Sending $US to the US

Smylers Smylers at stripey.com
Tue Oct 6 15:33:30 BST 2009


Ovid writes:

> I need ... that I mail ... $27 US.  My bank charges £20 for the bank
> draft, plus the £17 face value.  Anyone happen to know a less
> expensive way to send, via mail, US dollars to the US, short of
> sending cash?

I've previously managed to avoid these sort of charges by finding a
friend (or a semi-random stranger I only know online) who lives in the
USA with whom to make some kind of exchange.

For example, last time I stumbled upon an American looking for Saw
Doctors CDs which she hadn't been able to find locally.  I purchased
them from HMV in Leeds and posted them to her; she paid for the thing I
was after, in dollars, and mailed it to me.

The two payments don't even need to be exactly the same -- so long as
the difference is smaller than the hideous currency conversion or
postage charges which would be inflicted doing this 'officially', both
parties still gain.

(Also, you get a warm fuzzy feeling from having successfully bucked the
system ...)

Smylers



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