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[mosan]

I seems that even though transfers are in fact international, in most cases it will show up at the bank as a local deposit. It's up to the local bank (BKB, SCB, TMB) to identify the money as originating from overseas.  I've heard good and bad reports from both sides of the issue, specifically that Bangkok Bank is coding the deposits as Foreign Telex Transfer (FTT) while the other banks are showing anything but...

 

 

Edited February 3, 2019 by mosan

[Rc2702]

There system is local everywhere. That's why it's called a borderless transfer. You send to them locally and they release from there own bank locally to wherever it is going locally. Appreciate a bank may be reporting it as an intl transfer but I'm pretty sure it is not due to the system it is employing.

[farangx]

I don't understand why a bank here would tagged those baht as foreign transfer, was it because they were cleansed.

 

[indepth]

7 hours ago, Rc2702 said:

There system is local everywhere. That's why it's called a borderless transfer. You send to them locally and they release from there own bank locally to wherever it is going locally. Appreciate a bank may be reporting it as an intl transfer but I'm pretty sure it is not due to the system it is employing.

i believe that is what Mosan was alluding to.

[simon43]

This seems to be a 'hundi' system of funds transfer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundi

 

... which has been used for hundreds of years to 'transfer' funds in the absence of or as an alternative to the standard banking system.

 

I used to use this form of unofficial funds transfer when working in Burma, to send money to my bank account in Thailand.  It worked very well ????

 

But it is definitely NOT an international funds transfer as defined by a bank.  I have no idea why Bangkok Bank indicates it as such - it is a local funds transfer.

 

[wgdanson]

Are some people, including some IOs so stupid that they cannot see £1000 leaves a person's account in his home country, next day the equivalent in Baht is deposited in his Thai account. So obviously an INTERNATIONAL Transfer no matter what bank code is used.

[scottiejohn]

9 minutes ago, wgdanson said:

Are some people, including some IOs so stupid that they cannot see £1000 leaves a person's account in his home country, next day the equivalent in Baht is deposited in his Thai account. So obviously an INTERNATIONAL Transfer no matter what bank code is used.

YES they can be and often are that stupid.  TITS.

[simon43]

So obviously an INTERNATIONAL Transfer no matter what bank code is used.

 

Nope!  It is a local funds transfer.  You send money to a local bank account in your home country.  The recipient then calls up his contact in Thailand and says 'drop xxx baht into Mr yyy's account'.  

 

There is no international movement of funds.  Your funds are still in your home country.

 

Transferwise seems to be a good system for crediting funds in your Thai bank account.  But these Hundi types of system are 'informal' - they are not recognised by the banking system and IMHO, they should not be recognised by the IOs as an international funds transfer.

[owl sees all]

20 minutes ago, wgdanson said:

Are some people, including some IOs so stupid that they cannot see £1000 leaves a person's account in his home country, next day the equivalent in Baht is deposited in his Thai account. So obviously an INTERNATIONAL Transfer no matter what bank code is used.

Transferwise acts as a temporary trustee for two (or more) parties wishing to move funds from one place to another (does not have to be International, can be within a country).

 

You are in UK (say) and I am in Thailand (say). You want to send money to your account in Thailand from the UK, and I want to send money from my account in Thailand to the UK.

 

We agree on a rate, and you send me 1000 (say) and I send you the equivalent. The two transactions are local. They are simply matched at an agreed rate.

 

Transferwise acts as the intermediary. And charges a fee,

Edited February 4, 2019 by owl sees all

[Henryford]

The PDF receipt i get from Transferwise clearly shows it as a SWIFT transfer from GBP to Thai Baht. How is that not an international transfer?

[jacko45k]

8 minutes ago, Henryford said:

The PDF receipt i get from Transferwise clearly shows it as a SWIFT transfer from GBP to Thai Baht. How is that not an international transfer?

That isn't the point really, it is persuading immigration it is and it being accepted as such to get your retirement extension. 

By the way, one of my Transferwise PDF receipts makes no mention of a SWIFT transfer, but does say TransferWise Ltd on behalf of jacko45k Delivered via Local bank transfer

Edited February 4, 2019 by jacko45k

[mosan]

Of course your PDF receipt shows it's an international transfer. But I don't believe you're going to be able to take your PDF receipt to an Immigrations office and use it to verify your funds came from abroad.  I may be wrong, but I don't think I am.  Additionally, It's been known for quite some time that many of the deposits do not show up as being coded as an international transfer and that is what the real problem is.  If your local bank in Thailand does not show the transfer in your account as being sourced from overseas, then it will not be reported as such to immigrations—however, I hope I am wrong. 

Hopefully, the banks will get their act together and just somehow "show" these deposits as international versus domestic...

Edited February 4, 2019 by mosan

[onera1961]

29 minutes ago, simon43 said:

Nope!  It is a local funds transfer.  You send money to a local bank account in your home country.  The recipient then calls up his contact in Thailand and says 'drop xxx baht into Mr yyy's account'.  

 

There is no international movement of funds.  Your funds are still in your home country.

 

Transferwise seems to be a good system for crediting funds in your Thai bank account.  But these Hundi types of system are 'informal' - they are not recognised by the banking system and IMHO, they should not be recognised by the IOs as an international funds transfer.

Then how does Transferwise have money in their Thai banks. Do their reps travel all over the world, carrying suitcases full of Euro/Pound/Dollar and convert in the local market and then deposit those as cash in their local banks?

 

The IOS need to be educated and they should look beyond their narrow focus. And all Transferwise transfers must be accepted. If not, let there be a revolution. People need to organize and start a peaceful revolution. When Gandhi or MLK could overthrow centuries old colonial system and segregation, TI is nothing. Stop posting in TVF and start organizing. Let some leaders emerge and show the TI the proper path and how to formulate a retirement system. 

Sorry, cant join the revolution. I only live here for 6-months in a year on an O-A visa. Leaving Thailand next month for my three month vacation in Las Vegas and then to Benidorm for another three months until Schengen rule kicks me out. 

Edited February 4, 2019 by onera1961

[wgdanson]

22 minutes ago, simon43 said:

they should not be recognised by the IOs as an international funds transfer.

Of course they should be international. Money goes out of a foreign account one day and turns up in a Thai account the next day. 

How can that NOT be international whatever route is used. The IOs need to use a bit of logic, but sadly that word is not in the Thai language apparently.

[jacko45k]

10 minutes ago, wgdanson said:

How can that NOT be international whatever route is used. The IOs need to use a bit of logic, but sadly that word is not in the Thai language apparently.

No, you are asking an IO to believe what you tell him, when the evidence does not confirm it. (In my case a Thai bank book showing a domestic transfer in, and perhaps a Transferwise receipt saying the same that happens to be the same date). It is not beyond anyone's means to make non  Transferwise SWIFT transfers each month that do appear as international. For you not to do that would maybe look suspicious to him. 

[steve73]

Even the SWIFT system doesn't actually move any money around.. It's simply a messaging system between banks - how they actually "move the money" can vary, but it will only ever be bits in a computer that move.

 

The only way to be absolutely sure that money has come from abroad is to physically bring in GBP or $$ (etc.) notes, and then exchange them for cash at a bank or exchange.  But the I/O won't accept this method.

[phuketrichard]

1 hour ago, wgdanson said:

Are some people, including some IOs so stupid that they cannot see £1000 leaves a person's account in his home country, next day the equivalent in Baht is deposited in his Thai account. So obviously an INTERNATIONAL Transfer no matter what bank code is used.

how do they see the $$ left another country? Are u showing the bank book for your home country?

Past 20 years all my transfers for SCB show X1

Bangkok bank FTT

[onera1961]

27 minutes ago, jacko45k said:

It is not beyond anyone's means to make non  Transferwise SWIFT transfers each month that do appear as international. For you not to do that would maybe look suspicious to him. 

Most transferwise transfer to Bangkok bank are coded FTT. TI can verify a few that are not coded as FTT from transferwise receipt. Why that will be a big issue? The problem is people don't want to take risk. I always take risk and believe me or not rewarded handsomely in my life. Unless you take risk, life is not worth living. 

Edited February 4, 2019 by onera1961

[steve73]

I used to send my living expenses from the UK perhaps once per year as a lump sum using SWIFT, but I started to notice that it took around a week before my Thai account was credited, and the exchange rate was nearly always made at the lowest point during that week.  With the GBP perhaps being more variable than many currencies I'd calculated this was costing me around 1% (in addition to bank fees & generally poor bank TT rates). 

 

Using TW with it's very low fixed fee of just 1.50 per transfer, and a better Fx rate even after the variable fee is deducted, saves me at least 1% on each small transfer I now make.  (And it would probably have been more for larger transfers for the reasons I've given above.)  I feature I really like is that the FX rate is fixed.  If the rate drops significantly it matters not.

 

Over the past 12 years I've been here, I estimate I could have saved somewhere in the region of 100-200,000 bt (had TW been available during that time).  Some of this period I was working elsewhere, and making a SWIFT transfer once per year was easy.

 

Now I'm retired (yet still too young for a pension), I'm using my savings to live to a tighter budget, and the savings I can make using TW for a number of smaller transfers whenever the rate looks good, does make a difference.  Fortunately, by keeping 800k in the bank year round, it matters not how those transfers are recorded,  but it does mean I wouldn't be able to use the income method, unless resolved. 

 

 

 

[sfokevin]

TransferWise is not in the business of providing people with the proper visa documentation... It is in the business of transferring your money from point A to point B in the most economical way... 

[joevanwyck]

Thank You for taking your time to research and posting this .????

[farangx]

4 hours ago, onera1961 said:

Then how does Transferwise have money in their Thai banks. Do their reps travel all over the world, carrying suitcases full of Euro/Pound/Dollar and convert in the local market and then deposit those as cash in their local banks?

 

It is like 7/11, they stocked up their funds from their own warehouses.  Why do you think they can do it so cheaply without cable charges.  ????

 

[owl sees all]

4 hours ago, onera1961 said:

Then how does Transferwise have money in their Thai banks. Do their reps travel all over the world, carrying suitcases full of Euro/Pound/Dollar and convert in the local market and then deposit those as cash in their local banks?

The vast majority of the world's currency does not physically exist. Most of the world's currency is simply marks on pieces of paper or digits on computer screens.

 

Very little currency actually gets moved anywhere. That is true of virtually any country.

Edited February 4, 2019 by owl sees all

[xylophone]

3 hours ago, steve73 said:

Using TW with it's very low fixed fee of just 1.50 per transfer, and a better Fx rate even after the variable fee is deducted, saves me at least 1% on each small transfer I now make.  (And it would probably have been more for larger transfers for the reasons I've given above.)  I feature I really like is that the FX rate is fixed.  If the rate drops significantly it matters not.

I too would love to use Transfer Wise to get my money from the UK to Bangkok bank here, but as has often been said, the notation on my Bangkok bank account does not show an international transfer, which Thai immigration would want to see.

 

The same happens with my Bangkok bank transfer from their "account/branch" in London as it just shows up as a transfer, no money having left the UK and arriving in Bangkok, because it's purely a paperwork, or should I say computer, exercise.

 

Sure I would give it a try, but the problem is if it was rejected at my next retirement extension in October, I would be well and truly stuffed, so getting it right first time for me is imperative.

 

I will see what the UK pension folks say about the cost of transferring from them directly to Bangkok bank here in Phuket, and if it's not onerous, then I will pursue that route and just top up with monthly payments from my NZ bank.

 

As I mentioned in another post, I used to transfer 800K and could still do it, but I'm damned if I will be held to ransom by tying that and half as much of it up ad infinitum, when I already get two pension transfers from overseas and all it needs is a slight top up to qualify for the 65K per month.......... but Transfer Wise would make it easier!!

[Moonlover]

5 hours ago, simon43 said:

This seems to be a 'hundi' system of funds transfer https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hundi

 

... which has been used for hundreds of years to 'transfer' funds in the absence of or as an alternative to the standard banking system.

 

I used to use this form of unofficial funds transfer when working in Burma, to send money to my bank account in Thailand.  It worked very well ????

 

But it is definitely NOT an international funds transfer as defined by a bank.  I have no idea why Bangkok Bank indicates it as such - it is a local funds transfer.

 

Ah, so this system has a name does it? I've known about it for many years. It's the standard way that Third Country nationals working in the middle east to remit there earnings back to their families.

 

Thais working in Egypt use it as well. My wife used to when she was working there.

 

And in fact, if you go back in history, you would discover that a similar system was used by pilgrims travelling to the Middle East and its origins are attributed to the Knights Templar, the inventors of banking.

[Sheryl]

25 minutes ago, owl sees all said:

The vast majority of the world's currency does not physically exist. Most of the world's currency is simply marks on pieces of paper or digits on computer screens.

 

Very little currency actually gets moved anywhere. That is true of virtually any country.

Yes. And to my understanding the issue with how TW transfers show up in your bank account arises not because  the money doesn't physically cross borders but because it often arrives in one Thai bank and then gets transferred to another.

 

From detailed TV member reports in other threads, TW deposits show up  as foreign transfers if the first Thai bank to get the money is the one your account is at, and as domestic transfer otherwise.

 

TW uses 3 different banks in Thailand and you can neither choose nor know in advance which one will be the initial recipient  (I emailed them and asked).  At present, they seem to use Bangkok Bank the most but (1) they do not use it 100% of the time and (2) no guarantee this will remain the case in future.

[Sheryl]

15 minutes ago, xylophone said:

 

As I mentioned in another post, I used to transfer 800K and could still do it, but I'm damned if I will be held to ransom by tying that and half as much of it up ad infinitum, when I already get two pension transfers from overseas and all it needs is a slight top up to qualify for the 65K per month.......... but Transfer Wise would make it easier!!

Your situation is similar to mine. I could meet the income requirement  with a single monthly transfer from just ien of 3 income streams with no sending fee (once US Social Security starts IDD to Thailand, expected to be soon) and just a small top up. BUT the rules for the combo method are now entirely unclear, to say the least, even posters here cannot agree on what they mean and at least 2 equally plausible, but very different,  interpretations have been floated....

 

It is such a mess that I have more or less resigned myself to parking 800K in a fixed account separate from my living expenses for 3 years hoping that after that things will be clearer re combo method.  (And I too resent the loss in income on the funds that will entail! Especially since there is no rational point to doing it this way).

[farangx]

4 minutes ago, Moonlover said:

Ah, so this system has a name does it? I've known about it for many years. It's the standard way that Third Country nationals working in the middle east to remit there earnings back to their families.

 

Thais working in Egypt use it as well. My wife used to when she was working there.

 

When they send $300 back home to feed their families every month, a $30 bank fee becomes a killer.

 

[owl sees all]

3 hours ago, sfokevin said:

TransferWise is not in the business of providing people with the proper visa documentation... It is in the business of transferring your money from point A to point B in the most economical way... 

 

I think we are getting over-complicated.

 

I agree "TransferWise is not in the business of providing people with the proper visa documentation". But it does not transfer money. It acts as a facilitator., and for a small(ish) fee allows currency to be moved within countries, once a 'deal' on the exchange rate is struck between the parties.

 

The reason it states the mid-range rate is because that is the fairest for all parties involved.

[wgdanson]

3 hours ago, steve73 said:

Using TW with it's very low fixed fee of just 1.50 per transfer,

From where did you get that information. I just did £1000 costing £7.12 in fees. £1600 or about Bht 65,000 will be just over a tenner.