Accepting $ in Paypal and converting to £ - UK members advice please

Hi,

I do a fair bit of my business in the US, so mostly accept payments in $ using paypal. Even though the exchange rate has dropped, you still get stiffed if you transfer the $ balance to a UK account.

Is there any way of minimising this exchange rate hit?

 

Withdraw before the rate fals lower and charge in euro's.
I am not in UK.
regards
jeet

 

I've never really noticed it to be honest. I know that Paypal rates would be higher than xe.com (But then again, I don't think anywhere exchanges money at exact rates).
I've noticed that the $~£ has been getting quite stronger recently though. I don't think there's any easy way of saving money though maybe look for a bank account which can exchange currency at good rates instead?

 

How do you get stiffed? Where are you losing money?

We take payments in dollars, then and PayPal converts it to JP yen before depositing it in the bank (JP Bank), and their exchange rate really sucks. Thinking of putting it in a US bank account so we can withdraw it in US dollars in Japan and exchange it when the rates are favorable.

Another option is to use 2checkout - they let us send US dollars to JP bank, and it sits there in dollars until we exchange it.

 

Paypal sure rips you off when trading money from one country to the other, I get terrible rates when transfering my dollars to pesos to my bank account.

 

I thought you lived in the US? Do you live in Japan?

It might be better to charge in euros instead of pounds. The exchange rate wobbles about all over the place between USD and GBP.

Or you could try opeing up a dollar account at a bank ... maybe there are suggestions on the best from some of the people here. Basically you keep all your US dollars in the account and only exchange them when it's favourable to you. Plus it lets you buy in dollars without losing out on converting currencies.

 

Yeah, moved back to Japan this summer. Still spending quite a bit of time in the US though, on business.