Travel to South America: What about transferwise, xe.com, worldfirst and friends??!!

Hi guys,

We're going to South america in a few weeks, and I'm looking for ways to lower the cost of getting my CHF currency converted to local currency. I found a bunch of very interesting websites (see title) where they offer trasfer rates near to zero, while banks charge an administrational fee + hidden additional exchange rates.

I couldn't find anything about these banks here at moneyland. Am I looking at the wrong places?

Are these banks any good?

regards,

Geert

Hi Geert,

The interactive moneyland.ch comparisons only include products from financial services providers which are licensed in Switzerland and regulated by FINMA.

However, we have done a study which includes at least one of the services you mentioned (TransferWise). You can find the study here. Look under the "Currency Exchange Comparison" section for a cost comparison of TransferWise vs. other solutions.

Important points to consider when choosing a low-cost money transfer service are:

1. Does the service offer deposits into a Swiss bank account? If you have to transfer money into a foreign account or make an international credit card transaction (to the UK, for example) in order to use the service, this will cost you money. TransferWise and Revolut, for example, have Swiss bank accounts so you can use free local transfers to fund your accounts.

2. How will you access the foreign currency? Does the service come with a debit card which you can use to pay or withdraw money while traveling? TransferWise, for example, provides a Mastercard debit card. Revolut provides a Visa debit card. Both Visa and Mastercard are widely accepted in many South American countries. Money exchange services like xe.com and Worldfirst are better-suited for making international transfers to other individuals than for exchanging money.

3. Which currencies do you need? Not all service providers exchange all currencies. For example, xe.com does not give you the option of exchanging Swiss francs for the currencies of most South American countries. TransferWise currently charges around CHF 12.95 to change CHF 1000 into Peruvian nuevo sol, CHF 20.57 to exchange the same amount for Uruguayan pesos and CHF 13.32 to exchange CHF 1000 into Argentine pesos.

One thing to pay attention to is that many of the services you mentioned are not banks per se. They do not have banking licenses, but are simply authorized financial services providers.

Best regards from Moneyguru