I currently use Interac but I was wondering if anyone uses alternative to the methods below when transferring money.
Snail Mail
Pro
- Price is resonable
Con
- Cheque costs
- Postage costs
- Time
- Lost mail
Interac Email Money Transfer
Pro
- Fast
- Works with almost any bank
- easy
Con
- Service fees on both ends (lower than other services)
- Single transaction limits are low
Paypal
Pro
- Common
- Quick
Con
- reliability concerns
- More expensive than fixed price services
I stick with your last two myself. I find the Interac Email Money Transfer to be not bad at all. Paypal... well I use it mostly on eBay.
Quote from: Melbosa on December 02, 2008, 10:24:31 AM
I stick with your last two myself. I find the Interac Email Money Transfer to be not bad at all. Paypal... well I use it mostly on eBay.
Problem with Interac is that both parties get dinged if the receiving party is NOT one of the special Member banks. Paypal is sort of a must for eBay. Good to know that I am not the only one using the Interac transfers.
Don't forget money orders and Western Union.
In the past I've been able to get the banks or Western Union to set it up so that the recipient of funds merely has to go to their local branch or Western Union office to pick up money.
There is a brokerage fee, but it's usually negligible.
It is now free to do personal money transfers on Paypal within the US and Canada. Also there is no FEE for transferring funds in and out of Paypal using a Canadian bank account as long as it is over $150 but even then it is a very low charge if you are under it.
PayPal just became very useful again.
Too bad I don't have a personal account :( and I already assigned my new card to my current account. oh well.
I've sent money using Western Union & via Money Order a few times now, they both seem ok if PayPal or the like isn't an option.
Been using interac online transfer, but both ends get dinged for fees if the receiving bank is not in the program.
What does western charge? This is something I do monthly so fees count.
I don't know how much you pay in fees, but have you considered the low cost of a stamp and a cheque? 54 cents for the stamp (in Canada) and 10 to 50 cents for the cheque (depends on what your bank charges).
Western Union seems ridiculously expensive:
https://www.westernunion.ca/WUCOMWEB/priceShopperRedirectAction.do?method=load (https://www.westernunion.ca/WUCOMWEB/priceShopperRedirectAction.do?method=load)
To transfer $100 from Canada/Alberta to A Person In Canada cost $27.
To transfer $1,000 from Canada/Alberta to A Person In Canada cost $59.
Quote from: Thorin on July 07, 2009, 11:05:21 AM
I don't know how much you pay in fees, but have you considered the low cost of a stamp and a cheque? 54 cents for the stamp (in Canada) and 10 to 50 cents for the cheque (depends on what your bank charges).
Western Union seems ridiculously expensive:
https://www.westernunion.ca/WUCOMWEB/priceShopperRedirectAction.do?method=load (https://www.westernunion.ca/WUCOMWEB/priceShopperRedirectAction.do?method=load)
To transfer $100 from Canada/Alberta to A Person In Canada cost $27.
To transfer $1,000 from Canada/Alberta to A Person In Canada cost $59.
Fun thing with cheques is that they sometimes get lost or delayed in the mail unless you pay for tracking ect. The second month I was doing this the cheque was lost on its way. It took considerable time to confirm it was lost, get it canceled and get a new one sent and received.
So how much does the Interac Email Money Transfer cost per transaction?
Do you send payments to the same person each month? If so, they could open an account with the same banking institution as you and you could just do account-to-account transfers for free (or negligible cost).
Are you doing this to pay monthly bills for a rental property that you own? You can probably pay those same bills through online banking if you're with one of the big banks.
Interac Tends to cost about $4 for the receiving party if there bank is not a member and I believe $4-$6 for the sender even if there bank IS. So that is about $8 - $10 / mo or $96-$120 / year in fees. Interac also limits a single transaction to $1000 so it is about double that as I collect more than $1000 / mo in rent.
The transfer is from my property manager (collects from tenants on my behalf) to my self every month. We use very different banks and my NO FEE bank makes inter account transfers difficult. His FEE based bank would probably be easier but then I would be paying a monthly bank fee equal to or greater than my current cost.
Yes I am cheap, FREE is ideal for me for banking. My last FEE bank wanted to charge me $14 / month + additional use for the services I current get for FREE.
Have you considered Canada Post's money orders?
http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/personal/ratesprices/shop/moneyorders.jsf
$4.95 in Canada, although again a limit of $1,000.
As for Interac Email Money Transfers, at the Royal Bank they cost $1.50 to send (if you don't have a banking package that includes them).
You know what would work really well? If your property manager could set you up as a bill on his account. Then he simply pays a bill (probably free with his fee-based account), and no one pays.
Yeah, last time I tried to transfer money from one account/bank to another (that isnt mine), I realized they force you to own both accounts, and send in a copy of some form to make sure.
Quote from: Thorin on July 07, 2009, 06:14:01 PM
Have you considered Canada Post's money orders?
http://www.canadapost.ca/cpo/mc/personal/ratesprices/shop/moneyorders.jsf
$4.95 in Canada, although again a limit of $1,000.
As for Interac Email Money Transfers, at the Royal Bank they cost $1.50 to send (if you don't have a banking package that includes them).
You know what would work really well? If your property manager could set you up as a bill on his account. Then he simply pays a bill (probably free with his fee-based account), and no one pays.
I have also used Canada Post Money Transfers, they work pretty well too.
I think the point is sort of moot. The thread was origonally about finding the cheapest way to send money, and I updated it with a FREE option that came available. However the Canada Post option if only charged in one direction does sound good.
We are likely going to try paypal next month to see if we hit a limit, if it is timely and if it truly ends up being free.
Uh... Huh, missed that post (or forgot about it): http://forums.righteouswrath.com/index.php/topic,6731.msg45818.html#msg45818 (http://forums.righteouswrath.com/index.php/topic,6731.msg45818.html#msg45818).
You're right, all of our suggestions are moot since you have a free option. Let us know how PayPal works out for ya.
Quote from: Thorin on July 08, 2009, 09:15:35 AM
Uh... Huh, missed that post (or forgot about it): http://forums.righteouswrath.com/index.php/topic,6731.msg45818.html#msg45818 (http://forums.righteouswrath.com/index.php/topic,6731.msg45818.html#msg45818).
You're right, all of our suggestions are moot since you have a free option. Let us know how PayPal works out for ya.
Will do, I suspect it will not be a perfect option. I think that there will be a processing time issue between transferring funds in and out on each end.