Banks

[fmm]

Just got back from Cvo (lovely time!)
Millennium were very helpful - Isobel sorted out my account within 30 minutes, and on my return to the UK I have a bank card and several letters (all in Portuguese unfortunately), so wil lhave to wait until my next visit to work out if they are important or not!

[Barry]

Pleased you sorted out your account, fmm. Don't forget that you can use the on-line facility to keep an eye on your account, and also to transfer funds, if you need to. There's also a phone number for support when outside Portugal.

[Sheila]

Mllenium sound good. Do they charge for depositing a euro cheque?

What sort of exchange rate do you get if you deposit a sterling cheque and do they charge a transaction fee in addition?

Thanks

[Farol]

Don't know about the charges for paying in cheques but I top up my Millennium Euro account by paying in GB Pounds in cash. Even after deducting their commission charge I still get a rate that is usually better than I can get in UK and avoids the high charges charged by UK banks in doing tranfers to overseas banks.

For large amounts (such as when we purchased in the Algarve) we use Moneycorp. They give a commercial Forex rate but don't like dealing in small amounts.

[Pabbers]

Bit late for you now but we do bank with Barclays and the benefit is that you get stuff in English (if you need it). You CAN give them a UK cheque, which we did to open the account. Also if you wanted to you could have a sterling account. However, we too tend to pay cash in when we come over - gets you the best rate and there are no electronic transfer charges and it's credited immediately. Can also do internet banking but not UK to Portugal transfer as yet (probably tied up with money laundering fears!).

[Mike,Chislehurst]

An old subject but is it possible to pay in cheques in the UK to either Barclay's (Portugal) and also Millennium.

[fmm]

Millenium rang me up on my birthday to say "happy birthday" - I have never had that sort of service from a UK bank!!!

[Michael Crane]

Millenium rang me up on my birthday to say "happy birthday" - I have never had that sort of service from a UK bank!!!

Let me look after all your money for you and I'll send you a birthday present each year!

[carolyn]

We regularly send sterling cheques drawn on a UK bank (Nationwide) in the post to our account at Millennium. We get a reasonable rate of exchange and pay about 12 euros in charges. This is not for huge sums of money - just to keep the account topped up for the costs of running our villa. It takes about a week between posting the cheque in the UK and seeing it as a cleared amount at Millennium. It then takes about another week before the cheque clears from our UK account!

Over the years we have tried a number of ways of sending money with minimum charge - and this has proved as good as any! The only thing is you don't know is the exact rate of exchange you will get.