Uk To Thai Bank Transfer

[tomcreeduk]

I do apologies if this has been covered before but I'm scrolling through the website & some posts are from 2007.

Basically I have a Barclays UK bank and have just set up a KBank in Thailand. I can log on from UK & see my Thai balance so have basic access not that the website is to easy to use. When I set up the account I was given a SWIFT code and the account name & account number now that I'm back in the UK I want some advise on how straight forward is it to send money too ?

Is sending it from a UK bank the best and cheapest way or do you know the best bank / account to send it from ?

What are approx fees ?

Do I need an IBAN number if so what is it & how do I get it ?

I believe it's best to send GBP and let them do the currency conversion that end ?

I know the exchange rates change daily but do I get the TT rate if so what does it mean.

I'm looking at sending say £10,000 a year to the Thai account

Anything else that will help me please advise as this is 100% new to me. I'd be very greatful.

Thanks

[Satcommlee]

Hi,

I was the recipient of Barclays to Kasikorn transfers every month for many years.

Although the sending account was Barclays Business Banking.

Make sure they send it as GBP for best conversion.

All I needed was the following info..

Kasikorn Bank Public Company Limited
**YOUR BRANCH ADDRESS
Telephone: +66 2 8888 8888
Account Name: MR. YOUR NAME AS PER BANK BOOK
Account Number: 3XX-X-XXXXX-X
Swift Reference: KASITHBK

Money was very quick (sometimes minutes) to arrive.

Edited April 23, 2013 by Satcommlee

[BWPattaya]

I have a Coop account in the UK and a Kasikorn one here. I telephone the Coop in the evening, and it arrives here at 9am next morning. As Satcommlee says you only need the Swift Code: KASITHBK . There is no IBAN.

I always specify shared charges so the Coop sends GBP and I get charged 13GBP. They always ask what the money transfer is for, so called terrorist legislation says they must ask, so I always say "Living Expenses". If you want to send a lump over to buy a condo say that it is for a condo purchase.

[Cobalt60]

You will incur charges at both ends, well I do with Lloyds/Bangkok Bank.

//Edit: off topic. The OP clearly mentioned that he is using K-Bank (KasikornBank)

Edited April 25, 2013 by Maestro
added edit note

[Goshawk]

You will incur charges at both ends, well I do with Lloyds/Bangkok Bank.

this is my 2 bank combo also... £20 charge in uk + 'split charges' (cheapest) results in around 200baht charge/deduction once arrives in Th.

[GarryUK]

I did an HSBC to Kasikorn Bank transfer the first time I sent the GF money. I only did it once! I don't recall exactly but it cost about £20 in the UK, then Kasikorn Bangkok charged 900B (worked out about the same again), and finally her local branch charged another 110B or so. I sent GBP and was told that's why Kasikorn charged me 900B. Her bank told her I should send from Barclays or Llyods TSB I think, but when I went in to see them both their charges seemed just as bad.

Since then I've withdrawn cash from an ATM (when in Thailand), otherwise use Western Union. Heard many horror stories, but not had any problems myself. Usually costs me £6.90 and takes around 3 working days, and it costs her 110B each time so about £2.55 in todays money.

[chiang mai]

You bank with Barclays in the Uk and you now have a Kaikorn account in Thailand and you seem to be asking what is the cheapest way to send money from the UK to that Kasikorn account? The cost of transfering money depends on the bank that you use to send that money and not the one that recieves it, so in your case your funds transfer costs are determined by Barclays UK Kasikorn, as the recieving bank, will make a small charge for recieving the funds as will any bank in Thailand when funds are sent to them, you really can't escape that. What you can do however is to shop around in the Uk and see which ones have the cheapest international transfer cvosts, one bank you might want to check out is Bangkok Bank in London where, if you can manage to open an account with them, funds transfer costs to Thailand should be almost free.

Finally, IBAN numbers are only used for European bank destinations and are not used in Asia.

[sms747]

Remember if you transfer a lot of money eg to buy house, you will need to go into the bank in Thailand to sign for it before they will out it into your account. This happened to me and did not know about it by the time I found out the rate had gone down and it cost me 40k. Smaller amounts go in automatically.

[al007]

I use LLoyds TSB int , no charges on internartional transfers, but have to keep min pound sterling 2500 in account, Money into Bank Bangkok sterling account in thailand max fee about pounds 10. all works well, can do transfer on telephone

[colin25]

I recently sent some money from nationwide to KTB

As above re what was needed, the charge was £25, I sent GBP (always best, UK banks screw you in any exchange), and no charge from KTB side.

I also needed a reason for sending.

All in all, was easy.

[gwynt]

I have regularly sent from Nationwide to SBC GBP acc charged 25 pound by Nationwide and about 100Tb by SCB and I transfer to my Tb account when the exchange rate is favorable, unless I need the money and then only what is required.

I transferred enough to pay for the house in two batches with no restrictions.

[Baerboxer]

You bank with Barclays in the Uk and you now have a Kaikorn account in Thailand and you seem to be asking what is the cheapest way to send money from the UK to that Kasikorn account? The cost of transfering money depends on the bank that you use to send that money and not the one that recieves it, so in your case your funds transfer costs are determined by Barclays UK Kasikorn, as the recieving bank, will make a small charge for recieving the funds as will any bank in Thailand when funds are sent to them, you really can't escape that. What you can do however is to shop around in the Uk and see which ones have the cheapest international transfer cvosts, one bank you might want to check out is Bangkok Bank in London where, if you can manage to open an account with them, funds transfer costs to Thailand should be almost free.

Finally, IBAN numbers are only used for European bank destinations and are not used in Asia.

Not true. Thailand does not currently use IBAN numbers so the Swift Code is important. But many countries outside of Europe now also use IBAN.

[chiang mai]

You bank with Barclays in the Uk and you now have a Kaikorn account in Thailand and you seem to be asking what is the cheapest way to send money from the UK to that Kasikorn account? The cost of transfering money depends on the bank that you use to send that money and not the one that recieves it, so in your case your funds transfer costs are determined by Barclays UK Kasikorn, as the recieving bank, will make a small charge for recieving the funds as will any bank in Thailand when funds are sent to them, you really can't escape that. What you can do however is to shop around in the Uk and see which ones have the cheapest international transfer cvosts, one bank you might want to check out is Bangkok Bank in London where, if you can manage to open an account with them, funds transfer costs to Thailand should be almost free.

Finally, IBAN numbers are only used for European bank destinations and are not used in Asia.

Not true. Thailand does not currently use IBAN numbers so the Swift Code is important. But many countries outside of Europe now also use IBAN.

So which part of my post stating that IBAN numbers are not used here is not true!!!!

Edited April 24, 2013 by chiang mai

[bluemoon58]

Click on the link and have a read. The P.O charge nothing but my Thai bank does. I get proof of what the Thai bank have charged me, send it to the P.O and they refund it within an hour or two if it is a banking day. Simples...

http://www.postoffice.co.uk/international-payments

[DGS1244]

If you are from UK and have a Bangkok Bank account in Thailand then it is easier and cheaper as BB have a Branch in London and you can open an account there and do an internal transfer. Cheaper by far.

//Edit: off topic. The OP clearly mentioned that he is using K-Bank (KasikornBank)

Edited April 25, 2013 by Maestro
added edit note

[chiang mai]

If you are from UK and have a Bangkok Bank account in Thailand then it is easier and cheaper as BB have a Branch in London and you can open an account there and do an internal transfer. Cheaper by far.

We've been through this one a number of times and although it is theoretically possible to do what you suggest, many people here have tried to open a bank account with BB in London but nobody has been able to do so, I'm not certain that BB London actually has a retail banking license!

[DGS1244]

If you are from UK and have a Bangkok Bank account in Thailand then it is easier and cheaper as BB have a Branch in London and you can open an account there and do an internal transfer. Cheaper by far.

We've been through this one a number of times and although it is theoretically possible to do what you suggest, many people here have tried to open a bank account with BB in London but nobody has been able to do so, I'm not certain that BB London actually has a retail banking license!

I have friend here and he had no problems opening the account in the UK, guess he picked the right day.

[chiang mai]

If you are from UK and have a Bangkok Bank account in Thailand then it is easier and cheaper as BB have a Branch in London and you can open an account there and do an internal transfer. Cheaper by far.

We've been through this one a number of times and although it is theoretically possible to do what you suggest, many people here have tried to open a bank account with BB in London but nobody has been able to do so, I'm not certain that BB London actually has a retail banking license!

I have friend here and he had no problems opening the account in the UK, guess he picked the right day.

Lucky, he might be the only person who's ever managed to do so, everyone else has reported failures on this front and even the Bangkok Bank (expat) liason representatives to this furum couldn't confirm that it can be done!

[dunque]

You will incur charges at both ends, well I do with Lloyds/Bangkok Bank.

this is my 2 bank combo also... £20 charge in uk + 'split charges' (cheapest) results in around 200baht charge/deduction once arrives in Th.

Are you using Internet banking for he Lloyds part of h transfer, should be cheaper n that, I pay £10 for £1400 pm

[laislica]

Does anyone use a Forex Trading account?
Watch the rate online buy the currency have have it sent to your Thai bank.

Some FX accounts charge a "wire transfer charge" of say £12.50, others not.

It's fast and you get a good rate.

Some are by phone only so you need to call them with say Skype.

[Cobalt60]

I use FairFx pre charged card. Leave that in Thailand then when I am in the UK I can then charge up the card on line (can do this from anywhere now as they have an I phone app) and it can be drawn from any ATM in Thailand. Costs are the usual 150 baht ATM fee and a bit of what they make on the exchange rates.

It seems to be the cheapest way at the moment for me.

[Lambie]

Hi,

I have been transferring GBP to THB from the Post Office to Kasikorn for a number of years now and find the Post Office's service absolutely brilliant!

I transferred £2000 on 19/4/13 and got a rate of 42.6017THB.

Kasikorn charge for the service (547THB) which is taken off the amount transferred but the Post Office will credit this back to your English bank account if you send them a screen print of the amount that was actually deposited in your Kasikorn account. Can't fault that as a service!!!

For your info:

The URL for the PO service is >

https://postoffice.hifxonline.co.uk/Payments/account/login/default.aspx?returnUrl=%2fPayments%2fHome.aspx

There are security procedures in place for this service, so you have to register first and they send confirmation of your account to your UK address.

Once the transfer has completed (last one took 4 days) send your screen print and a copy of the financial transaction details (a pdf file provided by the Post Office) to:-

[email protected]

and they will credit you back the Thai bank charges.

Cheers

[tragickingdom]

No Iban used in Thailand (only within the SEPA zone), use your Bank name, Account Number and use the name of the account holder in combination with the SWIFT code. Take care that you use a free form of the bank account otherwise your internet bank program thinks it is local and the number is wrong. By far the fastest way to sent it to Thailand is to a Kasikorn bank account. If you sent before 14.00 it is available the other afternoon latest at 16.00 hrs.

All other banks are significantly slower in most cases.

[bkk_mike]

It's £10 for Halifax or Bank of Scotland to send using internet banking.

Are you using phone banking with Lloyd's that means you're paying £20 or do the different parts of the same bank charge differently?

Main rule though... Always send GBP. FX rates in Thailand are a lot better...

[bluemoon58]

Hi,

I have been transferring GBP to THB from the Post Office to Kasikorn for a number of years now and find the Post Office's service absolutely brilliant!

I transferred £2000 on 19/4/13 and got a rate of 42.6017THB.

Kasikorn charge for the service (547THB) which is taken off the amount transferred but the Post Office will credit this back to your English bank account if you send them a screen print of the amount that was actually deposited in your Kasikorn account. Can't fault that as a service!!!

For your info:

The URL for the PO service is >

https://postoffice.hifxonline.co.uk/Payments/account/login/default.aspx?returnUrl=%2fPayments%2fHome.aspx

There are security procedures in place for this service, so you have to register first and they send confirmation of your account to your UK address.

Once the transfer has completed (last one took 4 days) send your screen print and a copy of the financial transaction details (a pdf file provided by the Post Office) to:-

[email protected]

and they will credit you back the Thai bank charges.

Cheers

Did I not say this earlier...??? I use exactly the same system...

[Cuban]

As others have suggested SEND in GBP Sterling, the UK bank will want to send in Thai Baht because they screw you on the exchange rate.

Different banks charge different fees for these; SWIFT transfers, as they are called. So shop around, I suggest you seek a Standard SWIFT Transfer, which takes about ~3/4 working days, as opposed to an Urgent Swift Transfer which takes ~2/3 working days.

The cost seems to be between £20-30 depending on the organisation.

There are also fees to pay at the Thai Bank end, I suggest you communicate clearly to your bank that you pay UK bank fees (the £20) and the receiving account pays the Thai Bank fees. Otherwise you will be paying a the UK bank's poor exchange rate conversion rate on a small amount (~200Baht) for which there will probably also be a minimum exchange fee. The Thai Bank fee is deducted from the funds transferred.

The SWIFT code you have/need will be for the bank's main office in Bangkok, you will need to clearly communicate the target account name and number as appearing on the Thai Bank book.

UK banking staff seem to be completely unaware of international banking for the most part and it can take a while for them to learn with you as their Guinea Pig.

[Mackie]

This might seem unusual. Does anyone know what is the best way of sending money from Thai bank account to British bank account?

[brotch]

Hi

I now use UKforex it gives me the best rate and no charge over £3000.00 there is a £7 charge if under that ,but wont do under £1000 . I buy on line then do transfer to them and money is paid into my Bangkok bank its so easy . I was using Hifix but the rates were not good i get about 1 bt more per £ with Ukforex and lower charges . It will take a little time to set up but its worth it , banks are really expensive .

[mrbojangles]

It's £10 for Halifax or Bank of Scotland to send using internet banking.

Are you using phone banking with Lloyd's that means you're paying £20 or do the different parts of the same bank charge differently?

Main rule though... Always send GBP. FX rates in Thailand are a lot better...

I use the Halifax to SCB regularly and not being pedantic but I get charged £9.50 for a single transaction (I think upto a max of £10k). Again, sending in GBP is the best.

Hi

I now use UKforex it gives me the best rate and no charge over £3000.00 there is a £7 charge if under that ,but wont do under £1000 . I buy on line then do transfer to them and money is paid into my Bangkok bank its so easy . I was using Hifix but the rates were not good i get about 1 bt more per £ with Ukforex and lower charges . It will take a little time to set up but its worth it , banks are really expensive .

As above, if you sent it in GBP you wouldn't suffer from the UK Banks exchange rates.

[chiang mai]

This might seem unusual. Does anyone know what is the best way of sending money from Thai bank account to British bank account?

Pick your source and target banks and make a SWIFT transfer! Or are you really asking a different question?