Capturing favorable US/CAD conversion

[Jrn56]

ETI accepted 3 payments from our Capital One card last summer. (zero exchange fees for us).

[JaneM.]

I believe their current policy is that they'll accept up to $3000 on a credit card, but not more. However, you'd want to check with ETI to confirm or check to see if this has changed.

[yardsale]

We just made a substantial down payment on our 17b by transferring funds from the US to ETI in USD and having them make the conversion from USD to CD. We received a rate of 1.0763, a couple of hundred dollars cheaper than asking our bank to make the conversion. ETI's bank charged us a $35 fee for the transaction, but the whole procedure saved enough to pay the sales tax here in Vermont.

[Donna D.]

Perfect for you! However, I mentioned in another topic... this conversion rate stresses me out. I'm south of the border, the US side. Following the "daily" rate was driving me nutz and totally stressing me out. I started figuring my build and options wanted in US dollars (can I afford this...?) and I immediately calmed down. The upside was finding out I got a "refund." YMMV

[padlin]

Sending a personal check costs nothing but the stamps, and you still get credited for the converted rate.

[cpaharley2008]

Originally Posted by padlin

Sending a personal check costs nothing but the stamps, and you still get credited for the converted rate.

Just be sure and double US postage from US to Canada.

[Brian B-P]

Originally Posted by padlin

Sending a personal check costs nothing but the stamps, and you still get credited for the converted rate.

I assume that it cost the sender nothing (other than any trivial routine cheque fee), but does it cost the recipient nothing? I've never cashed a substantial cheque drawn on a U.S. bank, so I'm not confident that it would be free of charge to process.

[santacruzer]

My bank (Wells Fargo) wouldn't even cash a small check from ETI, even though the check was in U.S. funds. They required me to deposit it.

[Brian B-P]

Originally Posted by santacruzer

My bank (Wells Fargo) wouldn't even cash a small check from ETI, even though the check was in U.S. funds. They required me to deposit it.

That's normal, regardless of country. A non-certified cheque from someone who is not a customer of the bank is essentially (as the

old Jerry Seinfeld routine

said) really just an I.O.U. note... a bit of paper saying that some other bank will come up with the money when you give them the signed paper. A reasonable bank makes you deposit it, so if it bounces they just take the money back out of your account.

[yardsale]

Originally Posted by padlin

Sending a personal check costs nothing but the stamps, and you still get credited for the converted rate.

We found a small difference between sending USD to Canada for them to convert, and asking our US bank to convert on this end and make the transfer in CND. This is small potatoes compared to the basic conversion rate. Dosen't really matter which way you do it, and the daily rate dosen't change THAT frequently. It has been about .92 USD to one CDN for a few weeks now.

padlin is right though, the electronic transfer cost us $35.

[dbawden]

We opened an account at RBC. We live in the US near the border. It cost nothing to open or deposit money. You do need to personally deposit the money. Just write a US check and wait 15 days to clear. The account has both a US dollar and Loonie side. You do not get the exchange rate as the bank has both a sell and buy rate. I transferred $10001 a couple of weeks ago when it was .794 and got .816 and another $10001 this week because the trend has been up at .814 and got .842. I'll sit and wait to see what happens on the last $5001 I need to bring across.

Here are two good web sites to help educate yourself:

https://www.nbc.ca/content/dam/bnc/e...ysis/forex.pdf
XE.com - CAD/USD Chart

[float5]

People who owe Escape in the next months might want to look up the charts as to how the U.S. dollar has risen tremendously against the Canadian dollar in the last year and is now dropping. Of course, it may go right back up in the next months and could then be up over where it was a couple of weeks ago.

We did not know when ordering last October and the rate was in our favor at .11 that it would go to .20 (now dropping from that). As an example, that is a gain of nearly U.S. $5000 on $$25000. Our Escape will be several thousand more so we are gaining quite a lot. That may or may not last. We sent a cashier's check (no charge by our bank) on a Saturday by Fedex ($44) which was received on that following Monday.

[rbryan4]

The CAD is indeed rising, and a price increase from Escape is just around the corner as well. If it were me as as U.S. Buyer. I'd strike while the iron is hot.

[J Mac]

Originally Posted by dbawden

We opened an account at RBC. We live in the US near the border. It cost nothing to open or deposit money. You do need to personally deposit the money. Just write a US check and wait 15 days to clear. The account has both a US dollar and Loonie side. You do not get the exchange rate as the bank has both a sell and buy rate. I transferred $10001 a couple of weeks ago when it was .794 and got .816 and another $10001 this week because the trend has been up at .814 and got .842. I'll sit and wait to see what happens on the last $5001 I need to bring across.

Here are two good web sites to help educate yourself:

https://www.nbc.ca/content/dam/bnc/e...ysis/forex.pdf
XE.com - CAD/USD Chart

I wonder why nobody thought of that before. What a great idea.

[float5]

Originally Posted by rbryan4

The CAD is indeed rising, and a price increase from Escape is just around the corner as well. If it were me as as U.S. Buyer. I'd strike while the iron is hot.

You must have had a very good rate even if you paid earlier than when you picked up.

The catch with opening an account at the RBC is that you have to make the deposits in person. Kind of wipes out the advantage for most if one has to go up to Canada to do it!

[rbryan4]

Originally Posted by Floating Cloud

You must have had a very good rate even if you paid earlier than when you picked up.

Yeah, we did pretty good. Our net rate was about .802

[Jill]

Someone said earlier in this thread that banks will charge an almost 5% fee to change currency. Looking into that, this might apply only to when you want actual cash in a foreign currency. So I'm wondering when you're transferring money to ETI, do we still have to pay that 5% fee or do the banks have a reduced fee for this scenario? What was your experience on that?

[Jill]

Might have answered my own question. Should have read a little further before posting the above question. I found this in another thread "I spoke with Tammy about this and yes they do have an American bank account. I think she said with Citizen bank. We can deposit the money into that account then she can move it. She indicated that she was getting a very good exchange rate.". So my understanding is that if we use this process there will still be a fee, but it's marginal compared to the 5% bank fee.

[Mountain_gal]

Don't forget to check with brokerage accounts as well. Ours did an EFT to the Escape account for free. Then the Escape bank did the conversion which includes their fee.

[azjack]

Last year we used a credit union card, visa or master card for our purchases the CU did not tag on extra. This year with no CU card I called our Wells Fargo, their card would add about 3%, American Express also about 3%. Our Fidelity Visa is only 1%. A lot of places will just have take cash, including Escape for their work and I'll have to just accept the exchange rate. Is that OK Tammy?
Jack