WU Transfers

I was using WU when first sending money over, but I found Wise to be cheaper overall (fees + exchange rate).  I believe WU is able to offer $0 transfer fee as they get their money by offering a slightly lower exchange rate (at least, that has been my experience).

I was using WU when first sending money over, but I found Wise to be cheaper overall (fees + exchange rate). I believe WU is able to offer $0 transfer fee as they get their money by offering a slightly lower exchange rate (at least, that has been my experience). - @mati_steve

It looks like WU has zero transfer fees when using debit card, possibly a temporary promo. So far it looks like WU does not provide FAST ACH transfer for American bank accounts which is an instant transfer like a debit card transfer. Wise does provide FAST ACH bank account transfer at the moment. The bank account FAST ACH transfer is great for Americans whose debit card has expired and who have a hard time receiving a new one here. Remitly was providing FAST ACH up to now but I see only WISE has FAST ACH now. Worldremit never has bank account FAST ACH and only seems to gave debit/credit card transfer as an option. It seems that financial institutions compete against each other to see which one can make finance the most difficult for expats lol.

dannfinn said . . . .Wise does provide FAST ACH bank account transfer at the moment.

*********************

Yes I did a transfer this morning, Wise said the money would be in my account in 8 seconds

Hey wise what took you so long I expected 5 seconds.

The transfer rate was P58.

dannfinn said . . . .Wise does provide FAST ACH bank account transfer at the moment. *********************Yes I did a transfer this morning, Wise said the money would be in my account in 8 secondsHey wise what took you so long I expected 5 seconds.The transfer rate was P58. - @Enzyte Bob

Correction the exchange rate was P59.02

dannfinn said . . . .Wise does provide FAST ACH bank account transfer at the moment.
*********************
Yes I did a transfer this morning, Wise said the money would be in my account in 8 seconds

Hey wise what took you so long I expected 5 seconds.

The transfer rate was P58. - @Enzyte Bob

Hi 'Bob', for that transfer you chose the option 'from bank account', not from 'debit card', right? Debit cards are always fast because they go through visa or mc system but by bank account, (ACH system for Americans)  it is usually 2-4 days, except now WISE has a fast instant ACH option, very desirable for USA expats who have been here a long time and whose debit card expired. WISE enrolls your bank account for instant ACH through PLAID but WU does not have THE FAST ACH option, only debit/credit (fast) or (slow) ach bank account.

@danfinn On a separate Wise topic, people may or may not be aware, wise recently opened up WISE Pilipinas where you can use your Philippine address and still connect to your USA bank as usual and even have your SSA deposited there without the stiil-alive letter hassle because WISE checking uses a USA bank. Also, they mail your Wise debit card to your US address. Also, others on this forum are more experienced at WISE than me. Regarding what I said about instant ACH transfer, that only applies when sending from bank to Philippines where WISE is a middleman, sort of like using remitly without their new wallet feature which I now can see competes with the WISE process. I suspect experienced WISE users simply transfer US bank funds to the main WISE wallet (which I just noticed is instant) and then transfer from there to various Philippines receivers like gcash which of course will also be instant.

@danfinn  Also , I just changed my WISE address to the Philippines and cancelled my USA  Wise address. I requested my new Philippines WISE debit card which they shipped to my Philippine address. Before, under my USA address they refused to ship my replacement USA debit card to my Philippine address, only my USA address that sonebody over there had ti dhl here. (You get a new debit card regulated by BSP with the Philippine address). So, all in all it looks like a very positive development where, unlike many USA banks and credit unions with certain exceptions,  WISE is actually supporting expats with Philippine addresses with no-VPN online access, USA style checking accounts and connected to USA bank accounts as well as Philippines bank accounts and USA social security deposits.

Based on some of the comments above, I decided to give Wise a try and activated my Wise account by sending the initial p700 for deposit etc.

Question:

Is there any Advantages or Disadvantages of transferring from my US Bank to Wise then Transfer/Forwarding to BDO VS a direct transfer from My US bank directly to BDO via Wise ?

Is one or the other Cheaper ? Faster ? Same ?

I did activate my Wise account from here in the Philippines using my local bank, address and phone #

vehicross100 asked . . . I found it interesting that through my WU app I can send $ using my debit card to Gcash, PayMaya, Shopee, Lazada, Bayad and a few more. This is all for $0 (FREE) transfer fee and at a rate of 58.
My usual Bank to Bank is $2 per transaction and today at 57.4.
Not sure why the difference but might use the former next transfer.

********************************

The real cost of a transfer is the rate of conversion, at this moment at Wise it's P58.78 for $1.

@Enzyte Bob

This is all for $0 (FREE) transfer fee and at a rate of 58.

Glad you pointed that out Bob. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

@vehicross100

I find that, so far WISE PILIPINAS let's me load my dollar account instantly. Then, I can transfer from that WISE wallet to MAYA and GCASH for online payments of local utilities like water, electric, postpaid globe, internet etc.  I prefer not to select debit card transactions to load my US dollar balance, I want them to continue supporting fast ACH for instant transfers. Reason: Debit cards expire and it's a pain for my kin to DHL replacement debit cards to us. This may be a losing strategy because REMITLY is for the first time refusing to PLAID connect my credit union checking account to allow FAST ACH. However, WISE fast ACH still works for that. WU does not have fast ACH for bank account transmittals and worldremit only allows debit card transactions. If not for wise fast ach I might consider to have my pensions direct -deposited to my WISE PILIPINAS.

@danfinn

Thank you, very helpful

@danfinn

I had the same problem with Plaid and my CU. I discovered after multiple customer service calls. That my phone number was entered into the incorrect field. I think it was in the Home field and not the Cellphone field or something simple like that. And it was like that either with the credit union or Mastercard. But either way my credit union was able to fix it. Everytime I would try to use my CU debit card online where they used Plaid it would fail and say contact your institution. A supervisor finally caught the error. Plaid could not verify my card with the number in the wrong field. Hopefully this helps.

@danfinn

I don't understand the advantage of using Gcash or Maya over Wise anywhere in the Phillipines? Transfers from my US CU are instant. Transfers to my GFs local account are instant. I couldn't get Gcash because my goatee registers as a mask during the video verification. And you can not contact anyone at Gcash for any reason. I did get a Maya account. But never ordered a card. Because Wise literally works everywhere. I only use that card online and locally. US and Phillipines. AliExpress, Alibaba, Lazada, all my local bills and all local stores.

I do have an international notice placed on my CU debit card. And it has worked the few times I have used it here. But I prefer to keep it isolated to US transactions only. Like long term bills. Where I don't want to have to replace it for fraud. And end up having to change all my automatic debit payment if those monthly bills. I would replace my debit card at least once a year because if fraud. And end up spending an annoying amount if time updating my payment method with anything recurring.

I am a bit annoyed at the ₱250 ATM fee with Wise. Whenever I take out cash. I have not tried to look for a fee free ATMs for my CU debit card or the same for my Wise card. But it would nice not to pay that fee. I try to only take out the max daily amount when I do get cash. I can get two ATM withdrawals of 12k each. So 24k at a time but in two transactions so a total of ₱500 when I withdraw that 24k. So at least it keeps the percentage of fees to a minimum.

But I got my ACR card so I think I will open a Phillipines back account just to try to get free ATM withdrawals and be able to get cashier checks (manager checks) should I need too.

Has anyone done any deep research into PH banks and identified the best one? I have always had good luck with BPI. And did some research earlier this summer. But I was nit using AI as heavily as I am now.

@danfinnI don't understand the advantage of using Gcash or Maya over Wise anywhere in the Phillipines? Transfers from my US CU are instant. Transfers to my GFs local account are instant. I couldn't get Gcash because my goatee registers as a mask during the video verification. And you can not contact anyone at Gcash for any reason. I did get a Maya account. But never ordered a card. Because Wise literally works everywhere. I only use that card online and locally. US and Phillipines. AliExpress, Alibaba, Lazada, all my local bills and all local stores. I do have an international notice placed on my CU debit card. And it has worked the few times I have used it here. But I prefer to keep it isolated to US transactions only. Like long term bills. Where I don't want to have to replace it for fraud. And end up having to change all my automatic debit payment if those monthly bills. I would replace my debit card at least once a year because if fraud. And end up spending an annoying amount if time updating my payment method with anything recurring. I am a bit annoyed at the ₱250 ATM fee with Wise. Whenever I take out cash. I have not tried to look for a fee free ATMs for my CU debit card or the same for my Wise card. But it would nice not to pay that fee. I try to only take out the max daily amount when I do get cash. I can get two ATM withdrawals of 12k each. So 24k at a time but in two transactions so a total of ₱500 when I withdraw that 24k. So at least it keeps the percentage of fees to a minimum. But I got my ACR card so I think I will open a Phillipines back account just to try to get free ATM withdrawals and be able to get cashier checks (manager checks) should I need too. Has anyone done any deep research into PH banks and identified the best one? I have always had good luck with BPI. And did some research earlier this summer. But I was nit using AI as heavily as I am now. - @Moab762

There are a couple of issues addressed here regarding wise, gcash and maya. First, I agree that if I wanted to transfer to a Philippine bank account, it would be most efficient to use wise. But second, maya and gcash are great for paying local bills like electric, water, internet, landline etc.. There is no simple way to pay those bills with WISE. You would have to pay direct into their bank accounts which is possible for noreco2 electric but sort of a pain because you have to send a copy of the transfer to their accounting etc.. Paying by gcash and maya is quick and complete. It sure beats a few years ago when we in Dumaguete had to visit the offices and pay the bills in person! Anyway, that is what I was referring to. Third point: As you indicate, there is a 250 php ATM charge with WISE debit cards. This is even true if you are registered with WISE PILIPINAS and have their "Prepaid card". Mine is marked "Prepaid" in the lower left front side. Wise apparently does not refer to this BSP-regulated card as a "debit card" as the USA WISE card is referred to. However, from what I can see, it works the same as a USA debit card. Unfortunately the ATM charge is also the same as any foreign ATM card. Which brings me to another reason to use gcash and maya. For a very small price each will deliver you a debit card. The ATM charge when using these cards is 15 pesos (maybe one is 18 pesos). You can save a lot by transferring from WISE to gcash and maya for ATM withdrawals.

As far as PH banks, so far after 8 years we have had no need for one but the way things keep changing, it is possible that we will have one in the future. Actually, gcash and maya serve almost like Philippine bank accounts and their cards are accepted everywhere.

@danfinn
I had the same problem with Plaid and my CU. I discovered after multiple customer service calls. That my phone number was entered into the incorrect field. I think it was in the Home field and not the Cellphone field or something simple like that. And it was like that either with the credit union or Mastercard. But either way my credit union was able to fix it. Everytime I would try to use my CU debit card online where they used Plaid it would fail and say contact your institution. A supervisor finally caught the error. Plaid could not verify my card with the number in the wrong field. Hopefully this helps. - @Moab762

Thanks for the advice. In my case, for Remitly and WISE etc. I have not had a problem with DEBIT cards. For debit cards all transfers are instsnt. I am not sure if  PLAID is involved with debit cards. Remitly, wise etc.  simply go through the visa and Mastercard systems which is inherentby an instant transaction. However, if you go through a non-plaid connected bank account with Temitly for a BANK ACCOUNT ACH transfer, then transfer time is typically 2-5 days. Nowadays there is a popular option where PLAID links Remitly, WISE etc  to your BANK ACCOUNT to perform a Fast ACH transfer (instant, like with a debit card). I think Remitly etc. take the risk of waiting for payment from the bank but only with PLAID connected accounts. But recently, Remitly had asked me to re-connect to them with PLAID but when I do so, remitly will no longer connect with the CU. I still transfer from my CU BANK ACCOUNT but only as a bank that is not linked by PLAID with the result that it takes 2-5 days to complete. However, with Remitly I can still transfer instantly with my CU debit card. With WISE, I am connected throuugh PLAID, no problem, and I can trsnsfer instantly from my CU BANK ACCOUNT. I only think fast ACH is important because debit cards expire and getting new physical cards here is a pain. If fast ACH BANK ACCOUNT transfers were shown to be reliable in the future, I would just let the USA debit cards expire and make future instant transfers with fast ACH.  Thanks again, I will confirm that my phone numbers are listed in proper order in my CU profile.

I assume with a Phillipine bank account you can use their debit card at their atms without a fee?

I can't get Gcash like I said. I have a goatee. Lol!

But I also don't pay my utilities directly. Our landlord does. We just send one payment to them. After getting a copy of all our individual bills. 

Just  thought - investigate the MANY advantages of having a GoTyme account. They now allow foreigners with an ACR card to open online. Card is delivered free and ATM withdrawals (at any bank) are just charged at the standard 18peso fee. I believe if you combine ATM withdraws with over the counter withdrawals in a Robinson's store you could even withdraw 80K in one day! I transfer in instantly with Remitly from my UK bank and use their app to pay all our utility bills free and also to transfer money to my partner's bank and her Gcash- instant and free again.

I assume with a Phillipine bank account you can use their debit card at their atms without a fee?I can't get Gcash like I said. I have a goatee. Lol!But I also don't pay my utilities directly. Our landlord does. We just send one payment to them. After getting a copy of all our individual bills. - @Moab762

I suspect you can use ATMs cards here for no fee when used at the bank's own ATMs. But that is what I ass-u-me. And 15-18 pesos per maya-gcash withdrawal is extremely low and essentially "free" to me. So gcash has a stupid verification process...you can still get MAYA and MAYA is the better of the two. Great your landlord handles those payments for you. As I recall, when we first moved here our landlord had a local person handle that for us , we paid the person, and all of the utilities etc. were actually in the landlord's name. Later we bought a house and everything had to be transferred from previous owner of that house into my name (by me) and of course, the previous owner would not pay the bills anymore. I suspect that, in that case, we could have found someone whom who had paid bills for that owner whom we could pay to do that for us, now that I think of it, but we ended up paying everything in person ourselves as we now owned the accounts and we actually didn't mind so much going into town and doing it. But then covid hit and there was a ban on seniors going outside. The "elder ban". We needed a certificate from the barangay captain to go past the covid checkpoints and venture into town. By or at that time, most utilities in Dumaguete created online payments, maya and gcash worked well and I think we could use lazada as a bill payment platform too and I think you still can.

Just thought - investigate the MANY advantages of having a GoTyme account. They now allow foreigners with an ACR card to open online. Card is delivered free and ATM withdrawals (at any bank) are just charged at the standard 18peso fee. I believe if you combine ATM withdraws with over the counter withdrawals in a Robinson's store you could even withdraw 80K in one day! I transfer in instantly with Remitly from my UK bank and use their app to pay all our utility bills free and also to transfer money to my partner's bank and her Gcash- instant and free again. - @C D87

Thank you for the advice. It is always good to investigate options for moving money while living here and I definitely will check in to it. One thing with WISE is that they link up with a USA bank so that we can deposit our social security and pensions direvtly into it if we wish, and we get a Philippine WISE "debit card" to withdraw etc., albeit at the high 250 peso rate.

@danfinn

So trying out Wise today and guess I’m missing something.

Setting up a transfer Directly from WF to BDO via Wise just for comparison to WU.

I Did all the Plaid confirmation etc before hand and when choosing WF its showing (ACH) Transfer.

But, if I Sent $ today the 25th its stating $ wont be deposited until Dec 2nd ?  Is that Right ?

Thats 7 Days from now…I must have goofed up because WU probably do it in 4. Cost more…

Maybe someone can School me on what I did Wrong ?

FYI,

I figured it out.

I had chosen WF instead of Connected Bank (ACH) option.

Once I changed to above option it stated within Seconds, NM my bad…

Discard

@vehicross100

I'm not sure I understand your process. My use cases is simply transferring money from my US CU into my Wise account so I have a card that works everywhere here. It does it instantly. But I'm pretty sure it wasn't that way in the first months. There may be a trust period. Where once you establish a security relationship it moves your funds instantly. But that would be a question for AI or the internet. I do not know specifically what their policy is on that. But I'm sure it's readily available online.

@vehicross100

So your transferring from Wells Fargo, to Wise, so you can transfer from Wise into your Phillipine bank account?

That may be a limitation from Wells Fargo(?). But honestly once it's in your Wise (other than getting cash from an ATM and having to pay 250 pesos) the Wise card is taken anywhere.

I would run these scenarios thru AI and ask it what the quickest and least costly method is to get US funds into your Phillipine bank account. It can search a 100 sites and figure that out for you in about 20 seconds. Whereas it would take you or I a day or two.

Share your results. I may run this question thru AI myself. I have my ACR card now and need to choose a Phillipine bank.

My money remains in the states at Citibank, I use their pay bills for my life insurance, Netflix & charge card payments, all electronic payments.

I've registered my Grandson on bill pay and for Birthday & Christmas presents,

since there is no electronic pay for him on bill pay, Citibank will mail him a check with no cost to me.

On a regular basis I use Wise to transfer funds to my BDO account. I withdraw cash from BDO & keep P10K to P15K on hand (WAM: Walking Around Money).

I also use BDO bill pay for Meralco & Internet electronic payments.

You've heard of KISS, keep life simple stupid.

@Enzyte Bob

That's basically what I do. Keep my two investment accounts and CU in the US. And any money I need for here in my Wise account. But I will now add the Phillipines bank account so I can get cash for free and a managers check if necessary.

@Moab762

To Clarify, I use WF for the US and BDO here.

I do not need to use Wise as a bank, i’m just using them to transfer $ from there to here.

Like a WU transfer.

I Simply set up a transfer from my WF directly into BDO via Wise.

I wouldn’t actually be depositing $ into my Wise account.

After fiddling around for a while I figured out what option to choose in order for it to be sent and deposited in seconds with my US (Plaid/ACH) connected bank. (WF)

Wise Definitely has a much better rate then WU and much Quicker.

For our Bills, much like everyone else, my Wife just loads up her Gcash/Paymaya from Bdo and Settles them up.

This has been working ok for us for the last 10 years.

Although The limits that BDO and Gcash has set sometimes slows us down to where it might takes us 3 days just to pay all our obligations due to the transfer limits etc.

All my money stays in Austria in EUR. It would be unwise to save any money in PHP as the currency devaluates. When I came here 9 years ago the exchange rate was 1 EUR = 48 PHP. Now it is 1 EUR = 68 PHP. To pay the bills here, I use my mastercard. In case cash is needed, I transfer from my Austrian bank account to WISE Belgium. The transfer is free and the money is there in less than a minute. From WISE Belgium, I transfer to the BDO account of my wife. This is also done in less than a minute. The transfer fees are super low. For 10,000 PHP it is less than 2 EUR. In the past the transfer fee was up to 20 EUR. (Austrian Bank to BDO)

Thank you WISE for this great service

Andy from Boracay

@Andy_1963

It would be unwise to save any money in PHP as the currency devaluates.

But how much higher will the Euro, £, US Dollar appreciate against PHP? All the aforementioned currencies are at  historical highs. Heck when I first set foot in the Philippines in January 2001 there was political turmoil with President Estrada being kicked out of power for embezzlement. The PHP was not much weaker then than it is now. Moreover the 'real' (adjusted for inflation and interest rates) return on money invested in cash accounts in Philippine banks is currently higher than it is stateside.

If I was resident in the Philippines with a local Peso account there is a good argument for transferring a tranche of funds now while your domiciled currency is strong. Not even the revered financier Warren Buffet times the market at its peak.

@Andy_1963

Back in 2014/15 when I first arrived I was getting 45/46 to USD.  My simple math tells me for the same $5000 I could send back then, it would now equate to additional $1000 in pesos here today. But only if living a lifestyle as a local. If I try to live like back home here those additional funds start evaporating.

Gotta stay away from S & R…

A few years ago I was paying our building foreman 650, today it’s now 850 Daily.

We will start building again in February so sending Some cash here to prepare. For me at the current exchange rate it’s a win for now.

Wise update:

Few days ago I sent my first Wise Transfer $100 for testing.

Deposited in BDO immediately

Set up a $500 transfer and wise stated again in it would be in seconds, but I canceled that one and set up a $1500.

On that one it stated it will be deposited on the 4th, a full 7 days.

I tried again with a larger amount and again it stated 7 days on the 4th. 

With such good rates I sent that one also.

Appears that, for me, small transfers of under $1000 are in seconds and $1500 and above are 7 days. Not sure about $1000.

These were directly bank to bank so next time I will try depositing to Wise first as some have stated above and then transfer to BDO to see if any fees or transfer schedules change.

@vehicross100

I think Wise makes the transfer on good faith, that's why you get immediate transfer.

I imply this because I made a transfer and then tried to make another transfer two days later. Wise said this would take "X" number of days because they are waiting for my previous transfer to clear.

I use "X" number of days because I don't recall how many. They said it could be longer if it was over a weekend. I cancelled the transfer and then tried the transfer two days later and it went through immediately.

FWIW

@vehicross100

I am following this and very interested in your results. For me, I would like in the future to simply allow my USA bank debit card to expire and use fast ach transfers to move money. It would be great if one could just move the larger $1500 to Wise instantly and then move it from Wise to the Philippine receiver instantly. Will be interested in your result. My USA CU will not send a physical replacement debit card to the Philippines. (More recently I cannot even log into their new updated banking app with my foreign ip address, I must use a VPN located in the same state as the CU. Different issue). I just want to use fast-ach in the future, rather than debit card (which is generally guaranteed to be instant), and use the Wise Pilipinas debit card as my global atm card, letting my CU debut card simply expire.

@vehicross100

Hi, the most effective way is not to send a foreign currency to the BDO account but PHP. So, instead of 1000 USD you transfer 60000 PHP and the receiver gets exactly 60000 PHP. This avoids fees and taxes in the Philippines. The reason why it is so fast is that the money goes from the WISE BDO account to your BDO account.

@vehicross100

From my US CU to Wise I can do $1000 instantly. But can not do $2000 instantly. That jumps to like 4 or 7 days iirc. Transferring money from Wise to gfs local PH bank account is instant. But have not tried large amounts.

@Moab762
To Clarify, I use WF for the US and BDO here.
I do not need to use Wise as a bank, i’m just using them to transfer $ from there to here.
Like a WU transfer.
I Simply set up a transfer from my WF directly into BDO via Wise.
I wouldn’t actually be depositing $ into my Wise account.
After fiddling around for a while I figured out what option to choose in order for it to be sent and deposited in seconds with my US (Plaid/ACH) connected bank. (WF)
Wise Definitely has a much better rate then WU and much Quicker.
For our Bills, much like everyone else, my Wife just loads up her Gcash/Paymaya from Bdo and Settles them up.
This has been working ok for us for the last 10 years.
Although The limits that BDO and Gcash has set sometimes slows us down to where it might takes us 3 days just to pay all our obligations due to the transfer limits etc. - @vehicross100

How do you do this in Wise? I'd be interested to know. I'm about to open a PH bank account. And my strategy would have been to transfer into Wise from US CU, then transfer to my PH bank. Or go straight from my US CU into the PH bank. But that probably wouldn't be peso so I'd probably get dinged with exchange rate or fees. It sounds like your able to do this instantly with a very small fee?

@vehicross100
Hi, the most effective way is not to send a foreign currency to the BDO account but PHP. So, instead of 1000 USD you transfer 60000 PHP and the receiver gets exactly 60000 PHP. This avoids fees and taxes in the Philippines. The reason why it is so fast is that the money goes from the WISE BDO account to your BDO account. - @Andy_1963

What is a Wise BDO account? I set my Wise account up while still in the US.

Moab762 asked . . . . What is a Wise BDO account? I set my Wise account up while still in the US.

******************************

I'm wondering what type account you set up with Wise?

You asked "What is a Wise BDO account?

Wise is a medium to transfer funds, BDO is a bank in the Philippines.

An example:

(1) My USA bank is Citibank, my funds are in Dollars.

(2) Wise is a medium for transferring my Dollars

(3) BDO is the Philippine bank that receives the dollars transfer in Pesos through Wise.

(4) Wise transfers the dollars into Pesos then into my BDO account.

(5) Wise informs me of the transfer rate & how many pesos will be deposited.

(6) Transfer must be between two different currencies.