

Ask HN: Paying Overseas Employees - Mizza

Hello, HN!<p>Today, I hired my first employee! The problem we've encountered is that he's in Europe and I'm in the US and that European banks want to charge massive fees to process US cheques. Is anybody here in a similar situation? What's the best way to go about doing this. Paypal seems like one option, but it seems very unprofessional and I don't trust them very much.<p>Would very much appreciate your input!
M
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pcc
I've had a similar situation (Canada to South Africa) and at the time the best
thing was to go in to the bank to do a wire (swift) transfer.

There are various options; eg what currency you want to send the funds in (ie
who bears the currency risk), and on what side the charges are paid.

There are still some overheads this way, so we found it most practical to pay
2 months at a time and do the wire every other month.

You can also try finding out about the cost of you just drawing a banker's
draft on your bank directly in the foreign currency.

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scorpioxy
I've received international payments before from clients using Paypal,
Moneybookers and Western Union as well as direct bank transfer.

Mostly, the direct bank transfer was the easiest. I paid $30 as a transaction
charge.

Paypal is not supported in my country so that money is stuck in paypal and i
can only use it online. But Moneybookers supports bank transfers and it is
much easier to deal with in my country.

This is all relative of course. Larger companies for example will already have
a process in place for bank transfers, while smaller ones or individuals will
prefer something like Paypal.

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sjtgraham
I have a USD denominated checking account with Citibank UK, any EU citizen can
open one, and there are no fees for paying in USD cheques.

I also have a US bank account with Chase. I'm an EU citizen. I just walked
into a branch in Midtown Manhattan and said I needed an account to receive
approximately $10,000 per month and suddenly the need for a US passport, SSN,
etc evaporated. YMMV.

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mattm
Use XE Trade. Get his bank information and transfer the money directly into
his bank account.

