How To Reduce Your Money Transfer Fees

Here are a few hints and tips that you may find useful when looking to perform a money transfer home or when transferring money overseas. A few ways to save money include:

Check out delayed transactions.
Look into performing a direct bank to bank transfer.
Always take into account hidden exchange rate costs.
Make sure you look around to get the best rates. Check out the competition!
Read the small print! Some services charge different amounts depending on where you are sending your money transfer to.

Here is a more detailed breakdown on how the above suggestions can be benficial.

Consider a delayed transaction: Two of the biggest money transfer service providers are Western Union and Moneygram, both of these provide a delayed transaction service. What this means is that if you are able to plan ahead and the transfer is not urgent then you can schedule your transfer to take 2-3 days. The fee for this is usually cheaper occasionally upt to a whopping 25%! Whilst this is not ideal for an emergency it certainly is a useful moneysaving tip for regular senders of money.

Bank to bank transfers: It is also worth mentioning that some service providers are able to directly transfer money into a bank account dependent on which country you are sending to. Usually this will take around 5 business days and you will also need to provide some additional banking details. This can save a lot of hassle for the person you have asked to collect the money and deposit into your account. Money transfer agents also like this I they don't have to pay a commission to the agent that pays out the money.

Always take into account hidden exchange rate costs: Many of the major companies often do not make it very easy for you to discover the exact exchange rate that they are offering. They do not always exchange at the market rate and may well be making extra money for themselves at this point. Make sure you check the exchange rate before you agree to the money transfer, this can easily be done online at anytime.

Make sure you look around to get the best rates. Check out the competition: The money transfer situation at the moment is incredibly competitive with new companies entering the market all the time and more established companies increasing their array of services. This is especially true with the continued growth of the internet and globalization. However in this market the demand is there and growing so there is still plenty of opportunities for newcomers to offer competitive and sustainable services so always keep looking! This is especially true of areas such as South America and South East Asia.

Read the small print! Some services charge different amounts depending on where you are sending your money transfer to. The actual money transfer fee is often dependent on the location. This could be different for regions of the world, countries and even states. Most online transfer agents allow you to get estimated transfer fees for sending money from different locations. It may be significantly cheaper for you to send money from the neighboring state or even to collect the money from a different location. The key here is to test! Also have a look at the differing rates for transferring different amounts of money. Some companies are better with smaller amounts of money whereas others are more cost efficient for larger amounts of money.

Despite all of the above information and the obvious desire to want to get the cheapest money transfer fee please remember that you get what you pay for. The lowest priced service as with any service industry may not be the best, please be warned!

Security issues are also usually top of most people's concerns and rightly so. Whilst most scams and cons can be avoided through using common sense there are still times when you may let your guard down. This is when you may fall prey to such activities. A few simple guidelines to arm yourself with include:

Never pay for goods and services in advance to people or companies - especially if you have never used that companies services before, don't share passwords or use simple codes that could be easily worked out from your personal details, use a combination of letters and digits and change your password at regular intervals. Beware of contact from far away strangers, yes it sounds ridiculous to even contemplate replying to that e-mail from Nigeria promising you a share of a transfer but guess what people do...don't be one of them.

With all the above information in mind the key to successfully finding the most convenient, inexpensive and efficient money transfer service for you is simply to go ahead and do a bit of research first, that and use your common sense and you should have no trouble in transferring your money and an acceptable rate.