sending money to France - ideas?
 

we have booked 3 nights in a B&B in Paimpol, Brittany and the owner has asked us to pay the deposit by bank transfer.

when I did this for my italian holiday, my UK bank charged me another £20 on top of the € I was sending, but as it was quite a lot of money, it didn't mind too much. this time it's only €71 so I don't want this is cost me another £20 on top.

anyone got any bright ideas for paying this without being stung by the bank?

I suppose i could just stuff the notes in an envelope and trust to luck!

annhig - when we are asked to do this we ask instead if they will take a regular cheque in their currency and just hold onto it and give it back when we arrive. That way they can cash it if they need to, but there is no charge and you can pay for all nights when there...worth a try?

"I suppose i could just stuff the notes in an envelope and trust to luck!"
I wouldn't. Not only because it might well be stolen but also because it is illegal in France.

Ask your bank for an international draft in euros, which is essentially a cashier's check in another currency. Here in the USA, my bank charges about $5.00 for one. Then mail it.

merci, tout le monde!

jamikins - I'm not sure about asking them to take an english cheque as i don't think that they could bank it - so it's not much use as a deposit.

St, Cirq - - nice idea. i wonder though if it's that easy, why my bank didn't mention it when i needed to send some € to Italy?

Pvoyageuse - thanks for that. i am imagining the scene : "sacre bleu, les anglais avant payez avec les notes! ou est le gendarme?" [with apologies to the late lamented Miles Kington for the franglais].

Yesterday we mailed a check for a deposit in US Dollars (after the conversion). The Gite owner said she would keep it, & when we arrived she would give it back to us & we could pay in Euros cash. If we didn't arrive, she would cash the check. This is pretty much what jamikins recommended - except we wrote it in our currency.


We usually go to France twice a year. On our fall trip we sometimes go to a France post office and send a "Mandat postale" to the proprietor for our next-year's spring trip. A mandat postale is like a "money order" in the US - we gave the post office euros & they wrote a check in Euros & mailed it to the proprietor. This is something Pvoyageuse recommended to me several years ago - and I hope she corrects my spelling of Mandat postale (my wife is out shopping & she usually corrects my French spelling).

We also mailed Euros cash this year for deposit on another gite.

Stu Dudley

St Cirq

My bank (BofA) wanted about $40 for a Euros check. Is the international draft the "normal" method the bank uses to write a foreigh currency check - or is this something a bank might not want to disclose or only offer to their best customers???

Stu Dudley

Hi, Stu. I think there is a difference between an international draft and a check the bank makes out for you in a foreign currency, but I could be wrong. The international draft predates wire transfers, so is kind of an old-fashioned instrument at this point, and I'm not sure your average teller would even know what one is. I haven't used one in a few years, but when I did I always had to go to the branch manager or someone higher than teller rank to obtain one.

Wire transfers are somewhat dated as well. The new low cost option is EFT which when one establishes an account with a specialist he simply moves money from his bank account to a French bank account (you´ll the payee´s IBAN number and bank name). Alternatively, you can have a check sent to an address you specify at no cost, not even a currency conversion fee.

There usually is a charge if someone wants a bank wire. Here are three options:

http://www.hifx.com/

http://www.xe.com/

http://www.currencyonline.com/

I recently sent a Euro bank draft to hold a room in France as well. My bank only charged me $6.50. I'm guessing your bank probably didn't mention this option because they make more money off a wire transfer.

I've noticed some private home accommodations in Europe are starting to use Paypal to collect advance deposits - I wish they all did.

As a private owner I also do what Stu's gite owner does (take a check in your currency) No problem to cash a foreign check but it costs me 25€. Stu delete the "e" of postale since mandat is masculine :)

The Gite that I rented wanted an International Bank Transfer for 20% of the rent with the rest at arrival. My bank charged me $50 plus giving me a poor exchange rate for the transfer. I did not like it, but I would not call it a sting.

LFB I wish I could use Paypal but I receive so many scams from supposed Paypal that I couldn't know which one is genuine.

Well, it would be silly for owners to take a check and "hold it" anyway as if it were cash, as it is not. That doesn't make any sense at all fiscally, not that I'm saying some owners might not do it. Anyone could just cancel the check if they wanted, I don't know why owners don't understand that fact. It's very easy to cancel payment on a check, I can do it with one phone call (in fact, I just did one a couple days ago because a handyman I paid claims he lost my check).

I use xe.com when I need to do wire transfers. It's a bit of a hassle to set up but they have an excellent exchange rate and no fees as far as I recall - haven't used it in about a year but once you set up your account it remains open....first learned of it here, of course....

Actually, I've done the check thing 4-5 times, the mandat postal (without e) 3-4 times, and cash 2-3 times. Once, the check was mailed back to me when the gite owner died, and they had to sell the gite to settle the estate & therefore cancelled our upcoming rental. Many Gites-de-France departments offer a "paypal" type of secured payment - but it is not Paypal. I get a lot of paypal "scams" too.

Stu Dudley

well, we've got as far as the international bank transfer page on our bank's website, but the charges are not clear - one bit says £10, another £20. so we've got to wait until tomorrow morning when we can phone them up.

luckily we have until 10th june to pay; after that, we have to phone to ask for a "prolongation".

anyone got a messenger pigeon we could use?

Owners in France and other continental nations are most accustomed to guests from within the Euro zone, where bank transfers are easy and very inexpensive. So they don't understand the reluctance those from outside have with the cost of transfers.

PayPal is a great convenience for buyers and sellers, but it comes at a cost, as the international fees can run up to almost 4 percent. That's likely to find its way into the rental prices.

I had a terrible time trying to send a 40 euro deposit on a place outside Les Eyzies. My bank, Chase, wanted $75 for the draft with a week wait. I went to several other banks and exchanges in Manhattan and finally gave up. I fedex'd cash. The potential loss of 40euros was worth the gamble. I hope more owners use Paypal in the future. After that I only chose those that did, or those who did not want a deposit.

Ann, I expect the £20 last time was for a CHAPS payment : you should now be able to do a BIC/IBAN transfer within Europe much more cheaply or even free. I'm with HSBC and have done it several times, and most recently was able to do it via internet banking - so is that what you are now looking at ?

The HSBC website doesn't seem to state the fee upfront, but I've now checked back to the last time I did it (last year) and there was a charge of £9. Cheaper than CHAPS, anyway !

Before anyone says anything, I'm aware that BIC/IBAN transfers are apparently not available to/from the US - but we are talking about transfers within Europe here.