As its founders explain, TransferWise was specifically created in 2011 to allow moving money internationally without excessive currency conversion fees. Anyone who exchanged and transferred currencies back then could remember that traditional banks applied high fees and there were no alternatives if you wished to transfer money from one country to another.
TransferWise has suggested an online solution with real exchange rates and one of the lowest commissions. Since then many alternative platforms emerged, but TransferWise continues to pioneer in the sphere of quick and cheap money transfers across the globe.
And here we explain why.
Pros
– Online account set up and verification
– User-friendly interface for website and app
– Low currency conversion and transfer fees in comparison to bank fees
– Mid-market exchange rates
– No need to open TransferWise account for recipient
– Customer support with local languages
– European IBAN
Cons
– Slow account verification within 1-3 days
– Unfavorable conversion fee on large amounts
– Certain countries are not supported
Short Description
TransferWise is headquartered in the UK with officed in Belgium, Hungary, Ukraine, UAE, Hong Kong, Malaysia, Australia, India, US, Brazil, Singapore, Australia, Japan and Estonia. Its website is translated into several languages, including French, German, Portugal, Russian, Chinese, Romanian, Italian, Turkish, etc. You can get a customer support in these languages as well.
Within the recent years, TransferWise has gained popularity for quick and cheap international transfers. It also develops business solutions, including so-called Borderless Account that is made for business that frequently sends money abroad.
Account Opening
Opening account in TransferWise is quicker compared to opening account in a bank. As part of AML procedure, this payment institution requests documents for remote verification. In practice, it takes up to 3 days to receive a response from the Compliance Department. Due to anti-money laundering legislation, the exact list of documents depend on each situation, but it is no longer a big deal to get certified documents online (if you don’t know how to do, please contact us).
Transferring Funds
Another great thing with TransferWise is that your recipient doesn’t need to use TransferWise for you to send money to them. You can create an individual or business account, then send money to recipient’s designated bank account. That’s it.
TransferWise supports 19 currencies. The company has grown to 1 million users, so you can be surprised how many friends and business partners of yours use this service to transfer money abroad.
Transactions can take up to 5 business days, but in reality the money is received within a few hours for major currencies, such as USD, EUR, GBP, AUD, SGD.
TransferWise provides you a real-time currency converter to compare conversion rates. However, TransferWise works well with smaller sums as its commission is calculated from the transferred amount and does not decrease progressively as the sum grows.
That’s said, for transfer of more than 5,000 USD there can be other solutions that would be cost-saving for larger transfers.
TransferWise debit Mastercard
TransferWise issues debit Mastercard to be used in more than 170 countries globally. It can be utilized with Apple Pay, Google Pay and Samsung Pay.
Security
Another important issue that bothers all users is how much TransferWise is secure for international money transfers. For many of us it seems that virtual accounts are vulnerable and insecure. But the thing is that regulations governing payment institutions are as strict as those governing traditional banks.
TransferWise is regulated in several countries, including the UK, US, etc.
In terms of technical measures, TransferWise implements:
– Cloudflare for DDoS protection and Web Application Firewall
– additional security measures, like making sure restrictive firewalls are configured and login is only allowed in a secure manner
– Access to servers is tightly controlled and audit logs of all issued commands are kept
– Regular software updates and scanning of out-of-date software
– SOC 1 type 2, SOC 2 type 2, PCI DSS certified
– GDPR and ISO27001 compliant
– 2-step login for customers
Opening a TransferWise account is free, so it is a great opportunity to try whether TransferWise works for you and your business.
