Transferwise

sgndep wrote:

Hi guys,

A question about transferwise. Is it possible to receive a payment from Europe in euro and then send to my local bank. Or safer to let my Vietnam partner do all the admin and then transfer to her account.  She's a Vietnam national.

Any advice is warmly appreciated

I used it to transfer money from a UK account in GBP to my TransferWise account while in VN, the hen send that payment to a Vietnamese bank account in USD... So yes it should be fine, whenever you send the funds it asks you what currency you want to use and also shows how much the end user gets.. so you can see which currency has the best dress and exchange rate

Jlgarbutt wrote:

sgndep wrote:

Hi guys,

A question about transferwise. Is it possible to receive a payment from Europe in euro and then send to my local bank. Or safer to let my Vietnam partner do all the admin and then transfer to her account.  She's a Vietnam national.

Any advice is warmly appreciated

I used it to transfer money from a UK account in GBP to my TransferWise account while in VN, the hen send that payment to a Vietnamese bank account in USD... So yes it should be fine, whenever you send the funds it asks you what currency you want to use and also shows how much the end user gets.. so you can see which currency has the best dress and exchange rate

Just like Jlgarbutt has said it's easy, I use mine all the time from my bank in Australia to VN bank account here you may have to fill in a box that says where is money from and what it is for,, I put personal account Aus - Monthly living expenses in VN.
Like stated it tells you if you send *** you get *** in local money.

First time may take a couple of days for money from your account to hit Transferwise account and usually pretty quick to transfer, second time it's a bit quicker in my experience.

Also the stated exchange rate holds for 2-3 days which gives time for them to get money without the rate moving on the deal,, even if the actual rate moves.

How are their exchange rates?  Just yesterday, I sent $100.00 into our Citi account to cover fees for a few years and they converted at 22,502.5 VND.  Last time she was there, my wife took out the time deposit that was making the account free and put it in another bank, but that's another story.  I don't know about the Saigon gold shops, but that looks to be about a 3% discount off of the rates on xe.com.  It is sort of a hidden fee built into a transaction that is nominally free.  Of course nobody ever accused Citigroup of placing the interests of their small customers first.

THIGV wrote:

How are their exchange rates?  Just yesterday, I sent $100.00 into our Citi account to cover fees for a few years and they converted at 22,502.5 VND.  Last time she was there, my wife took out the time deposit that was making the account free and put it in another bank, but that's another story.  I don't know about the Saigon gold shops, but that looks to be about a 3% discount off of the rates on xe.com.  It is sort of a hidden fee built into a transaction that is nominally free.  Of course nobody ever accused Citigroup of placing the interests of their small customers first.

as of 07:40
send $1000
12.76 USD fee
23,182.5 rate (47hrs(
you get 22,886,691VND

My friend in Australia wanted to send $1,000 AUD to VN and he said Western Union was good as well having at the time (a month ago) less of a fee both are easy to go to their website and just put in the amount - country and compare the 2.

It does matter bigtime if sending from C/Card, paypal, postoffice, bank or cash for each end so check out which is best in your location.

There is also Instarem but when I went to transfer it had a low AUD - VND amount cap you could transfer check for your location  - it did however have very good rates.

Or download the apps and compare.

Even easier is to setup a AUD account and receive aud and no worries about the exchange rate.

colinoscapee wrote:

Even easier is to setup a AUD account and receive aud and no worries about the exchange rate.

And then take out AUD go gold shop D1?

Not sure if you can get one here, but TransferWise back home also issue MasterCard for use in store or ATM

Jlgarbutt wrote:

Not sure if you can get one here, but TransferWise back home also issue MasterCard for use in store or ATM

Didnt know that one, very interesting.

I just looked at getting it said
"We’re sorry, cards haven’t reached Vietnam yet
Click below to be the first to know when they do."

sgndep wrote:

Hi guys,

A question about transferwise. Is it possible to receive a payment from Europe in euro and then send to my local bank.

I've been using transferWise borderless.

I do gbp (EUr is also possible I believe) deposit to tw borderless account. Then can convert to VND and hold that Vnd in borderless account or send it to local Vietnamese bank.

You can hold multiple currencies (usd, AUD....etc). Exchange rate for conversion matches xe.com rate. There is only a small charge for transfer to local bank. About 65k vnd per transfer. Think it was reduced recently to about 60k Vnd.

If you get the borderless card you can withdraw up to certain amount (it's the equivalent of 200 gbp for uk account holders - don't know what the EUR limit is) from ATM in Vietnam. I've been able to withdraw 6,000,000vnd without fee (as it's just under 200 gbp).

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

Keiran83 wrote:

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

How much are you trying to send? what do you put as reason for sending?

If less than $5,000 and reason is living expenses it should go through ok,,,, unless your visa has expire here and they see your out of the country,,,
Ive just had a shit fight with VP Bank they want docs where from, why, blah blah blah every time I get my pension money.
They have cracked down becoz they are fighting to get every last drop of tax and wonder where the money came from and if they can wring tax out of you ( as least that was the gist of the convo I got, they wanted to know if it was money being used in a business?)

Andybris2020 wrote:

Keiran83 wrote:

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

How much are you trying to send? what do you put as reason for sending?

I’ve only been doing test amounts of $20 because I don’t want to lose it all or have it stuck in limbo. I’ve put ‘other’ next to every attempt except my last, which was ‘living expenses’. It’s likely my visa that’s stopping it. They don’t have a number I can call them on from Aus, so I’m hoping they call me tomorrow.

Keiran83 wrote:

Andybris2020 wrote:

Keiran83 wrote:

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

How much are you trying to send? what do you put as reason for sending?

I’ve only been doing test amounts of $20 because I don’t want to lose it all or have it stuck in limbo. I’ve put ‘other’ next to every attempt except my last, which was ‘living expenses’. It’s likely my visa that’s stopping it. They don’t have a number I can call them on from Aus, so I’m hoping they call me tomorrow.

thats weird, i just sent over 15 transfers in the last year all no problem, i put person going to me,, and reason living expenses,,, ive sent other people money here through it no problem as well,, weird

Keiran83 wrote:

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

With the AUS to Vietnam VCB bank account transfer using Transwise, I take it that it's never gone through?

If so, could be to do with the type of your account at VCB. I did a 'test' transfer of 10 EUR from Transferwise to my Sacombank All-for-one account back in 2019. Transfer bounced straight-away.

I figured it must have bounced because the all-for-one account isn't a fully-fledged current account.

Then tried 10 GBP transfer to Timo current account and that one went through fine.

Honestly VCB has been a headache since I started using it, but my work set up the account. I think I’ll be looking for a different back when I return unless they can help me... which historically ha not been my experience with them!

Keiran83 wrote:

I've been trying to send money from Aus TransferWise to my account with Vietcombank, but it keeps bouncing. Is there anything people recommend, or is VCB just impossible to send money to if you're a foreigner? I'm in Aus at the moment, but returning next week and can't get VND here.

I have the same problem.  I opened an account at Vietcombank  that only allows me to fund from my US account and they gave me the bank information, but Transferwise tells me that the receiving bank rejected the deposit.  I've tried revising the information I gave to Transferwise in hopes of correcting whatever error there was, but nothing has worked -- I'm up to four rejections now. 

I will go to Vietcombank on Monday to make sure there is no typo in the information they gave me, but it's quite annoying that I am given no reason for the rejections.  I set this up to allow me to pay my rent with Vietcombank's app, but it looks like I won't be able to fund the account in time to pay next month's rent.

Best way to send money to Vietnam via Transferwise is through a US$ account with HSBC — fast, efficient and no fees.  Then take out money in USD and change as usual at your local exchange stall, like those at Ben Thianh market

I received this from TranferWise yesterday:

"Our team have confirmed that the payment bounced-back  because some beneficiary accounts are not eligible to accept transfer via NAPAS rail (instant payment).

This reason differs between different VND banks, however we confirmed that some banks don't support foreigners/expat account holder via NAPAS.

As NAPAS is the only transfer method our partner is using, payments to  accounts with such 'limitations' cannot be supported with our default partner.

However, we can offer to manually route affected  transfers to our back-up partner  as a temporary workaround till we get a new partner.

In order to do this, you will need to:

1. setup another payment order, allow us to pay-out and let it bounce-back with our first partner.

2. Please do not cancel the returned transfer.

3. But instead contact us (customer support) for manual routing,

3. We will then manually payout through another partner

4. The payment will reach your recipient in the next 1 working day

As the steps are manual, please do note that it will take a longer time (2 working days) for your payment to be completed. So do have us process your future transfers as such, however, that is if you also agree with the time frame."

They left out, however, that there is no customer support available in Australia until the 29th December, which I didn't realise until I'd completed steps 1 and 2, and on step 3 learnt that there was no one to help me until Tuesday. For an international company they work at an absolute snails pace.

I'm also waiting for an account verification with Hai Ha Money Transfer (https://hhmt.com.au/) which is an Australian-based VN money transfer company. Hopefully I'll have something sorted out ASAP.

I used to use Ozforex.com.au (now known as ofx.com) to transfer from Australia. Then I checked out Transferwise earlier this year and never looked back.
OFX took 3-5 business days to complete the transfer to my VN bank (Sacombank) but Transferwise now does it in 7 minutes in total....amazing as I watch the steps progress on-screen.
This is only possible since OSKO Payments Service has been introduced into Australian Banks which allow for instant transfer across different AUS Banks.
I pay from Westpac $1000 AUD to Sacombank in VND for a fee of $11 AUD and the exchange rate matches xe.com pretty much (a slight delay so it can work in my favour if I study xe whilst on the rise, then make the transaction as soon as it drops) .
I've never had a bounce or issue transferring $1000 AUD.

Keiran83 wrote:

I received this from TranferWise yesterday:

"Our team have confirmed that the payment bounced-back  because some beneficiary accounts are not eligible to accept transfer via NAPAS rail (instant payment).

This reason differs between different VND banks, however we confirmed that some banks don't support foreigners/expat account holder via NAPAS.

As NAPAS is the only transfer method our partner is using, payments to  accounts with such 'limitations' cannot be supported with our default partner.
.......

Just stumbled across this post from October 2020:

....initiated a Transferwise transfer to my wife's account.  Within 30 minutes she got a notification that the money was deposited into her account.  It took 1-2 hours for the transfers I tried to send to myself to bounce back to me.  There are no records of any transactions listed for my account.  I'll try sending to my account again.  Both of us have separate Vietcombank VND accounts.  Maybe there is a restriction on my account as a foreigner.

I had test payments from Transferwise and Hai Ha Money Transfer come through at about the same time. TW took 2 days and came in at a lower rate. Hai Ha is a little more fiddly, because you set up the payment request, send the agreed amount to Hai Ha, then go back and click 'money sent'. They then send the money to VN. It takes about 8 hours, but whatever they do didn't have any of the issues TW had with sending to my Vietcombank account.

I have been sending money from my Australian Westpac account to my Vietcombank account for the last 6 months, $1000 at a time.
Westpac charges me a flat $25 and the Vietcombank rate is lousy.
Transferwise would have saved me around 900K VND each time.

I have considered Transferwise but it appears that there is some sort of block to receiving money from a Vietnamese source (because of the NAPAS system?). I had a Vietnamese friend try to send my 20,000vnd from his Vietcombank account this morning. It would not go through.

I have been tracking the Transferwise AUD/VND rate for the last 10 days.
Transferwise matches fairly closely to the RBA rate.
Hai Ha looks good at the moment because of the $3 fee.
I have been told that Xe.com looks good until you actually come to send money and then the rate drops.

Until I can find a hassle free alternative I will stick with Westpac, although I may give Hai Ha a try.
Does anyone know If I'm I likely to have the NAPAS problem using Hai Ha?

I’ve now made 3 transactions with Hai Ha. The last transaction was $2000 (-$3 for fee) and the equivalent of XE predicted value of $1973 arrived in my account. VCB took 100k to receive the funds and it all took place within about 12 hours. Overall, I’m really happy with Hai Ha, even if they are a little fiddly, I think they’re actually easier to set up than TFW.

Keiran83 wrote:

I’ve now made 3 transactions with Hai Ha. The last transaction was $2000 (-$3 for fee) and the equivalent of XE predicted value of $1973 arrived in my account. VCB took 100k to receive the funds and it all took place within about 12 hours. Overall, I’m really happy with Hai Ha, even if they are a little fiddly, I think they’re actually easier to set up than TFW.

Hi All as a comparison  , I normally transfer Aus$2000 from my ANZ bank in Sydney  to my Vietcombank  Australian dollar account , It cost me Aus$23 at the ANZ bank, The money is in the Vietcom bank next morning every time, ,Vietcombank take about Aus$3 for receiving the money and if i draw out Australian dollars they charge me the  equivalent of Aus$9 .If  I then go to a gold/jewelers shop with the dollars, i  get near the Xe rate usually ,example, if the Xe rate is say Aus$1 = 17,800 vnd the Jeweler's give me 17700 vnd . I some times change dollars to dong  in the bank at no charge, but for example  if Xe Aus$1 = 17800 the bank will be around 17500 vnd , so not such a good rate.

honem wrote:

I have been sending money from my Australian Westpac account to my Vietcombank account for the last 6 months, $1000 at a time.
Westpac charges me a flat $25 and the Vietcombank rate is lousy.
Transferwise would have saved me around 900K VND each time.

I have considered Transferwise but it appears that there is some sort of block to receiving money from a Vietnamese source (because of the NAPAS system?). I had a Vietnamese friend try to send my 20,000vnd from his Vietcombank account this morning. It would not go through.

I have been tracking the Transferwise AUD/VND rate for the last 10 days.
Transferwise matches fairly closely to the RBA rate.
Hai Ha looks good at the moment because of the $3 fee.
I have been told that Xe.com looks good until you actually come to send money and then the rate drops.

Until I can find a hassle free alternative I will stick with Westpac, although I may give Hai Ha a try.
Does anyone know If I'm I likely to have the NAPAS problem using Hai Ha?

Sorry honem ,i meant to attach this to your  message ,but messed up.

I do not understand ,have you tried to put dollars or Dong into your Transferwise account from Australia or from Vietnam?. I know nothing about NAPAS, but many years ago i had an Australian dollar account and a Vietnam dong account here in Nha Trang ,One day in the bank i put some dong in my dong account to cover fees , left the bank and got a phone call a few hours later to tell me to pick up my 100,000 vnd i had just put in my account  ,with the lady telling me  a foreigner is not allowed to put Vietnam dong in  this account  in Vietnam. I closed that account later ,it was of little use to me!!. My Vietnamese wife has a Dong account only and she can do what ever she likes as we do in Ozz. I wanted her also to have her name on my dollar account here in Nha Trang, "not allowed!" ,Even tough she has her name on my ANZ account in Ozz and can draw money out there or send it to my dollar account in Nha Trang. The government here like to keep close control of every thing here i have found including banks!.

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:
1. Westpac charges me AUD$20 per transfer, not $25, my mistake.
2. I have never used Transferwise. I was looking at it as a cheaper alternative to Westpac.
3. The NAPAS system (The National Payment Corporation of Vietnam) (google "napas vietnam") is used to transfer funds between accounts in Vietnam.
4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.
5. Keiran83-thanks for the info. It looks like Hai Ha has some way of avoiding the problems that Transferwise have.
Any more info is welcome.

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:
1. Westpac charges me AUD$20 per transfer, not $25, my mistake.
2. I have never used Transferwise. I was looking at it as a cheaper alternative to Westpac.
3. The NAPAS system (The National Payment Corporation of Vietnam) (google "napas vietnam") is used to transfer funds between accounts in Vietnam.
4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.
5. Keiran83-thanks for the info. It looks like Hai Ha has some way of avoiding the problems that Transferwise have.
Any more info is welcome.

The banking system here is anti foreigner. They claim its to stop money laundering, what a friggin joke. There are a 1000 locals here to every expat and they are worried about us.

I tried another transfer with TransferWise, this time calling them after the money was returned by Vietcombank, but they could not relink the money to a manual transfer because I used ACH to get the money from my bank to them.  I talked to Vietcombank today and they told me that they cannot use NAPAS to put money in to my account, only Swift. 

Transferwise had offered to attempt a manual transfer if I set it up via phone, so when their helpdesk opens at 8 am GMT, I will call them, tell them what Vietcombank said and try one last time.  If it doesn't work, I will close my account here and just use ATMs and trips to the bank to pay my rent.  What a pain it has been.

colinoscapee wrote:

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:
1. Westpac charges me AUD$20 per transfer, not $25, my mistake.
2. I have never used Transferwise. I was looking at it as a cheaper alternative to Westpac.
3. The NAPAS system (The National Payment Corporation of Vietnam) (google "napas vietnam") is used to transfer funds between accounts in Vietnam.
4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.
5. Keiran83-thanks for the info. It looks like Hai Ha has some way of avoiding the problems that Transferwise have.
Any more info is welcome.

The banking system here is anti foreigner. They claim its to stop money laundering, what a friggin joke. There are a 1000 locals here to every expat and they are worried about us.

We know the fears and the real reason  the government worry about foreigners putting money in accounts over here.  And it doesn't make sense , when you know that the locals know how to move money about  and avoid the government walls.

Or just open a Sacombank account as that works fine with Transferwise....as in my post it takes 7 mnutes from Westpac AUD $ via Transferwise to have dong available in my Sacombank, with only the TW fees applicable (about $9 per $1,000 AUD).

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:

4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.

Any more info is welcome.

Incorrect as I cannot put Dong into my Sacombank over the counter, only overseas transfers can go in and I use Transferwise everytime (previously used OFX.com and that worked too but much slower = 3 business days)

QPR_FC wrote:

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:

4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.

Any more info is welcome.

Incorrect as I cannot put Dong into my Sacombank over the counter, only overseas transfers can go in and I use Transferwise everytime (previously used OFX.com and that worked too but much slower = 3 business days)

He is more or less correct for Vietcombank.  They won't accept transfers for these restricted accounts from NAPAS, only from Swift.  Since TransferWise uses NAPAS by default, that is where the problem lies for the Vietcombank accounts that only allow funding from foreign banks.  It's fortunate for you that you have a Sacombank account, but I have Vietcombank, and so far I have not successfully funded it.  We'll see what happens.

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:
1. Westpac charges me AUD$20 per transfer, not $25, my mistake.
2. I have never used Transferwise. I was looking at it as a cheaper alternative to Westpac.
3. The NAPAS system (The National Payment Corporation of Vietnam) (google "napas vietnam") is used to transfer funds between accounts in Vietnam.
4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.
5. Keiran83-thanks for the info. It looks like Hai Ha has some way of avoiding the problems that Transferwise have.
Any more info is welcome.

Transferwise is wholly foreign owned so how would banks here think transfers are from locals? I used the services dozens of times, same day transfer, good rates of exchange.

QPR_FC wrote:

honem wrote:

Everyone, thanks for the feedback.
Just to clarify:

4. I am on a tourist visa and was told when I opened my Vietcombank account 3 years ago that all deposits must come from overseas. Maybe that is why Transferwise deposits get rejected and bounce back to the sender.

Any more info is welcome.

Incorrect as I cannot put Dong into my Sacombank over the counter, only overseas transfers can go in and I use Transferwise everytime (previously used OFX.com and that worked too but much slower = 3 business days)

You can deposit cash over the counter, what you need is documentary where the cash came from.

Vietcombank told me I cannot deposit cash, period.  They only allow transfers from foreign banks.  If I still had a one-year visa, I could have gotten a more open account, but since they are not issuing visas, that is not a possibility.

What kind of visa do you have now?

paulmsn wrote:

Vietcombank told me I cannot deposit cash, period.  They only allow transfers from foreign banks.  If I still had a one-year visa, I could have gotten a more open account, but since they are not issuing visas, that is not a possibility.

You can if you have the relevant documents for working here, everything elso, no.

paulmsn wrote:

Vietcombank told me I cannot deposit cash, period.  They only allow transfers from foreign banks.  If I still had a one-year visa, I could have gotten a more open account, but since they are not issuing visas, that is not a possibility.

Ask them if you can open a prepaid Visa debit card VNĐ account for International customers (foreigners).

I have one at ACB Bank, and I can wire funds directly to the card from my United States bank using the 16 digit card account number (did that 2 weeks ago).

My dollars sent are automatically converted to VNĐ by ACB Bank.

I can also walk into the bank and deposit VNĐ cash without any supporting documentation regarding the source of the funds (last did that in December).

Current maximum balance limit is 200,000,000 VNĐ.