SCB Transfer Follies

[scottiddled]

I've been trying to arrange for international transfers with SCB for over two months. So far it's involved six in-person branch visits (to three different branches) with all my documents, including clear instructions on the transfer from my bank's website.

 

When I first tried to get this rolling in August, I was eventually able to do a one-time, in-person transfer for a much higher fee (at the third branch I tried). The transfer went through just fine. But everything else has been a mess.

 

It seemed as though they finally managed to process everything in late September, and I submitted an online transfer request yesterday. Then I got two phone calls from SCB (went to voicemail as I was working) and an email in awful English syntax telling me that I "did international transferred to USA" but that SCB's "relevant department" "said that [my] transaction was incomplete." They provided a phone number (with a "press 9 for English" option), but even that was a mess--pressing 9 just leads to an automated jumble in Thai. 

 

Has anyone had success dealing with these people? I'd love to switch to another bank, but sadly my employer requires use of SCB. I'm fully aware that this is likely a combination of incompetence on their end and Thailand's hostility (and bureaucracy) surrounding transferring money out, but this is the kind of <deleted> that makes people like me say "forget it, when my contract's up I'm moving on."
 

[allane]

You have my empathy.  Since you are at the same bank (and branch ?) as your employer, might it be possible to get someone from the firm to intervene on your behalf ? Junior employees who won't stop playing with their phones long enough to help a farang, might act differently if someone who matters is on the other end of the phone call.

[scottiddled]

22 hours ago, allane said:

You have my empathy.  Since you are at the same bank (and branch ?) as your employer, might it be possible to get someone from the firm to intervene on your behalf ? Junior employees who won't stop playing with their phones long enough to help a farang, might act differently if someone who matters is on the other end of the phone call.

That's a possible next step.

 

My sense isn't that I've been "mistreated" (intentionally) or that the language barrier is the obstacle at this point (although it certainly made each previous interaction more difficult and longer, and made me give up on one branch after more than an hour). If I thought either of those things were really playing a big role, I'd have a Thai-speaking co-worker and/or HR get involved.

 

The bigger problems have been:

1. General ineptitude
2. These branches (even the large branch in the mall where they ultimately processed the "application") have very few people capable of such transactions. So they don't cross-train well and if a branch's key person is off that day, you're screwed. On my second attempt (the mall branch), after about 45 minutes they put me on the phone with someone with marginally better English skills than the staff I had been dealing with, who told me to come in Sunday (it was Thursday) and she could process it. While it's nice that the employees care enough to answer phone calls on their off days and talk with customers, it boggles the mind that a (significant) bank location has no one else who can do the task.
3. SCB bureaucratic rigidity (e.g., online banking interface that is late-90s-level software, unnecessarily restrictive fields (in both forms and computer data entry) that don't really match up to international transfer standards)
4. Thai government bureaucratic idiocy/requirements
5. The fact that my transfer was slightly more complicated because my U.S. bank (like many U.S. banks, especially smaller ones) does not directly accept international transfers. They designate Chase as their receiving bank. So you're listing Chase as the receiving bank (with all the accompanying IBAN/SWIFT numbers), and technically transferring to your local bank's account at Chase (their account number and the bank's name on the account). The comment/information field includes your name, account number, and address so your bank knows where to put the funds. It's all relatively standard, but it blows the mind of SCB. At one point I resorted to drawing a cartoonish flow-chart from SCB to Chase to my bank to me (think of the Thai immigration posters).

It's pretty apparent that #3 and #4 are related--or at least banks are wary of complying with the Thai government's procedures for letting money out of the country (including the boilerplate "acceptable" reasons for transfer). Then #5 gets them all worried about how to label the transfer so it still fits within their rigid mindset of #3/4.

 

I wrote back to SCB asking them not to refund my account and asking them to process the transfer as requested. No word back yet.

 

UPDATE:

 

SCB writes:

Quote

 

Please be informed that this transaction could not be proceeded. We need to cancel and return the fund back to your bank account because we have received the information from the investigation of outward remittance department that the receiver's account number ...is incorrect so we could not continue to proceed this transaction.
 
Please kindly provide us your contact number and the conveniently time so we will provide the right representative to contact you regard to this issue, urgently.

Also we would recommend you to remove/delete this application from SCB easy net because of the account number could not edit so please register the new application with the correct information.

 

The account number is not incorrect. It's been confirmed and they successfully sent a one-time transfer using the same exact information in August. They also deleted this "approved" transfer account online, so I'm assuming they're going to make me go through their absurd dog and pony show to get it reapproved. I'm heading to HR. It's "can you fix this and get them to transfer the money today?" time. If they can't I'm insisting on using another bank. If they can't do that, I'm considering resigning.

 

 

 

 

Edited October 30, 2019 by scottiddled
Update

[Berkshire]

On 10/29/2019 at 9:14 AM, scottiddled said:

I'd love to switch to another bank, but sadly my employer requires use of SCB.

You don't have to switch to another bank.  You can open an account with Bangkok Bank and conduct international transfers with them (I've been doing so for 15+ years).  If you need to transfer funds between BKK Bank and SCB, really simple to do online. 

[timendres]

4 hours ago, scottiddled said:

The fact that my transfer was slightly more complicated because my U.S. bank (like many U.S. banks, especially smaller ones) does not directly accept international transfers. They designate Chase as their receiving bank. So you're listing Chase as the receiving bank (with all the accompanying IBAN/SWIFT numbers), and technically transferring to your local bank's account at Chase (their account number and the bank's name on the account). The comment/information field includes your name, account number, and address so your bank knows where to put the funds. It's all relatively standard, but it blows the mind of SCB. At one point I resorted to drawing a cartoonish flow-chart from SCB to Chase to my bank to me (think of the Thai immigration posters).

This specific issue has caused major headaches for me in the past. It is just a problem for Thai banks, as it is not a common thing to do and they are not familiar with it.

 

@Berkshire's suggestion of working with Bangkok Bank is a good one. While they also have the bureaucracy, it was relatively painless and took less than one hour in the branch, and two days of waiting for the setup. Then it worked perfectly from the online banking.  

[scottiddled]

UPDATE: It took two more outgoing calls and a bunch of emails, but the transfer went through, 2+ days after I submitted it. Within 90 minutes of the final call, the money was in my U.S. bank account.

 

The conversations were extremely unpleasant. One of the things I love about the Thai people is there ability to come to face-saving consensus--even if it's not the ideal solution for one or more parties. But they basically wanted me to say "OK" to them refunding my money on the basis of some "department" of theirs thinking the transfer details were wrong. And I wasn't having it. While I love that Thai ability to settle things with a smile, I hate that Thai inability to think outside the box or take the next step to address a problem when the first step doesn't work.

 

At lunchtime, when the first phone representative asked me for my permission to refund the transfer, I politely said no and asked them to process the transfer as submitted. They fumbled around, put me on hold, asked if the information was correct, and then told me they would have their "transfer team" take care of it. 

 

After work, I saw three missed calls from SCB on my phone. While waiting for my dinner date to arrive at the restaurant, I gave it one last chance. I basically had the same conversation again, with the representative telling me that their team found a "problem" and me again firmly saying that I had visited the branch six times to set it up, and that the information was right. She then put me on hold, asked to confirm that I wanted to send the transfer (implying that if it doesn't work, it's my fault), and then told me will contact their transfer team right away and they will send it (deja vu).

 

 

 

 

 

[scottiddled]

Thank you Berkshire and timendres for the advice. Had the transfer not gone through, I likely would've gone to my "home" branch on Thursday with an ultimatum/question: can you send this immediately and assure me that my future transfers won't get held up, or do I withdraw all my money and walk next door to Bangkok Bank.

 

I might still open a Bangkok Bank account as a fallback, but I'm not eager to get in deeper with the bureaucracy.

 

Wouldn't it be great if Dee Money was actually a viable thing (instead of a bunch of advertorial hot air)? Or if TransferWise could hurry up and get outward transfers working? I know, I know, it's not all these companies' "faults" and Bank of Thailand (et al) are the big culprits, but it's 2019 and working people moving their (relatively small sums of) money shouldn't be this migraine-inducing.