Nat West Business Account and Euro Currency?

[Fred Bloggs]

A question for anyone who has a Nat West business account and invoices in Euros, recieving Euro payments. I can see (link below) that electronic Euro receipts to the Nat West account are free of charge, which is great. What I can't see is that when an account is based in the UK and in GBP Sterling, what happens when you recieve a Euros electronic payment? I am suspicous when a bank doesn't levy a charge. Do Nat West automatically convert Euro payments to Sterling on receipt? If they do, what's the FX like? I guess that's where they make their money. Sorry, I can't ask Nat West, I do not yet have an account with them but apart from this question, the Nat West account + FreeAgent looks unbeatable for me. Thanks.

Electronic payments | NatWest

[WordIsBond]

I strongly recommend that you NOT go that way for your euro clients. I've not had NatWest but I did ask them and other banks when opening a business account some years ago, and asked them if they could tell me what the exchange rate would be if I brought in X USD or Y euro, and they told me.

Every bank was skimming at least 2.5% on the exchange rate.

Transferwise Borderless Banking takes less than 1%. The fees are transparent, they give you interbank rate and charge a percentage fee. It costs less than £1 to then transfer your funds to your business account.

So, if you like Natwest go that way, but use Transferwise for your foreign clients. They pay into your Transferwise account, you convert it and then transfer it to Natwest. It will all probably happen faster than Natwest would process the euros, and cost you much less. I get an email when a client pays into my Transferwise account, log in and convert and transfer it, within 3 minutes it's in my Starling business account, 2 minutes later a chunk of it is in my business savings.

[Fred Bloggs]

Much as I suspected then WIB. I am a personal customer of Revolut and I believe they have a business account in the UK. One option is to use a Revolut account and transfer each Euro payment to my Nat West business account. My personal use of Revolut has been pretty good. I may give them a chance at a business account too. Thank you for a very quick and very helpful reply, WIB.

Edited to add - Yes, Transferwise Borderless looks great too. I am not sure about actual charges v Revolut but they are both low cost v a normal high street bank. The free Revolut Business account seems to levy a flat £3 per transaction. So That would cost me £6 if I recieved Euros once a month and sent GBP once a month. So, which would be better/cheaper is going to be pretty marginal. Though my soon to be started business is a side hustle so turnover isn't going to be massive. Cheers.

[WordIsBond]

Have never seriously considered Revolut, so can't comment on that. Yes, sounds like for the sums you are talking it doesn't matter much.

The only fees I pay with TW (for what you are doing) are £0.60 to transfer from TW to Starling, and the currency exchange fee. (I also pay fees to make foreign currency payments when I use a foreign subcontractor, which I do pretty regularly now. But that's also cheap.)

But £3 vs. 0.60, it's hardly a big deal. What might matter is if the exchange fees are significantly different, but even then, if the sums are small the fees aren't going to be THAT different.

I'm completely sold on TW and so are some others here, but if you've had good success with Revolut, why change?

[Fred Bloggs]

Have never seriously considered Revolut, so can't comment on that. Yes, sounds like for the sums you are talking it doesn't matter much.

The only fees I pay with TW (for what you are doing) are £0.60 to transfer from TW to Starling, and the currency exchange fee. (I also pay fees to make foreign currency payments when I use a foreign subcontractor, which I do pretty regularly now. But that's also cheap.)

But £3 vs. 0.60, it's hardly a big deal. What might matter is if the exchange fees are significantly different, but even then, if the sums are small the fees aren't going to be THAT different.

I'm completely sold on TW and so are some others here, but if you've had good success with Revolut, why change?

Thanks WIB. I got a quote to move Euros 1000 from a TW account to a UK GBP account and it worked out as Euro 8.40 for the transaction compared in realtime to the same Revolut transaction. Versus 2x £3 transactions for any value per month using Revolut. It seems I may be looking in the wrong place for the TW transaction? I don't know, it was their website I tried it was straight forward enough to get the quote. So, all things being equal, to transfer Euro 6000 monthly, which what I am expecting it would be Euro 6x8.40 = Euro 50.40 using TW compared to £6 using Revolut. Small beer but Revolut wins. Once I have it all set up, of course, actual experience may differ. My Revolut account is a personal one. I will have to open a business one. As an aside, it seems Revolut has FreeAgent integration too.

Thanks again for the input, WIB. Highly appreciated.

[Fred Bloggs]

A quick update from me on this. I applied for a Revolut business account as planned. The next day despite all my ID etc... Being for my UK residence, the application was refused. Presumably the Revolut servers saw that I was still abroad when I applied. So........ I applied for a TransferWise Borderless account. I filled in the forms and submitted the ID very easily indeed. Much slicker than Revolut. Within minutes the account was created and debit card applied for. The only thing I can't see at the TransferWise Borderless account dashboard is my banking details to accept payments from Europe. Presumably that becomes available once the debit card is sent out in the next day or two? Have to say, first signs are TW Borderless is the solution for me presently. Thanks for the advice. Appreciated.

PS - All I need now is a NatWest account but they are closed for business account openings presently.

[Fred Bloggs]

A quick update from me on this. I applied for a Revolut business account as planned. The next day despite all my ID etc... Being for my UK residence, the application was refused. Presumably the Revolut servers saw that I was still abroad when I applied. So........ I applied for a TransferWise Borderless account. I filled in the forms and submitted the ID very easily indeed. Much slicker than Revolut. Within minutes the account was created and debit card applied for. The only thing I can't see at the TransferWise Borderless account dashboard is my banking details to accept payments from Europe. Presumably that becomes available once the debit card is sent out in the next day or two? Have to say, first signs are TW Borderless is the solution for me presently. Thanks for the advice. Appreciated.

PS - All I need now is a NatWest account but they are closed for business account openings presently.

OK, I realised I had to pay £16 to activate the international banking. That's now done and the debit card is on it's way. I have to say, the setup, the look and feel of TW Borderless is way ahead of Revolut. I'm very grateful it was flagged up to me here as a possibility. Thanks.