Colombian banks make it difficult to wire money from USA

Bancolombia

Renting in Colombia does not need to be difficult. I moved to a small town near Rionegro 5 years ago, spoke no Spanish but I know how to negotiate. The apt owner ask for a co signer and as I knew no one in this country I simply told the owner I will pay 6 months rent in advance and on the 5th month pay monthly so they always were a month ahead. They liked the idea and told their friends so it has worked for others who are strangers when they arrive.

Good to know this works, thanks.  I had thought of attempting to make the same sort of deal.

do u know the data on what is teh intermediary bank of bancolombia?

I use express send with wells Fargo and let's me know in minutes my transfers and amount deposit.  Davivienda the same way in hours let's me know they have received my transfer.  Davivienda allows $3000 at month, they will decline transfers of you exceed that amount.

Try Alianza valores. I just transferred large sum to buy a house in Colombia. I have no cedula. Yesterday I got my visa for Colombia. It took me 3 days to get it. Easy. t alianza valores they speak English

Hello,

I see Alianza named as one of the recommended banks for opening an account in Colombia for purposes of purchasing a home and transferring the funds from my American Bank.

Does anybody know if I need to be in Colombia to open an account with them and has anybody worked with Citibank in Colombia as I already have an account with Citibank. Can Colombian bank accounts be opened online?

I am trying to do this from the United States so that my bank account will be ready when I need to transfer the funds for the closing.

Thanks for any advice.

David

There are no more Citibanks in Combia Colpatria bought them I believe I was counting on Citibank being here when I got here too but they closed before I got here, but if you use Colpatria ATM's Citibank won't charge you fees.

David you don’t need to be in Colombia. I just transferred large sum for property buy in Rionegro, la ceja and I am in Florida. I don’t have cedula either. You save yourself around 500$ going directly instead of all these so called lawyers . Spread is minimal if 3785 on world markets , they will give 3775 and I negotiated -5 for large sum. A lot of paperwork but talk to Angela in Bogotá . Really sweet lady. She will send you forms to fill out . Not easy but doable. Here is what’s up contact +573142995059. Tell her Peter send you.

I am currently living in Barranquilla and currently bank transfer from my bank in Canada to my Colombian wife’s bank account at BancoColombia...no issues, no bother.  Money available in 24 hours. Jon

Recently I used Transferwise to send money from my US bank to my Bancolombia account. I've used them three times in the last two months and will use them exclusively in the future as long as they continue to be the best service I can find.

Transfers have taken less than 30 minute and are the least expensive of any I have found.

I use world remit for anything less than 7,000$ .? The spread is usually around 50 so If world markets showing 1 usd =3800 you will transfer 3750 per each dollar plus $4 fee. It’s done in about 5 minutes and money arrives instantly . Tried all of them and the world remit works great for me.
Btw . I am picking up my cedula on Wednesday, visa got stamped on Friday for 5 years, opened bank account with scotia bank Colpatria, got health insurance with AXA Colpatria. Off to Bogota on Wednesday driving from Barranquilla. Rented a Chevy Trailblazer for two days. Wife little scared of driving near Bucaramanga section of Colombia but will try to take care and not drive at night. People here in Barranquilla really are taking care because of Covid. I have not seen one person without mask despite humidity and heat. Cheers. Happy to be here

To transfer smaller sums of money (say less than about US$ 10,000) to Colombia, WorldRemit works really well from Canada, the US and other world locations. Use this link to get started and you and I will get a small reward:
https://www.worldremit.com/fr/r/andrer69

When I tried to add a recipient in Colombia to receive money in their Bancolombia account using World Remit their form would not accept the address I entered. The error was that i needed to use letters and numbers or something to that effect. I was entering a standard street address. After searching for a bit and not being able to get to a support email or getting anyone to show up in their on site chat agent I gave up.

I may pay more using Transferwise but the forms you complete to join and send money work  flawlessly. When I called their support phone number to ask questions before using their service one of their support people answered immediately and was very helpful and courteous. Sometimes you get what you pay for.

Use a no charge Credit/Debit card like Scwab, Capitol One in US and KOHO or  Stacks
in Canada and go to zero charge ATMs like Davivienda and Colpatria/Scotiabank

You get the Visa International Exchnge rate all the time, purchases or withdrawlas,  and you dont get nasty emails from BancoColombia  or others asking you where you filled a declaration de Renta (Tax Return)

Make sure you check the spreads . It does matter when you send large amounts. If it’s $100 then is irrelevant

For anyone please stay away from ***. I recommended to transfer large sum. The things went south really fast when I tried to transfer to *** . They are another disaster. Thief banks. Stay away from ***. She screwed up the transfer and still to close to $4000 is still missing . She is not answering to any of my messages. My God I am so glad I did not buy anything in Colombia. Please rent there and stay away from these banks. I was able to get most of my money back which was over 200k but oh man what I went through.
Don’t buy anything in Colombia because as usual you will get shafted just like any other gringo.
I am back in the USA and have no intentions anymore being there including being with my wife that also turned out to be a thief and a lier.
I would not recommend having any large amounts of money in any Colombian banks. I learned the hard way. Now I hired an attorney to fight for custody of my child that she abducted from USA. It’s an agony

If you decide to write a book about your recent experiences with Colombia, I would be interested to read it.

I have found that using my debit card seems to be the cheapest way for me. Have been also using Xoom to send money to Bank of Colombia for my wife, she goes into their teller window and does battle when they try to make her use the ATM, I think they want the additional fees. I used to have the Xoom account linked to a credit card and was getting 1 percent back but they figured out the coding and last time wanted to charge me like it was a cash advance with all their nice fees and interest. I then linked it to my checking account.

Each month I transfer money from my US bank to my Bancolombia account for my expenses. For the past three months I've used Transferwise. The fees are reasonable, the transfers complete without a hitch and arrive in my Colombian account within 30 minutes. Before I used them I talked by phone with their support to reassure myself of certain concerns. I found them to be friendly, responsive and answered without hesitation. So far my experience with them has been 100% positive.

@ChrisGC Chris ***

@cartagenaexplorer

Wise is a joke  For no reason they shut down my account  Then wanted all sorts of convoluted photos, and told me to wait 40 days  Use Xe or Remitly  No problems with either.    I’ve made numerous transfers with zero issues  Xe has particularly good rates 

@djholcomb7952 Hello. I'd like to check out your property for sale. Can we connect via email or WhatsApp? You're still in Colombia, yeah?

@JamesDM    I had the same experience, but it took me 9 weeks to get my money out.............. I also discovered that when you use WISE, you are actually giving them your money.............they own it and they invest it in whatever they want and any positive returns they keep 100%, they do NOT state what happens if they loose your money .............. Wise is also NOT a bank, as I thought they were ................ TOTAL SCAMMERS!!

@jubiliado there should be no problem. do a Remitly transfer-if she has  a Colombian  Cedula-

I do it all the time-to both Davavienda and Banco Colombia

My girlfriend has an issue when I try to wire money to her Davaviienda  account though, becasue she has a Venezuelan PTP and not a cedula yet.

A word of caution. Watch the  limits you send to any bank, espescially Banco Colombia from overseas

You send more than 55 million in one year you will probably get an email from DIAN "suggesting " you  consider doing a "declaracion de Renta", but they also apparently  tell you to ignore the email if you feel you are not a "tax resident"

Still, best to avoid these emails.

I just replied to an 8 year old thread..sheessh

Still valid and good information to know!

lpd

Super random, but I am desperately looking for Intermediary Bank information for a bank to bank transfer from Australia to Bancolombia... it is coming from a super annuation company who won't use Wise, Remitly etc, and will only send in AUD. I have been trying to sort this out for 5 months, and the banks in Colombia (above and Davivienda) assure us that they don't use intermediary banks - but when the company attempts the transfer, it is rejected. We are losing our minds... there must be something we don't know...

Any suggestions or places to look?

Transfert with Remitly are ok in Colombia, but limited at 1200$ by transfert. Ask your bank about limits  tranfer because it depends each bank. For example limit of Davivienda is 5000$/month.

Thanks but it must be bank to bank. We were told today that the SWIFT code for Bancolombia is not updated to accept AUD so now we are stuck with our money in Australia and we cannot get it to Colombia. Any ideas? The money is coming from a super annuation company and is less than $12000 AUD

do you try convert AUD in EUR before send ?

@rvmax Thanks for the reply, but no. The money is coming from a superannuation company in Australia and I don't have any control over how and via which channels they send it. We were told yesterday that the SWIFT code for Bancolombia is not updated for AUD, which I really don't understand, but would explain why Bancolombia keep telling us they don't use intermediary banks, and also why the payment keeps getting rejected.

I have asked if the company can somehow make the payment in USD or via a remittance company like Remitly or something, we are desperate to resolve this matter, it's been months...

Anything above a few $1000 may be complicated by both practices of US banks and Colombian banks.

I’m a 81 male, US born and raised citizen that was convinced by my son to live part time in Colombia for my health.

The extreme temperatures in my mountain home in California can have significant snow, ice and temperatures above 112F in the  same year. My body can no longer handle that.

After 5 years of Airbnb living, i read the books, hired a local attorney and a CPA and I bought  3 story home in Cali Colombia in June 2021.  It took about 6 months getting the money there.  After remodeling I got tired of the stairs and wanted to add an elevator. The engineer and architect both said the house layout does not reasonably support the space needed for an elevator.

Armed with my new visa, attorney, real estate agent and CPA, I found the solution less than a block from Colombian home, a much bigger 3 story home. 5 months later, I have only been able to get 1/2 the money delivered to the seller and I'’m getting  worried.

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@emmaemma9transfer bank to bank to annother bank and from that bank to Colombia by Remitly

@mikehalonzoat your age you should be renting and spend all the money on your house renting and enjoying life

You wanna leave the mess of your house in Colombia to your son to take care of?

Best to leave him a bit of cash.