American Banks

HSBC has multiple locations in VN. Citibank Vietnam has one in Saigon and one in Hanoi and have the Citibank name but may not work the same way as Citibank here in the states. You can always open up an account with Charles Schwab or First Republic which will reimburse all of your ATM fees and use transfer services to send yourself money up to $2999 per transaction do to regulations.

The only US related bank that I know of is Citibank Vietnam.  They have branches in Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi but no-fee ATM agreements with a large number of Viet banks.  It is not a branch of Citibank but an affiliated bank, perhaps 49% owned by Citi.  You can make cost free transfers from a US based Citi account, called Citi Global Transfer or CGT, but the conditions are slightly worse than they have been in the past.  See my post #46 here:  https://www.expat.com/forum/viewtopic.p … =2#4672315 

Another possibility is HSBC which is a British bank, originally founded in Hong Kong, which has branches in some US states.  The last I looked the fees to maintain an account on the US side were exceptionally high unless you left a large deposit at typically low interest.  I don't know about now.

Note that recent changes in law mean that you will need a 1 year visa to open an account in Vietnam.  As a US citizen you should be able to get a 1 year tourist visa or business visa depending on your reasons for staying in Vietnam.  May I suggest that you read all of this recent thread:  https://www.expat.com/forum viewtopic.php?id=859279#4683575

Search this forum for the word 'banking', very common topic.
Short answer: open a Charles Schwab Investor Checking account in the states, overseas use ATMs to withdraw local currency, ATM fees will be 100% reimbursed, with good currency conversion rate. You can withdraw up to $1000 per day. Also bring a good low fee 2% refund chip credit card. You can pay for everything with cash (dong) in Vietnam, but large stores and malls will take credit cards. Bring a couple $thousand in new $100 bills for emergency, and a laptop for online banking etc.

https://www.expat.com/forum/viewtopic.p … 79#4683575

Corrected link from #3 above.

gobot:  You mention that the conversion rates are good with Schwab but can you look at one of your statements and tell us just what they are?  Schwab does seem like the best everyday solution to Vietnamese banking but there is some risk that a card could become lost or damaged.  In that respect having a bank to bank wire transfer option should be a good backup. 

Also my wife told me that her Schwab card would not work in Ben Tre but she does not recall what bank.  It may have just been down for a day but I don't know if Schwab truly works everywhere.

THIGV wrote:

my wife told me that her Schwab card would not work in Ben Tre but she does not recall what bank.  It may have just been down for a day but I don't know if Schwab truly works everywhere.

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam, usually for 1 of 2 reasons:

1. Some older ATM machines are not compatible with current chip card technology.

2. "Smaller" (less well known?) banks will often reject the card, while it almost always works at Sacombank, Vietcombank, Agribank, MB (Military Bank), ACB, HSBC and Vietinbank ATMs

NomadBob123 wrote:

Hi All, I plan to move to Vietnam in March at least for a couple of years and wanted to see if anyone can give me some good insight into which American Bank or Banks to set up an account with here in the US that also has branches in Vietnam?  My thoughts are to use an American bank thinking they will have a little better understanding of transactions (no offense to other foreign banks) just figured your own countries banks have better understanding of transactions you are use to doing.  Plus my thoughts are that I can have a family member in the states on the account so they can get things done for me.  I have traveled a lot and have been to SE Asia several times, but have never lived there.

I will shut up now and wait for the great advice.  Thanks in advance.

Nomad Bob

Well you did say a lot without telling us much... 😉

What is your source of income? Nothing specific, but how will you be funding the account? Will it be direct deposits? Do you plan on earning income INSIDE Vietnam?

Since you call yourself 'nomad' (original! 😁) let's assume you have a source of income in the USA.

You probably won't need a bank here, but you can wait to sort that out until after you get here.

Get a Schwab One account.

I've had two different Expats buy me dinner for giving them that advice.

IF you plan to earn money here, that's a totally different matter entirely.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

THIGV wrote:

my wife told me that her Schwab card would not work in Ben Tre but she does not recall what bank.  It may have just been down for a day but I don't know if Schwab truly works everywhere.

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam,...

Thanks for that reality check.  As gobot has been too busy to look at his statements just for my sake  perhaps I could put the load on you.  What kind of exchange rates have you experienced in recent months?  I have a feeling that exchange rate arbitrage is how a lot of bank make money out of nominally "free" services but some have said that the Schwab rates are fair.  Finding out the rates was my objective in asking my wife to try our card recently, but as I didn't explain my reason well enough and because she didn't need the cash, she dropped the project when it failed to work.  She later told me that the ATM was at DongA Bank.

THIGV wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

THIGV wrote:

my wife told me that her Schwab card would not work in Ben Tre but she does not recall what bank.  It may have just been down for a day but I don't know if Schwab truly works everywhere.

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam,...

Thanks for that reality check.  As gobot has been too busy to look at his statements just for my sake  perhaps I could put the load on you.  What kind of exchange rates have you experienced in recent months?  I have a feeling that exchange rate arbitrage is how a lot of bank make money out of nominally "free" services but some have said that the Schwab rates are fair.  Finding out the rates was my objective in asking my wife to try our card recently, but as I didn't explain my reason well enough and because she didn't need the cash, she dropped the project when it failed to work.  She later told me that the ATM was at DongA Bank.

I'll probably need to make a withdrawal in about a week. I'll make sure to do a Google real time check of the exchange rate and compute what I get. I know in the past it's been very very close to the real time rate

THIGV wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

THIGV wrote:

my wife told me that her Schwab card would not work in Ben Tre but she does not recall what bank.  It may have just been down for a day but I don't know if Schwab truly works everywhere.

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam,...

Thanks for that reality check.  As gobot has been too busy to look at his statements just for my sake  perhaps I could put the load on you.  What kind of exchange rates have you experienced in recent months?  I have a feeling that exchange rate arbitrage is how a lot of bank make money out of nominally "free" services but some have said that the Schwab rates are fair.  Finding out the rates was my objective in asking my wife to try our card recently, but as I didn't explain my reason well enough and because she didn't need the cash, she dropped the project when it failed to work.  She later told me that the ATM was at DongA Bank.

I just withdrew ₫3,000,000 VNĐ from an ACB ATM in Vũng Tàu.

I did a realtime Google search for the current exchange rate and got this:



According to my Schwab app, they charged me $131.65 USD for the total transaction.

131.65 X 23,208.50 = 3,055,399.025

So I paid ₫55,399.025 VNĐ for the transaction.

Unfortunately, I didn't have a receipt printed, but usually ACB has been charging ₫50,000 VNĐ for a maximum ₫3,000,000 VNĐ withdrawal (including ATM fee and VAT).

So let's assume that ₫5,399.025 VNĐ is the total charge to me:



.23 cents appears to be the exchange rate profit.

That won't be rebated to me, but the ₫50,000 VNĐ will.

THIGV:  Husband withdrew 12M (rent time!) this afternoon from Sacombank ATM (4 transactions, 30k fee per transaction). 

Schwab statement showed $131.22 for each transaction, but as $1.29 fee will be reimbursed, the final cost will be $129.93.

Live rate from xCurrency was $129.20 and XE was $129.25 (for 3M).

We lost between 68 cents - 73 cents for each 3M or $130.  If my calculation is correct, that's 0.0055%.  No bank gives better exchange rate than Schwab, and for American expats and travellers, no method is more convenient than Schwab ATM.

As for failure rate, we've experienced only once when a BIDV machine didn't accept my card.  We waited until the next day to find a Sacombank ATM and it worked fine.  It has worked in Hanoi, Hue, Da Nang, Hoi An, Nha Trang, Saigon, Vung Tau, Can Tho, Phu Quoc, 8 other Asian countries, 2 Middle East countries, Australia, everywhere in Europe, everywhere in North and South America.

I simply love Schwab.

Thanks so much to both of you for your efforts and detailed reporting.   
A trophy for each of you. 

As I suspected Schwab is the way to go as long as you do not need to deposit locally obtained income.  Citibank is calling their service free, but they are more than making it up on the exchange rate.  Since we already have both, or I could say three, accounts we will probably keep Citibank open.  The US end is free (senior citizen and direct deposit) but we recently withdrew the balance that was making the VN end free of charges.  We will see how long we can stand paying the monthly fee.

THIGV wrote:

gobot:  You mention that the conversion rates are good with Schwab but can you look at one of your statements and tell us just what they are?

Sorry Thigv    I actually gave it a go. After 2 hours the result wasn't making sense. I even spreadsheet it, but was saying Schwab cost me 4% over XE.    So I decided to mull for awhile. I find that lots of problems sort themselves out after some mulling. 

Annnnd - I had a math error.    I had added the bank fees instead of subtracting before calculating the exchange rate. (My reimbursed HSBC ATM fees were $18 on 3 withdrawals total of $900, a lot more than Ciambella's $1.29 fees. I checked my HSBC slip; fee on 7.000.000 is 140.000vnd.)

23226 / $1 = Schwab exchange rate calculated.
23240 / $1 = XE rate, which fluctuated over the month, I decided to use the rate on Aug 31, the day they posted the fee refund.  A delta of 0.999409 is a rounding difference.

THIGV wrote:

Schwab card failures

Being a creature of habit, I go out of my way to use HSBC. But 2 weeks ago we forgot to take money to get my TRC renewed    so walked around the block on Nguyen Thi Minh Khai. Three puny ATMs at the Open University were reject-reject-reject, but a nice Exim kiosk on the sidewalk was generous.

Sure are some nice trophies you gave to O and C.    Must have made them really happy. Nicest trophies I've ever seen... 

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

THIGV wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam,...

Thanks for that reality check.  As gobot has been too busy to look at his statements just for my sake  perhaps I could put the load on you.  What kind of exchange rates have you experienced in recent months?  I have a feeling that exchange rate arbitrage is how a lot of bank make money out of nominally "free" services but some have said that the Schwab rates are fair.  Finding out the rates was my objective in asking my wife to try our card recently, but as I didn't explain my reason well enough and because she didn't need the cash, she dropped the project when it failed to work.  She later told me that the ATM was at DongA Bank.

I just withdrew ₫3,000,000 VNĐ from an ACB ATM in Vũng Tàu.

I did a realtime Google search for the current exchange rate and got this:

(image blocked)

According to my Schwab app, they charged me $131.65 USD for the total transaction.

131.65 X 23,208.50 = 3,055,399.025

So I paid ₫55,399.025 VNĐ for the transaction.

Unfortunately, I didn't have a receipt printed, but usually ACB has been charging ₫50,000 VNĐ for a maximum ₫3,000,000 VNĐ withdrawal (including ATM fee and VAT).

So let's assume that ₫5,399.025 VNĐ is the total charge to me:

(image blocked)

.23 cents appears to be the exchange rate profit.

That won't be rebated to me, but the ₫50,000 VNĐ will.

CORRECTION:

Today I made another ₫3,000,000 VNĐ withdrawal at the same ACB Bank branch, using my Schwab card.

This time I printed a receipt which showed that the total ATM fees (not itemized) were ₫55,000 VNĐ.

So it appears that the additional charge due to the exchange rate  was ₫399.025 VNĐ or $0.017 USD (1.7 cents)

gobot wrote:

Sure are some nice trophies you gave to O and C.    Must have made them really happy. Nicest trophies I've ever seen... 

Here is one for you too.   

It's just like Oprah.  "You get a car, you get a car too.  Everybody gets a car."

Schwab just rebated my September ATM fees today.

A sweet $60.29 USD deposit into my checking account.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Schwab just rebated my September ATM fees today.

A sweet $60.29 USD deposit into my checking account.

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

AkaMaverick wrote:

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

Have you noticed the title of this thread?     It is after all called American Banks.

Maybe you could open a thread that extols the virtues of HSBC.     No maybe better wait a bit on that one.   

THIGV wrote:

AkaMaverick wrote:

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

Have you noticed the title of this thread?     It is after all called American Banks.

Maybe you could open a thread that extols the virtues of HSBC.     No maybe better wait a bit on that one.   

There is probably a difference whether one looks for information about a bank or whether one praises the own bank in every second post.

I haven't been in this forum long, but I've read so many times how wonderful Schwab is.
Therefore, new thread "Praise the Charles Schwab Bank".

There are several threads on this forum that I never click on.  You are free to do the same for this one.   

AkaMaverick wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Schwab just rebated my September ATM fees today.

A sweet $60.29 USD deposit into my checking account.

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

Welcome back, Andy!

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

AkaMaverick wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Schwab just rebated my September ATM fees today.

A sweet $60.29 USD deposit into my checking account.

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

Welcome back, Andy!

I hope you're not confusing me with someone who's been negative here. I don't want to be put in a bad light.
Otherwise I feel forced to report you.

AkaMaverick wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

AkaMaverick wrote:

Maybe you Americans should open a separate thread where you can praise Schwab every day.

Welcome back, Andy!

I hope you're not confusing me with someone who's been negative here. I don't want to be put in a bad light.
Otherwise I feel forced to report you.

On the contrary, you are a very entertaining caricature, my dear Swiss friend.

You haven't seen Toy Story 2?

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

THIGV wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

I average about a 15% failure rate with my Schwab Visa debit card while traveling around Vietnam,...

Thanks for that reality check.  As gobot has been too busy to look at his statements just for my sake  perhaps I could put the load on you.  What kind of exchange rates have you experienced in recent months?  I have a feeling that exchange rate arbitrage is how a lot of bank make money out of nominally "free" services but some have said that the Schwab rates are fair.  Finding out the rates was my objective in asking my wife to try our card recently, but as I didn't explain my reason well enough and because she didn't need the cash, she dropped the project when it failed to work.  She later told me that the ATM was at DongA Bank.

I'll probably need to make a withdrawal in about a week. I'll make sure to do a Google real time check of the exchange rate and compute what I get. I know in the past it's been very very close to the real time rate

Same here, Schwab FX rates have been spot on the real time rate every time.

Sounds a bit inconvenient having to do 4 transactions a month to pay your rent.

You have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline, out of money or limited max withdrawals. Besides, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

They're better options available.

Diesel305 wrote:

Absolutely, you have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline,  out of money or limited max withdrawals. In addition, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

There are most better options available.

No, there aren't.

You may think there should be better options, but there aren't.

Also, the limit is per transaction.

You can do multiple transactions.

Unless you are hungover or using a walker.

I use Ria. I can send up to $2999 per transaction and you pay $5 if you send the max amount ($2999). I can pick up the funds in person, direct deposit or delivered to my home. They also offer a competitive exchange rate; current rate $1=22,847.

I never have to worry about losing my card. I have several payment accounts attached to my profile. If I lose a card or wallet I can simply log in and send myself instant cash from over 390,000 locations worldwide.

The availability is pretty much instant.

Diesel305 wrote:

You have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline, out of money or limited max withdrawals. Besides, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

They're better options available.

If you live outside the city where there are not so many ATMs, there are usually already some people staying in the queue at the ATM.
Many of them will then withdraw the maximum amount several times and you will wait 10 to 20 minutes (many times in the blazing sun).
Many times the ATMs are out of order or crashed.
Often the ATMs don't show the limits and you have to try from top to bottom until you find the maximum possible amount.

If I need a lot of money (20 million) I have to drive to an ATM of a bank from which I have a bank account.
Sometimes I've driven many kilometers to find such a free and functional ATM.

It's really annoying sometimes.

AkaMaverick wrote:

Diesel305 wrote:

You have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline, out of money or limited max withdrawals. Besides, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

They're better options available.

If you live outside the city where there are not so many ATMs, there are usually already some people staying in the queue at the ATM.
Many of them will then withdraw the maximum amount several times and you will wait 10 to 20 minutes (many times in the blazing sun).
Many times the ATMs are out of order or crashed.
Often the ATMs don't show the limits and you have to try from top to bottom until you find the maximum possible amount.

If I need a lot of money (20 million) I have to drive to an ATM of a bank from which I have a bank account.
Sometimes I've driven many kilometers to find such a free and functional ATM.

It's really annoying sometimes.

I hear you.

That sounds like a real pain.

But you have a Vietnamese wife and are here on a TRC/VEC, correct?

In the context of the guy who says it's really inconvenient for paying your rent, you can get money into a local bank account and you can pay your landlord from a Vietnamese Bank to their Vietnamese Bank.

Paying rent, wouldn't that work for you?

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Diesel305 wrote:

I use Ria. I can send up to $2999 per transaction and you pay $5 if you send the max amount ($2999). I can pick up the funds in person, direct deposit or delivered to my home. They also offer a competitive exchange rate; current rate $1=22,847.

I never have to worry about losing my card. I have several payment accounts attached to my profile. If I lose a card or wallet I can simply log in and send myself instant cash from over 390,000 locations worldwide.

The availability is pretty much instant.

Don't you get tired of getting banned from the forum and having to create a new username?

LOL. Banned? My account is three years old ( my account is older than yours ).

AkaMaverick wrote:

Diesel305 wrote:

You have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline, out of money or limited max withdrawals. Besides, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

They're better options available.

If you live outside the city where there are not so many ATMs, there are usually already some people staying in the queue at the ATM.
Many of them will then withdraw the maximum amount several times and you will wait 10 to 20 minutes (many times in the blazing sun).
Many times the ATMs are out of order or crashed.
Often the ATMs don't show the limits and you have to try from top to bottom until you find the maximum possible amount.

If I need a lot of money (20 million) I have to drive to an ATM of a bank from which I have a bank account.
Sometimes I've driven many kilometers to find such a free and functional ATM.

It's really annoying sometimes.

Exactly, the reason why I use Ria.

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Don't you get tired of getting banned from the forum and having to create a new username?

I don't know anything about his prior posts but what is there about posts on this page that would justify a ban?

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

AkaMaverick wrote:

Diesel305 wrote:

You have to factor in the time it takes to goto the ATM and the weather. Also, there is always the possibility the ATM is offline, out of money or limited max withdrawals. Besides, most ATM's only allow a max withdrawal of 3 million.

They're better options available.

If you live outside the city where there are not so many ATMs, there are usually already some people staying in the queue at the ATM.
Many of them will then withdraw the maximum amount several times and you will wait 10 to 20 minutes (many times in the blazing sun).
Many times the ATMs are out of order or crashed.
Often the ATMs don't show the limits and you have to try from top to bottom until you find the maximum possible amount.

If I need a lot of money (20 million) I have to drive to an ATM of a bank from which I have a bank account.
Sometimes I've driven many kilometers to find such a free and functional ATM.

It's really annoying sometimes.

I hear you.

That sounds like a real pain.

But you have a Vietnamese wife and are here on a TRC/VEC, correct?

In the context of the guy who says it's really inconvenient for paying your rent, you can get money into a local bank account and you can pay your landlord from a Vietnamese Bank to their Vietnamese Bank.

Paying rent, wouldn't that work for you?

I don't pay rent.

But I often need unexpectedly large amounts of money and the (often very old) ATMs outside Saigon are a nuisance.
That's all I wanted to do when I replied to Diesel.
If I lived in the center of Saigon (or any other major city) I wouldn't have any problems with ATMs.

You guys really have a problem.
If someone has a different opinion or view he is simply called a troll, idiot or in other ways.
But that is unfortunately common in today's world. You can see this every day if you follow today's world politics.

This is a public forum where everyone should be free to express their opinion without being offended or attacked.

Diesel305 wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

Diesel305 wrote:

I use Ria. I can send up to $2999 per transaction and you pay $5 if you send the max amount ($2999). I can pick up the funds in person, direct deposit or delivered to my home. They also offer a competitive exchange rate; current rate $1=22,847.

I never have to worry about losing my card. I have several payment accounts attached to my profile. If I lose a card or wallet I can simply log in and send myself instant cash from over 390,000 locations worldwide.

The availability is pretty much instant.

Don't you get tired of getting banned from the forum and having to create a new username?

LOL. Banned? My account is three years old ( my account is older than yours ).

I apologize.

I shouldn't post when tired.

Something in your syntax (and seeing it was your first post) had me thinking you were a person who has been recently banned on multiple occasions.

I've reported my own post, asking ADMIN to delete it.

AkaMaverick wrote:

OceanBeach92107 wrote:

AkaMaverick wrote:

If you live outside the city where there are not so many ATMs, there are usually already some people staying in the queue at the ATM.
Many of them will then withdraw the maximum amount several times and you will wait 10 to 20 minutes (many times in the blazing sun).
Many times the ATMs are out of order or crashed.
Often the ATMs don't show the limits and you have to try from top to bottom until you find the maximum possible amount.

If I need a lot of money (20 million) I have to drive to an ATM of a bank from which I have a bank account.
Sometimes I've driven many kilometers to find such a free and functional ATM.

It's really annoying sometimes.

I hear you.

That sounds like a real pain.

But you have a Vietnamese wife and are here on a TRC/VEC, correct?

In the context of the guy who says it's really inconvenient for paying your rent, you can get money into a local bank account and you can pay your landlord from a Vietnamese Bank to their Vietnamese Bank.

Paying rent, wouldn't that work for you?

I don't pay rent.

But I often need unexpectedly large amounts of money and the (often very old) ATMs outside Saigon are a nuisance.
That's all I wanted to do when I replied to Diesel.
If I lived in the center of Saigon (or any other major city) I wouldn't have any problems with ATMs.

You guys really have a problem.
If someone has a different opinion or view he is simply called a troll, idiot or in other ways.
But that is unfortunately common in today's world. You can see this every day if you follow today's world politics.

This is a public forum where everyone should be free to express their opinion without being offended or attacked.

You are correct, of course.

Sometimes people really are trolls, spammers and returning folks who have been previously banned.

However, I was wrong in that case.

I've apologized and reported my post to ADMIN for deletion.