I’m a foreigner but work for a US company. The company gave me some stock (on E*trade) which I sold, so there is some money, and I’d like to wire the money to another account, which is also in US (firstrade)
The wire took several days and charge me 25 US dollars. In my country, wire transfer between different banks is near instant and charge less than 1 US dollars.
So my question is, is it how wire transfer normally works in the USA? Or perhaps it’s because I’m a foreigner? If it’s normal, what’s the difference between US bank and other countries’?
In: Economics
Wire transfers are the electronic version of taking cash from one account and depositing it into the other. Real wire transfers are not common, they are instant and clear instantly, but often come with fees, some banks charge to send wire transfers, some even charge to receive them, and some banks require you to come in person to initiate them. The fees depend entirely on the bank or financial institution you’re using.
The more common way to transfer money electronically is ACH (automated clearing house) which normally doesn’t come with fees, but it usually takes about 3 business days to “clear” the transfer. The ACH system works by all Banks submitting their planned transfers in batches to the clearing house system, and the clearing house turns the total of the transactions into one big deposit or debit to each bank. Banks will often make the money you send this way available instantly, trusting that they will get what they’re owed from the clearing house later, but sometimes, especially with new accounts or suspicious deposits, they will wait for the transaction to truly clear.
Edit to add: some banks also just have a policy to place a hold on large transfers, which could be another reason you had to wait a few days.
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