Pay Pal fees for overseas travel payment

[kpc]

Need quick advise re fees and Pay Pal payments.

I need to pay for some travel in USD$. The overseas travel company wants 3% in addition to cover their Pay Pal fees. If I send them USD$x + 3% from my Australian Pay Pal account, and the funds are drawn from my Australian Master card credit card, are there any additional Pay Pal fees? Would I just see on my credit card USD$ +3% in the AUD$ equivalent. thanks

 

[ric_melb]

I am not so familiar with Paypal, but suspect you may be up for a few costs here
Could be up for the 3% the travel company wants to charge, plus a 3% conversion fee.
Plus your credit card transaction could be treated as a cash advance, so you could be up for interest. Also are Paypal fees really 3%?

 

[odysseus]

I need to pay for some travel in USD$. The overseas travel company wants 3% in addition to cover their Pay Pal fees. If I send them USD$x + 3% from my Australian Pay Pal account, and the funds are drawn from my Australian Master card credit card, are there any additional Pay Pal fees? Would I just see on my credit card USD$ +3% in the AUD$ equivalent. thanks

There are a couple of ways foreign payments can be made in paypal. You haven't said whether you have an invoice from them, but either way it should work out the same. Work out the USD cost they want e.g. USD1000 + 30 = USD1030. That's the amount the TA wants to get.

Then when the USD amount is recorded in Paypal, you can choose whether they or you will convert that amount. They'll tell you their converted amount e.g. it might be something like AUD1055 in which case that exact amount will be charged to your AUD account. Or you can say you want your credit card to do the conversion, in which case they will charge USD1030 to your card and then it's whatever your bank converts it at that you'll pay.

And yes - to the question about paypal fees. 3% is about right.

 

[kpc]

There are a couple of ways foreign payments can be made in paypal. You haven't said whether you have an invoice from them, but either way it should work out the same. Work out the USD cost they want e.g. USD1000 + 30 = USD1030. That's the amount the TA wants to get.

Then when the USD amount is recorded in Paypal, you can choose whether they or you will convert that amount. They'll tell you their converted amount e.g. it might be something like AUD1055 in which case that exact amount will be charged to your AUD account. Or you can say you want your credit card to do the conversion, in which case they will charge USD1030 to your card and then it's whatever your bank converts it at that you'll pay.

And yes - to the question about paypal fees. 3% is about right.

Yep, that's what I thought! Of course, I charged it to my Wizard Master Card in USD as I'm sure Wizard will give me a much better foreign exchange rate than Pay Pal.

I did enquire about a wired transfer but my bank wants to charge a flat $55 fee for this online:evil:, and I'll have to pay the fee twice as I will be making 2 payments to the travel operator:shock:. So the Pay Pal option comes out only slightly more expensive than a direct wire, for 2 transfers but I have the protection of Pay Pal :shock:, or more importantly my credit card, if things go pear shaped....and the money stays in my bank account a little longer

 

[odysseus]

I did enquire about a wired transfer but my bank wants to charge a flat $55 fee for this online:evil:,

It probably doesn't help you now, but that particular fee is abnormally high. The majority of banks charge in the range of $25-35 for online (or even branch) international transfers.

Even as a non-customer you could go into branches and pay less than that... just in case you have a need again.

 

[kpc]

It probably doesn't help you now, but that particular fee is abnormally high. The majority of banks charge in the range of $25-35 for online (or even branch) international transfers.

Even as a non-customer you could go into branches and pay less than that... just in case you have a need again.

It was $25 for the transfer, and if I chose to pay the receiving bank's charges (which the travel agent would obviously insist on!), it was another $30, making it a total of $55 per transfer (HSBC is the Bank). Does this sound right?

 

[moa999]

It was $25 for the transfer, and if I chose to pay the receiving bank's charges (which the travel agent would obviously insist on!), it was another $30, making it a total of $55 per transfer (HSBC is the Bank). Does this sound right?

Sounds about right and the big issue is you often don't know what the receiving banks fees are so you then would have to make a second payment.
International money transfer is a rort