Banking Problems

[westbounder]

Here's my dilemma, I opened a Bank account at Bkk Bank in Chiang Mai 3 years ago.I am moving to Chiang Rai soon and I want to transfer my account to Chiang Rai.When I move, if I keep my current account that I opened in Chiang Mai and if I use the account in another provincethey charge a fee for every transaction. So I want to close my Bkk bank account that I opened in Chiang Mai and open a new one in C.Rai. I think they said they can not do this and transfer my money but they will charge me fees. I don't want to pay fees and I don't want to close my account in C. Mai and have to bring all my cash to Chiang Rai with me on the bus.What do I do? Possibly a switch to another Bank other than Bkk Bank might be better because I am not hardly getting any interest on my money there anyway.

If you know the answer to my problem, please tell me what to do.

If your not sure or just assuming, then please do not try to answer.

Thank you kindly

[ludditeman]

Ask for a Bank draft in the bank at Chiang Mai, made out to you, cost is 40bht.

Pay Bank draft into bank of your choice in Chiang Rai, when you get there.

TMB give 2.5% interest in their "No fixed" account, only allowed two free withdrawals a month, further withdrawals cost 10bht each.

(Withdrawals in person at branch only, using passbook, no ATM card)

Might be an idea to open a normal account with them too, then you just transfer from one account to the other each month.

(Normal account, you get ATM card but no interest)

[rmacdon61]

West. All the above, but keeping BKK bank for you, U.S. based retire, is you have a BKK bank in New York should you need to move money back or to here from the US. I use BKK bank as it's international ties, at least in Canada made swift transfers easy, I am sure others are as easy. I am basing this on my limited knowledge of thai banking so please disregard if not useful.

[chiang mai]

Get in touch with poster Ianguygill in this forum, Ian is a farang who works for Bangkok Bank and is often instrumental in resolving problems such as yours.

[changraider]

Bkk Bank does seem to have many interbranch problems/ charges - eg charges for withdrawing at a non-home-branch atm, charges for depositing at a non-home-branch, charges for inter-branch transfer. I've never heard of any other bank charging for these internal money movements (though I'm always open to new info!).

I'd open a non Bkk Bank account in Chiang Rai, transfer your Chiang Mai funds to the new account and close your old account. There was a recent thread on CR forum about preferred banks which might help. I am very happy with Kasikorn services, but it's important that you ensure whichever bank/branch you employ has someone with good English, and I can't help on that as I'm outside of the city. For deposit interest-bearing accounts, Thai Life is the best. No bank will give you good interest on a current/chequing account.

By the way SWIFT international transfers should take the same amount of time regardless of whether the sending and receiving bank are the same or not - though you may have a lower SWIFT fee if they're the same. As Bkk Bank charges for inter-branch transfers anyway I wouldn't be too concerned about the SWIFT angle.

[toybits]

If you are concerned about bring all that cash with you - ask bank to prepare a managers or cashiers cheque for you. But you will have to pay a small fee for that as well. If you open a Bkk Bank account here at Chiang Rai, you could transfer funds from your CMai account to your CRai account as well - but there is also a transaction fee. That is how banks earn money. Love it or leave it.

[changraider]

If you are concerned about bring all that cash with you - ask bank to prepare a managers or cashiers cheque for you. But you will have to pay a small fee for that as well. If you open a Bkk Bank account here at Chiang Rai, you could transfer funds from your CMai account to your CRai account as well - but there is also a transaction fee. That is how banks earn money. Love it or leave it.

Agreed about the cashier's cheque TB, but personally I draw the line at banks charging for inter-branch transfers for the same customer, it's not standard practice in Europe or in Thailand.

[chiang mai]

If you are concerned about bring all that cash with you - ask bank to prepare a managers or cashiers cheque for you. But you will have to pay a small fee for that as well. If you open a Bkk Bank account here at Chiang Rai, you could transfer funds from your CMai account to your CRai account as well - but there is also a transaction fee. That is how banks earn money. Love it or leave it.

Agreed about the cashier's cheque TB, but personally I draw the line at banks charging for inter-branch transfers for the same customer, it's not standard practice in Europe or in Thailand.

Thailand operates a provincial banking system where inter-branch charges between different regions are standard practice, certainly true of banks such as BB and probably all others.

[changraider]

If you are concerned about bring all that cash with you - ask bank to prepare a managers or cashiers cheque for you. But you will have to pay a small fee for that as well. If you open a Bkk Bank account here at Chiang Rai, you could transfer funds from your CMai account to your CRai account as well - but there is also a transaction fee. That is how banks earn money. Love it or leave it.

Agreed about the cashier's cheque TB, but personally I draw the line at banks charging for inter-branch transfers for the same customer, it's not standard practice in Europe or in Thailand.

Thailand operates a provincial banking system where inter-branch charges between different regions are standard practice, certainly true of banks such as BB and probably all others.

Kasikorn hasn't charged me for inter-province transfers, even to other customers. My understanding is that BB is alone in these practices. I'd be interested if someone can confirm for other banks.

[pomchop]

If you are concerned about bring all that cash with you - ask bank to prepare a managers or cashiers cheque for you. But you will have to pay a small fee for that as well. If you open a Bkk Bank account here at Chiang Rai, you could transfer funds from your CMai account to your CRai account as well - but there is also a transaction fee. That is how banks earn money. Love it or leave it.

Agreed about the cashier's cheque TB, but personally I draw the line at banks charging for inter-branch transfers for the same customer, it's not standard practice in Europe or in Thailand.

Thailand operates a provincial banking system where inter-branch charges between different regions are standard practice, certainly true of banks such as BB and probably all others.

Kasikorn hasn't charged me for inter-province transfers, even to other customers. My understanding is that BB is alone in these practices. I'd be interested if someone can confirm for other banks.

Kasikorn charged me a couple hundred baht fee about a month ago when a friend in bkk deposited few hundred thousand baht into my CR account...they actually called me from bkk while he was there to deposit into my account to ask me if i agreed ok for him to put into my account and for me to ok that there would be a fee....i thought it kinda strange but what are you going to do but pay it ....

[chiang mai]

When you transact at a branch of your bank that is outside your home province you can expect to be charged for all manner of items including deposits of cash to your account and withdrawals using a passbook, it takes some getting used to be that's the way it is here, I seriously doubt that any Thai banks are different in this resepct.

[bifftastic]

Bangkok Bank charge me 20 baht for transfers to another Bangkok Bank account in a different province.

If I were the OP I'd open another BB account in Chiang Rai and do the transfer, the fact that they do charge may well be annoying, but it's only 20 baht and you only need to pay it once.

For help with BB accounts I've contacted the ThaiVisa member Daveroc.

Part of his job in Bangkok Bank is to assist foreign customers with any issues they have.

He was able to sort my problem out very quickly.

Hope this helps,

Biff

[harrry]

The charge is on a sliding scale and is capped at 500 baht. It will also take them a few days to do it. They will insist on sending your instruction to pay physically to the branch in CM.

Edited October 27, 2011 by harrry

[bifftastic]

The charge is on a sliding scale and is capped at 500 baht. It will also take them a few days to do it.

Hi Harry, I thought that was for international transfers?

I've transferred ฿1,000 and ฿15,000 between Bangkok Bank accounts in different provinces and was charged 20 baht each time.

However, when I send a SWIFT transfer from the UK, there is the sliding scale you refer to.

Maybe with larger amounts the inter-province charge also has a sliding scale?

Me not having any larger amounts would account for why I haven't encountered it yet I suppose!

[harrry]

The charge is on a sliding scale and is capped at 500 baht. It will also take them a few days to do it.

Hi Harry, I thought that was for international transfers?

I've transferred ฿1,000 and ฿15,000 between Bangkok Bank accounts in different provinces and was charged 20 baht each time.

However, when I send a SWIFT transfer from the UK, there is the sliding scale you refer to.

Maybe with larger amounts the inter-province charge also has a sliding scale?

Me not having any larger amounts would account for why I haven't encountered it yet I suppose!

I just had to do that to transfer money 400000 baht from my old fixed account in CM to my new one in CR. A processess much more involved than it should be.

Edited October 27, 2011 by harrry

[muchogra]

When you transact at a branch of your bank that is outside your home province you can expect to be charged for all manner of items including deposits of cash to your account and withdrawals using a passbook, it takes some getting used to be that's the way it is here, I seriously doubt that any Thai banks are different in this resepct.

chiang mai is absolutely correct here. That's the way banks here operate. It's already much better than decades ago.

I had deposited cash a few times this year of B200,000 at a KBANK Bkk branch into my KBANK CM account. The charge was B20 plus 0.1% of the amount. (B10 for every B10,000) On smaller amount like a few thousands they charged B20 plus 0.5%. The maximum charge on the amount deposited or transferred is B1,000 plus the B20 basic fee. I deposited 3M cash and I was charged B1,020. Thus, if you have a lot to transfer it's "cheaper". I also had carried a few times B160,000 cash in my pocket flying from Bkk to CM but for some they don't want to carry much cash.

[bifftastic]

The charge is on a sliding scale and is capped at 500 baht. It will also take them a few days to do it.

Hi Harry, I thought that was for international transfers?

I've transferred ฿1,000 and ฿15,000 between Bangkok Bank accounts in different provinces and was charged 20 baht each time.

However, when I send a SWIFT transfer from the UK, there is the sliding scale you refer to.

Maybe with larger amounts the inter-province charge also has a sliding scale?

Me not having any larger amounts would account for why I haven't encountered it yet I suppose!

I just had to do that to transfer money 400000 baht from my old fixed account in CM to my new one in CR. A processess much more involved than it should be.

Really? I've not had to move anything more that 20 or 30K which I did online anyway (2 clicks and it was done). Still, it;s interesting to know about the charges, thanks

[changraider]

There's so much interesting but conflicting info here it's hard to make sense of it all. A couple of thoughts: maybe the charges vary depending on the method eg cash, online, atm transfers,cashier cheques etc., or maybe they vary by how the bank categorises their customers.

At Kbank I usually use the ATM transfer facility and haven't been charged for it (sending or receiving) and this includes inter-province transfers up to several hundred thousand to/from other customers. The same is true for cash. The account is linked to a premium cc for which they waive all fees, so maybe they also waive xfer fees.

Anyway as several posters have pointed out the fees are very reasonable for most transactions.