So Who Took The 500 Baht Haircut On The Swift Transfer? Bkb

[4evermaat]

I had a guy send a transfer to me from I think Commonwealth Bank in Australia to Bangkok Bank thailand (acct in chumphon). He sent $312.46 = 9095.71 THB @29.11 aud --> THB exchange rate.

I get the SMS from BkB about 2 hours after the guy sent it (very good total sending time).

[name of sender] transferred 8,485.71 ([email protected] - THB 110) from abroad into [acct #]

I signed into internet banking to get some more facts, and here is the details:

11 Apr 2013 10:33

BAHTNET

8,485.71 xxxxxxxx User

So who is this BAHTNET? and why did they need 500 baht? The 110 baht I am unsure what that was for if the money was already in baht (bangkok to chumphon?)

I'm not ready to assign blame YET, except for the sender who apparently used THB instead of AUD as I instructed them specifically to use the AUD option. He sent me a screenshot of the internet banking form and it looks like the bank "automatically" detects that the SWIFT code points to a Thai Bank and offers THB option as default sending currency. The user would have to know where to click on the triangle drop down menu which i'm guessing had other available currencies. How convenient.

PS: the AUD --> THB TT exchange rate was actually 30.225 or so. So that was appx 350 baht lost on the exchange rate. But the 500 baht is where I really want to know where that went.

[topt]

I would guess your receiving bank took some of it - normally 200- 500baht - although 500 baht seems excessive on such a small transfer for a Thai bank receiving but not if it is the cost of the Aussie bank to send?

Also depends on who pays the charges -IE you can usually choose to share the charges or sender or receiver pays all.

Edit - I think BAHTNET is just the net amount of Baht received after charges

Edited April 11, 2013 by topt

[4evermaat]

I would guess your receiving bank took some of it - normally 200- 500baht - although 500 baht seems excessive on such a small transfer for a Thai bank receiving but not if it is the cost of the Aussie bank to send?

Also depends on who pays the charges -IE you can usually choose to share the charges or sender or receiver pays all.

according to the SMS, BKB only charged 110 baht. I'm guessing there is a separate fee for non THB arriving transfers from abroad vs THB transfers from abroad.

But the sender paid all SWIFT transfer fees.

[fletchsmile]

When you send a SWIFT, charges can be set as either:

BEN: local fees and overseas fees paid by beneficiary (receiver)

OUR: local fees and overseas borner by remitter (Sender)

SHA: local charges borne by remitter,a nd overseas by beneficiary

One of Thailand's main clearing systems is BAHTNET.

ANZ don't have full bank status in Thailand and aren't a Bahtnet member. So on top of the above fees the is likely an additional charge from the correseponsent bank, as the transaction will go ANZ > Corresepondent Bank > Bangkok Bank.

Fletch

Edited April 11, 2013 by fletchsmile

[topt]

I would guess your receiving bank took some of it - normally 200- 500baht - although 500 baht seems excessive on such a small transfer for a Thai bank receiving but not if it is the cost of the Aussie bank to send?

Also depends on who pays the charges -IE you can usually choose to share the charges or sender or receiver pays all.

according to the SMS, BKB only charged 110 baht. I'm guessing there is a separate fee for non THB arriving transfers from abroad vs THB transfers from abroad.

But the sender paid all SWIFT transfer fees.

Yes but how did he pay them - did he pay separately as otherwise to me that sounds like the 500baht which just gets deducted in transit as it were.

Edit - so Fletch the 500baht is probably the correspondent bank fee?

Edited April 11, 2013 by topt

[BookMan]

When you send a SWIFT, charges can be set as either:

BEN: local fees and overseas fees paid by beneficiary (receiver)

OUR: local fees and overseas borner by remitter (Sender)

SHA: local charges borne by remitter,a nd overseas by beneficiary

One of Thailand's main clearing systems is BAHTNET.

ANZ don't have full bank status in Thailand and aren't a Bahtnet member. So on top of the above fees the is likely an additional charge from the correseponsent bank, as the transaction will go ANZ > Corresepondent Bank > Bangkok Bank.

Fletch

ANZ (business account) charges about $30 on the Aussie end ( they charge you more to send it in AUssie dollars), and when it goes in to SCB, SCB charges another 700 baht or so.

[yoshiwara]

I would guess your receiving bank took some of it - normally 200- 500baht - although 500 baht seems excessive on such a small

Appears to be a flat rate.

[cardholder]

There is also likely to be a small inter-province charge.

[mausbiber]

I also had to learn it the hard way.

About one year ago I transferred money from my European bank to BkkBank.

I chose to send THB because exchange rate was better in Europe.

When finally I got the money into BkkBank, it was less than expected.

The nice lady at the counter explained to me:

incoming international fund transfer in THB cannot go directly to a BkkBank-account.

It must be processed first by another bank, I think it was SCB. This bank deducts their own fee.

Than SCB transfers the THB-amount by BAHTNET to my BkkBank-account, of course charging again a fee.

So be careful: if you want to send a THB-amount from outside to Thailand check before if any other bank is involved and what are the fees.

Obviously with another bank there may be a different procedure (e.g. SCB does not have to cooperate with another bank).

To me it looks a little bit strange why BkkBank can handle incoming funds in EUR but not in THB - TIT

Like normal the website http://www.bangkokbank.com/BangkokBank/PersonalBanking/DailyBanking/CurrencyExchange/Pages/Fees.aspx#1

do not show the full truth

[aarn]

I had similar experience, SWIFT/IMT transfer from CommBankAustr to KBank (Chumphon) last year.

CommBank hit me for $AUD22 to send $AUD.

KBank gave me reasonable Xrate ie. 3% better than changing to baht in Austr, then transferring.

Kbank fees were not unreasonable.

Three months later, 500B fee pops up in my KBank account. Code was same as for SWIFT/IMT.

Enquired in bank - staff had no idea (other than to suggest I forgot an ATM transaction).

Thus, moral is anticipate ongoing charges... plus, NEVER use an ATM that is not outside a bank. AA

[Pib]

The missing 500 baht sure sounds like Commonwealth uses a Thai correspondent/intermediary financial agency/bank for transfers to Thailand and the simple fact it was an even 500 baht. Additionally, from some googling I found where the Bank of Thailand (the daddy rabbit for bahtnet) charges its "associated" members 500 baht "per month" to use bahtnet...but that fee sure sounds like a monthly subscription fee a bank would pay and not what would be charged to someone for any single transaction. But if a Thai correspondent bank was used in this transaction before that correspondent bank sent it over to Bangkok Bank I could easily see them charging 500 baht since it's in the 200-500 baht ballpark all Thai banks charge to receive/convert incoming money before possibly transferring it again to another branch. Seems every time I read a post about Commonwealth it's about high, mysterious fees in money transfers.

[Canuck50]

This seems to be a standard service fee. I deal with Krungsri in BKK and HSBC in Canada. When I do a wire transfer in $CAN to Krungsri, my HSBC charges a wire transfer fee on the Canadian end and Krungsri charges the current exchange rate PLUS 500 THB for their services. Here is a clip from Krungsri's fee schedule for this service:

• 0.25% of the transferred amount, a minimum of THB200 and a maximum of THB500 per transaction.
• In the event that the fund recipient’s account is located outside of our clearing zone (Greater Bangkok Area) or in provinces other than Bangkok, an additional communication fee of THB20 per transaction will apply.

I presume the service fees for most Thai banks are roughly the same. It was so much easier back when HSBC was here and I could simply do an online transfer. Does anyone know of another bank that offers the same international banking services as HSBC did?