[Bomi]

The Indian rupee is not a freely traded currency. Hence, for outward remittances one has to go through a bank or authorized dealer.

[Jeroen]

I can share my, so far, only experience of transferring money from India to Europe, in my case the Netherlands.

I bank with Citibank. I had to fill out a few forms and the bank provided assistance on what to fill out. Also, I had provide copies of my pay slips. I had to provide as many payslip (which are per month) as the total amount I wanted to transfer. Seems a bit daft if you ask me. You'd think somebody would understand the concept of saving.

Anyway, once we got the paperwork in order I had the money in my account in the Netherlands within 72 hours. Pretty good I would say!

Jeroen

[Pancham]

Guys a friend wants to send money from US to his mother here in India. He will be using PayPal to send the money. How good is PayPal? How are the conversation rate?

[TorqueyTechie]

I have used Xoom.com, ICICI money to India and Paypal.

Xoom.com : Fast service. The amount gets deposited within 4-5 hours of transfer ( during business hours in india). the conversion rate is pretty good as well. They charge a nominal fee of 5$ I think for under 1000$ transfers.

ICICI Money to India: I have an SBI NRI account and to transfer to this account I use money to india. The transfer takes 5 business days and there is an option for opting either to fixed transfer rate or floating transfer rate and generally the conversion rate is pretty much close to the actual conversion rate. I forget the charge for providing the service.

Hope this helps.

[kaka46]

Xoom is the fastest provided you have an account with the banks that they have a tie up with. ICICI, HDFC, PNB are a few examples and the transfer is almost instantaneous(through IMPS).

[Pancham]

Originally Posted by TorqueyTechie

I have used Xoom.com, ICICI money to India and Paypal.

Xoom.com : Fast service. The amount gets deposited within 4-5 hours of transfer ( during business hours in india). the conversion rate is pretty good as well. They charge a nominal fee of 5$ I think for under 1000$ transfers.

ICICI Money to India: I have an SBI NRI account and to transfer to this account I use money to india. The transfer takes 5 business days and there is an option for opting either to fixed transfer rate or floating transfer rate and generally the conversion rate is pretty much close to the actual conversion rate. I forget the charge for providing the service.

Hope this helps.

Well guys Paypal is what her son trusts so its going to be Paypal. Now I tried to set up an account for her and while doing it I had to mention the purpose of money transfer. All the purposes mentioned were business related. Cannot she receive money without having any business purpose attached to it ?

[Pallavi]

I used the option of "Online purchases" when registering with PayPal. The options might have changed as i had registered more than 2 yrs ago. This reason is indicative only. For every transaction, we give the specifics anyway.

Ask him to declare the amount as a gift to his mom when sending the amount. PayPal also waives off the service charges if the amount is declared as a gift.

It takes about 3-4 working days for the amount to be shown in his mom's India account, depending on the bank he is using.

[hellmet]

I need to send a few dollars as a fee to a government agency in the USA and they have requested that the fee be paid either by "check, money order, or cashier's check drawn on a US bank".

At the risk of sounding stupid, here are my questions:

Can I just send an Indian CitiBank cheque? Else, can someone please explain what a "cashier's check" means and where do I get one? If that is something not available here, where/how would I get an international money order?

Also not sure of how to comply with "drawn on US bank".

[khoj]

Cashier's cheque is a bearer cheque, uncrossed and fully endorsable. This is asked for so that the beneficiary gets the full amount in cash mentioned on the face of the cheque upon presentation to the bank's cashier, no questions asked. This is a very commonly used instrument in US.

Drawn on a US bank means the cheque should be from a bank incorporated in the USofA. Citi is a US bank and it's banking instrument will be good.

Seems you have an account with Citi. Ask them to draw up a cheque in favour of the beneficiary payable in US$ in the US with no deductions, all bank charges to your account. This will ensure that the beneficiary gets the full amount just as in a cashier's cheque.

Citi will debit your account towards the amount plus service/conversion charges plus service tax if any and you are done.

To save yourself from the hassles of sending the cheque over, you can ask Citi to do a TT (telegraphic transfer / intra bank money order) to the beneficiary's account with all banking charges to your account. This will be a direct transfer just like our domestic NEFT, RTGS etc. It will be quicker, safer & less bothersome.

Originally Posted by hellmet

I need to send a few dollars as a fee to a government agency in the USA and they have requested that the fee be paid either by "check, money order, or cashier's check drawn on a US bank".

At the risk of sounding stupid, here are my questions:

Can I just send an Indian CitiBank cheque? Else, can someone please explain what a "cashier's check" means and where do I get one? If that is something not available here, where/how would I get an international money order?

Also not sure of how to comply with "drawn on US bank".

[hellmet]

I went to Citibank today. They said issuing a Cashier's Check requires plenty of documentation and needs a CA to sign - he could charge anywhere upto 5K. I was suggested to go to Thomas Cook and the likes. I enquired at Cox n Kings and Thomas Cook - both refused to issue the cheque for anything but educational purposes.

Next stop would be a local bank - ICICI/HDFC etc.

[khoj]

What did they say regarding TT?

If the amount is not too big have a known person in the U.S. send the cheque and you can deposit the equivalent amount in their account here or give cash to their nominated person.

Originally Posted by hellmet

I went to Citibank today. They said issuing a Cashier's Check requires plenty of documentation and needs a CA to sign - he could charge anywhere upto 5K. I was suggested to go to Thomas Cook and the likes. I enquired at Cox n Kings and Thomas Cook - both refused to issue the cheque for anything but educational purposes.

Next stop would be a local bank - ICICI/HDFC etc.

[Pandher]

Why not use Bitcoin? Faster and non existent fees

[Bomi]

Go to a small time CA. The fee for a CA certficate should not be more than Rs. 1500, assuming all your documentation is in order. This certificate will be required regardless of which bank you go to.

[JoseVijay]

Originally Posted by hellmet

I went to Citibank today. They said issuing a Cashier's Check requires plenty of documentation and needs a CA to sign - he could charge anywhere upto 5K. I was suggested to go to Thomas Cook and the likes. I enquired at Cox n Kings and Thomas Cook - both refused to issue the cheque for anything but educational purposes.

Next stop would be a local bank - ICICI/HDFC etc.

Have you checked with HSBC? The branch is located in Rajbhavan road, Somajiguda.

[ampere]

Originally Posted by hellmet

I went to Citibank today. They said issuing a Cashier's Check requires plenty of documentation and needs a CA to sign -

Originally Posted by khoj

What did they say regarding TT?

I think if its a govt fee, they need to endorse the same to be sent from the sender. And yes its the same process for TT as well. One would need to file a 15CA/15CB via a CA before approaching the bank.