Have you or your organization tried using Remitly to send money to field workers in overseas locations? Remitly is an online money transfer service that allows you to send money internationally across over 100 currencies with no hidden fees. You can choose from various delivery options, including bank account transfers, mobile wallets, cash pickups, and home delivery, depending on your recipient’s location.
An organization recently shared with us that when they used Remitly, the transfer occurred instantly. The field workers received the funds in local currency without having to go to the bank. There was no wire fee, but a small percentage was charged as a convenience fee. This convenience fee might be considered minimal compared to the hassle of taking a bus downtown to a bank, retrieving the wire, paying the wire fee, and transferring to local currency (often by private exchange houses or by black market exchange specialists in a risky part of town).
What has been your experience? Does your organization allow its use? If the auditors don’t mind, it seems like a real time saver.
https://www.remitly.com/us/en. Please comment.
I used Remitly for the first time in 2024 to send $1800 to S Asia. In regard to sending, the process was very user-friendly. The recipient also had no problems receiving the money.
We’ve used Remitly, SendWave, and Western Union’s instant payment to send money to Kenya. Each one works depending on what kind of account the recipient has. If they have MPesa, just about any method of sending money works. When we have used one of these and it didn’t go through, they have refunded us the money immediately.
I’m excited to try this. I’ve been using Paypal until now.
It depends on the amounts involved…
It’s a good idea to evaluate amounts and check exchange rates as well as fees when looking for a way to transfer funds.
I’ve looked into several different options and have found that these ways work best for us in Central America:
1) Write a check from the USA and deposit it into my bank here in Central America. (If it is a large amount, I request a better exchange rate at the bank before depositing it.) The downside of this method is that it takes about 30 days to clear. The upside is that there are no fees.
2) Do a wire transfer from the US Bank directly to my bank account here. The upside is that it usually clears within a day or two. It also seems to get a better exchange rate than I can find elsewhere. The downside is that each wire transfer has a bank fee.
I checked on Remitly and the standard exchange rates they offer make the cost of using Remitly greater than the bank’s fee for a wire transfer when you get to certain amounts.
For example: to transfer $1,000 with Remitly the standard rate today is 1 USD = 7.5709 GTQ. My bank has a standard rate of 1 USD = 7.58 GTQ today. That means that to transfer $1,000 it would cost you $9.10 + $1.99 fee = $11.09. That’s about 1.1%! But if you are transferring $10,000 or more the Remitly exchange compared with the bank exchange rate increases 10-fold to $91 + $1.99 topping out at $92.99 for you to get your money. Depending on the transfer costs at a US bank the wire fee can be free to $60 or a percentage. (Avoid those percentages for large tranfers!)
So $60 vs. $92.99 can add up. Its a good idea to evaluate your transfer amounts and compare your exchange rates as well as fees to see what works best for your situation.