⌛ ATM machine charges..

According to My Wife, it seems as though some of the Banks over there {if not all of them} are starting to charge P150 to use Their ATM machines when using an International ATM card. Can anyone else verify this for Me? cheers......

 

Went to the BDO bank the other day..new atm charges 350 pesos. Did not process the transaction. My credit union charges 1 usd. Have never seen any additional fees deducted, maybe the banks can say they are charging a fee..but it depends on your bank to allow it.

 

You can just use xoom.com to send money to yourself. the charges are a lot less than western union. and you can send up to $6000.00 a month.

Just a thought

 

My Wife's been using one of My ATM cards over there for several Years now and there's only a $1 transaction fee taken out from My Credit union on this end. We try to use MetroBank or BDO because We seem to get the best exchange rate from Them, but for some reason neither one of those banks ATM'S have worked for Us lately. Maybe it's because They've been busy revamping Their system so They can impose additional charges to those Who Use ATM cards from another network. Either way, it's still cheaper than using Western Union, Who will charge Me $12 on this end and over there where You have to worry about where to exchange U.S.$ into Pesos or having to settle for Western Unions Exchange rate.... Cheers..

 

Take a close look at Xoom's exchange rate. They aren't making money of the fees, it's the approximately 4% hickey you take on the exchange rate that gets ya! On $6k per month that would be $240...ouch!

Oh, and I did notice the same P150 fee at a MetroBank ATM awhile back...but still no fee at BPI.

 

The cheapest way to transfer funds on larger sums is still to wire in (USD usually), then exchange with a money changer. They will meet you at the bank and do it there, or can electronically deposit it in your local bank acount if you share a common bank. Exchange rates are very competitive.

 

Yes they do get you on the exchange rate. If you send the money in dollars instead of peso you can see the actual charge. Even so they are very fast.

I would agree that the bank transaction for larger sums is probably the cheapest. My bank charges $30 flat for the transfer. We had a problem with the atm method because the receiver did not listen to what they were told and overdrafted the account a couple of times. That is why we went to xoom. They get a bit less but that is a result of their actions.

By the way what are you all getting for the $ to Php exchange now? On line I see its under 45P.

 

Certain banks in the U.S. have an option for sending remittances to certain banks in the Philippines. For example, you can send up to $3,000 per day to a BPI account for an $5 fee.

You used to be able to withdraw money via debit / credit card in BDO for a $5 charge. I did this to get around the ATM withdrawal limit (though the card I was using at the time also charged $5 per withdrawal at the ATM.) They later shut down the service and I don't know if they ever reopened it. I don't remember what the limit was but it might have been good enough to pull out enough funds to live on if you did it a couple of times per month. If they haven't restarted it then maybe they would be able to do this for you if you have an account there.

 

I had not heard of this arrangement...you can transfer $3k per day in dollars for a $5 fee??

Which bank(s)?

That's a good deal.

 

WellsFargo for sure. Info listed below. Not sure if there are others but if WellsFargo does this then I would imagine there are others.

https://www.wellsfargo.com/per/intl_remittance/asia