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1 minute ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

Sigh.

 

UK banks didn't need to, because IBAN had already done that.

 

<Sigh> Which part of a "much cheaper" are you struggling with? 

 

Transfers between the UK and EU using IBAN are much more expensive that they would be if banks participated in SEPA, which is actually built on top of the IBAN system.

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3 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

Are you sure about that?

 

Yes, for international transfers, which was the context of my reply.

 

You either pay a fee, or lose on the currency conversion, or a combination of the two.

 

[edit]Maybe it's free if both parties have sterling or Euro accounts, but I don't think that was the point[/edit]

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2 minutes ago, cctransuk said:

The bit where no quantitative substantiation of the statement is being given.

 

This is the internet :)

 

All I know is that customers were asking about SEPA as a cheaper way to pay but my bank was not a part of it and had no plans to be. Probably moot in a few weeks time in any case.

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I must be really fortunate as neither of my two UK banks charges me to send or receive funds between my accounts and other party accounts in Europe. I pay in the destination currency and the currency conversion rate from GBP is stated at the time of the transaction. Similarly, I receive funds in GBP with the continental sender paying the specified rate for the conversion of his local currency to GBP. I have not yet worked out how to pay someone in euros without a conversion from GBP since my account is in GBP. Maybe @Crosland can enlighten. There has to be a conversion somewhere. 

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2 minutes ago, Mike Harvey said:

I must be really fortunate as neither of my two UK banks charges me to send or receive funds between my accounts and other party accounts in Europe. I pay in the destination currency and the currency conversion rate from GBP is stated at the time of the transaction. Similarly, I receive funds in GBP with the continental sender paying the specified rate for the conversion of his local currency to GBP. I have not yet worked out how to pay someone in euros without a conversion from GBP since my account is in GBP. Maybe @Crosland can enlighten. There has to be a conversion somewhere. 

 

Did I say anything to the contrary?

 

Did you read the bit where I said "You either pay a fee, or lose on the currency conversion, or a combination of the two." You WILL get stiffed on the currency conversion by using high street banks, especially if they do not charge a separate fee.

 

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3 minutes ago, PenrithBeacon said:

Another thread just asking to be locked!

 

And, another addition to my "ignored Users' list too.  :lol:

 

Life's just too short.  

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If a trader takes PayPal, but you don't have a PayPal account, you can still pay his PayPal invoice using a debit or credit card. 

 

As an membership organisation (The 2mm Scale Association) over 95% of our shop sales are by PayPal, either from the members own PayPal account or using the above process. The remaining 5% can pay by cheque if they have no computer or card/PayPal.

 

Whilst we pay for the PayPal facility, the simplicity of it - getting a fairly substantial quantity of payments each month, from members across the globe, to three separate mail-order shops manned by volunteers and then reconciled by muggins here - makes it good value. The cheques are generally a pain and they're usually the part that causes issues.

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1 hour ago, Steamport Southport said:

I'm afraid I haven't got a credit card and don't want one. You get charged for them.

 

I don't get charged for any of my credit cards, unless of course I don't pay the bill in full each month, which I always do. In fact, I have a Cashback card and earn 0.5% of all money spent; Not a king's ransom but over the year it can mount up. 

 

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17 minutes ago, Mike Harvey said:

I must be really fortunate as neither of my two UK banks charges me to send or receive funds between my accounts and other party accounts in Europe. I pay in the destination currency and the currency conversion rate from GBP is stated at the time of the transaction. Similarly, I receive funds in GBP with the continental sender paying the specified rate for the conversion of his local currency to GBP. I have not yet worked out how to pay someone in euros without a conversion from GBP since my account is in GBP. Maybe @Crosland can enlighten. There has to be a conversion somewhere. 

 

The charge will be in the conversion rates.

 

If you send £100.00 to someone in the Eurozone it will be converted at say 1.08 giving Eur108.00.

 

If that were then immediately transferred back, the rate might be 1.16 giving you £93.00 back in your UK bank.

 

Congratulations, you have generated £7.00 of fees! :D

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1 hour ago, cctransuk said:

 

Not true - I have a Barclaycard and there is no fee; I just pay off the full balance at the end of the month.

 

Exactly like a debit card except that, before interest rates became virtually zero, I got paid a little interest on my credit card spending before I paid had to pay it off at the end of the month.

 

John Isherwood.

 

I had one when I was a student and the fees were crippling.

 

However you need to have something which those credit cards are linked to such as a house as collateral. Many people don't own property. I certainly don't.  

 

They don't give credit cards to everyone, apart from the ones which have a very high interest rate. Which are virtually loan sharks.

 

Remember all those companies giving out free, high interest credit cards to everyone including the cat?

 

https://abcnews.go.com/Business/cat-credit-card-offer-weird-credit-stories/story?id=19740206

 

 

Jason

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11 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

 

Having been in that position but the other way around - UK bank account wanting to buy things from small traders on the continent who would only take a bank transfer (very expensive back then from the UK) or national cheque, I understand your pain*.  The issue is however not that they don't want your business but rather that they don't need your business.  

 

 

I've used TransferWise to get around this issue - their fees are minimal in comparison with the banks. I think there are one or two other competitors in that market these days too. Continental small traders I've paid this way have invariably got their payment within a day or so, if not instantly. 

 

Alas the issue that is going to make this kind of thing much more difficult now is the changes to VAT rules for imports to the UK worth upto £135. The new requirement to pre-pay the VAT on all commercial packets is clearly designed to catch all the Chinese sellers on eBay, Amazon, ALiExpress etc who are selling direct using the existing £15 loophole (and under-declaring) to avoid VAT. The onus on online marketplaces to collect the VAT clearly addresses that. https://www.gov.uk/guidance/vat-and-overseas-goods-sold-directly-to-customers-in-great-britain-from-1-january-2021

 

The unfortunate side effect is that direct transactions with small traders will also be caught out - and for them it probably won't be worth their while dealing with all the new British red tape and registering with HMRC to make the pre-payments. So far as I can see, this is going to make it next to impossible for anyone in the UK to buy things from any small suppliers overseas from 1st Jan. 

 

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11 minutes ago, Yorkshire Square said:

If a trader takes PayPal, but you don't have a PayPal account, you can still pay his PayPal invoice using a debit or credit card. 

 

As an membership organisation (The 2mm Scale Association) over 95% of our shop sales are by PayPal, either from the members own PayPal account or using the above process. The remaining 5% can pay by cheque if they have no computer or card/PayPal.

 

Whilst we pay for the PayPal facility, the simplicity of it - getting a fairly substantial quantity of payments each month, from members across the globe, to three separate mail-order shops manned by volunteers and then reconciled by muggins here - makes it good value. The cheques are generally a pain and they're usually the part that causes issues.

 

You can. But not if it flags up your card number and bank account as fraudulent which is what happens to a lot of people, myself included. It also flags up your telephone number and email address as well. Meaning if you use a different card or email it still pops up to be invalid as they've blacklisted all your details.

 

It's only PayPal that has that problem. It's a known issue. But PayPal refuse to do anything about it.

 

https://www.google.co.uk/search?source=hp&ei=PZ3XX5DLIcKmaK-6k5gO&q=paypal+says+my+card+number+is+invalid&oq=paypal+says+m&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQARgIMgUIABDJAzICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyAggAMgIIADoICAAQsQMQgwE6CAguELEDEIMBOg4ILhCxAxCDARDHARCjAjoFCAAQsQM6CwgAELEDEIMBEMkDOgsILhCxAxDHARCjAjoICAAQsQMQyQNQtgFYuBlgx29oAHAAeACAAVuIAYAIkgECMTOYAQCgAQGqAQdnd3Mtd2l6&sclient=psy-ab

 

https://www.google.co.uk/search?ei=WJ3XX5KCEJmhgAbj3ICYBg&q=paypal+says+my+bank+account+is+wrong&oq=paypal+says+my+bank&gs_lcp=CgZwc3ktYWIQARgDMgUIABDJAzICCAAyAggAMgIIADICCAAyBggAEBYQHjIGCAAQFhAeMgYIABAWEB4yBggAEBYQHjIGCAAQFhAeOgQIABBHOgcIABDJAxBDULi9A1jZ2QNg-_gDaABwAngAgAFtiAHgEZIBBDIzLjOYAQCgAQGqAQdnd3Mtd2l6yAEIwAEB&sclient=psy-ab

 

 

Jason

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2 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

However you need to have something which those credit cards are linked to such as a house as collateral. Many people don't own property. I certainly don't.  

 

So the millions in rented property can't get credit cards? All you need is bank account and the means to pay off the minimum each month.

 

2 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

They don't give credit cards to everyone, apart from the ones which have a very high interest rate. Which are virtually loan sharks.

 

Virtually all (maybe absolutely all) UK credit cards have an interest free period. You only pay interest if you it as a form of borrowing, i.e by not clearing the balance each month.

 

It's your choice but a CC is a very convenient way of paying for stuff. You also get the protection of the consumer credit act if you spend over £100 (?), which covers the cost of a lot of locos these days. This makes the card issuer jointly liable with the provider. Even just using the card to pay the deposit on a high value item gets you whole load of protection should the supplier go bust or mess up in some way.

 

I just got £80 of free Xmas booze from Tesco courtesy of the points collected on their credit card/clubcard :) 

 

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20 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

I don't think it's just rural areas. You should see the students panic when they go to pubs and clubs in cities like Liverpool and Manchester, and find that most of the boozers don't have cashless or insist they have to spend over £20 to use their card. It's really only 'Spoons that are cashless.

 

"Can I pay by phone app?"

"On yer bike son!"

 

That's major cities. I doubt the average small town business in Lancashire or Yorkshire are going to be very tech friendly.

 

Every single one of our burger vans in Orkney has contactless payment so it's really not that expensive... So much for being a backward rural area...

 

 

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3 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

So some odd gob who you have never heard of asks you for your bank details.  And you are advocating giving them these details.

 

You can't do much with the account number and sort code apart from pay money INTO it...

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2 hours ago, Steamport Southport said:

 

You can. But not if it flags up your card number and bank account as fraudulent which is what happens to a lot of people, myself included. It also flags up your telephone number and email address as well. Meaning if you use a different card or email it still pops up to be invalid as they've blacklisted all your details.

 

It's only PayPal that has that problem. It's a known issue. But PayPal refuse to do anything about it.

 

Jason

 

That's a shame, but there are only 300 odd people saying they have this problem. How many accounts do PayPal run, do you think? I have control of four alone.

 

PayPal can be awkward sometimes, especially if it's a bit out of the ordinary. Conversely, some of the comments by posters in those links mention giving fake names and scamming Instagram accounts. Maybe some aren't as legit as you might think.

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4 hours ago, Andy Hayter said:

 

 

So some odd gob who you have never heard of asks you for your bank details.  And you are advocating giving them these details.

 

Isn't that exactly the sort of thing you banking types are constantly warning us against?

 

 

Thought somebody would think of this but bear in mind that when you send somebody a cheque that cheque has your account number and sort code on the cheque so the person you are sending the cheque then knows those details.

 

When my electrician, roofer, plumber or gas man does some work in my house they always send a bill showing those account details so that I can do an online payment.

 

This conversation started regarding making a payment to a supplier not to a complete stranger or some old gob you have never heard of. 

 

Keith

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4 hours ago, cctransuk said:

 

I didn't pay a fee to receive an IBAN payment, and the payer gave no indictaion that he did either.

 

My understanding is that IBAN is simply an international version of BACS.

 

John Isherwood.

Not quite but you've got the right idea.  IBAN isn't a system, it's just an (International) Bank Account Number - just an international standard version of our Sort code + Account Number.  It's printed on your bank statement.  That would be quoted to the SEPA Credit Transfer system to pay somebody in Europe. 

 

The USA don't use that though - you could get your bank to transfer via SWIFT (Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Transactions sa), using the SWIFTBIC (Bank Identifier Code) with their account number.  Unfortunately the US end of that is still low tech and more expensive.  SWIFT processes by far the largest amount of international payments by value, albeit not by number of transactions.

 

BACS (Bankers Automated Clearing System) is a computer system developed by and originally owned by participating UK banks.  BACS Ltd, the cheque clearing system and Faster Payments are now all owned by Pay.UK.  Originally it was used primarily for distributing big payrolls direct into peoples bank accounts, and it processed everything on those big old magnetic tape reels which were mailed in.    The tapes were moved around their site in buckets on an automated system that rather resembled an O gauge railway.  Became more widely available to small business when they added support for floppy disks, and later a dial-up system which saved both time and mechanical handling.  These days the BACS direct credit service is accessed online.  They also process direct debits and the current account switching service.  BACS uses the sort code and account number to identify you.

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1 hour ago, frobisher said:

 

You can't do much with the account number and sort code apart from pay money INTO it...


I dunno, Jeremy Clarkson printed his in a newspaper column to prove this point, someone promptly signed him up for a £500 a month direct debit donation to a charity....

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20 minutes ago, Andy Hayter said:

So correct me if I am wrong but doesn't that supplier have to send his bank details to the odd gob so that said odd gob can make the payment?

 

We are talking about a supplier sending his details to his customer.... not to some unknown odd gob.

 

Keith

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