R]

Bumped this as I'm a little out of the loop with Forex Brokers this year.

Any better than HiFX for small transfers at the moment? Need to shift a few small but regular lumps between personal banks (UK > USA)

[Du1point8]

I use smart currency and they have been very good.