I just won an item on Ebay, it’s from Australia. The sellers take money orders/Bank Checks or Bank transfers.
-Bank says transfer cost $40 just to set up and cannot do Bank Checks.
-Post Office says no money orders to Australia.
All I want to do is give a guy in Australia 8 US dollars! I’d rather not keep bugging the seller, it’s been a week past the auction close and I just want to get this over with.
Any help would be appreciated from either side of the Pacific
Ask the seller if he’ll take US dollar bills. He should be able to change those at any bank in Australia, for a small commission, and it’s a reasonable rish to send USD 8 in the mail, fairly well disguised. But he won’t be able to change US coins, and they are harder to hide in the mail.
Does the guy have a PayPal account? I hate Paypal, but it’s one way to “translate” money across nations.
So just send a $5 and three $1.
I get dozens of cash payments sent from Europe, Japan and Australia per month–the expense of money orders in those places means that most of my eBay customers (those that don’t, or won’t use PayPal, that is) send the bills.
Haven’t lost any yet; I ask them to wrap them in at least 2 sheets of paper. If you’re really worried about the $8, you could send it registered (but here in Canada, for example, that costs you $11!!)
Here in Canada, we can send money “by email”. The sender makes a special type of transfer from eir bank account, and it goes to an intermediary; the receiver gets an email with a weblink, and goes to the intermediary’s secure website to deposit the money into eir account. Total cost: $1.50 plus whatever the banks involved charge for making a withdrawl and a deposit by online banking.
We really need to take that international. Paypal is almost there, but it isn’t as integrated into the banking system.
Re: the OP… How expensive are those places like Western Union? If not, cash may be the best bet.
I am astonished that the US post office does not have an agreement to exchange pstal money orders with Australia. OTOH, it looks like Canada doesn’t either. Perhaps it’s a conspiracy to get people to visit Australia…
Oh well. Looks like cash is the way to go.
Just ask if cash is OK. I’ve never had any problem with an international seller accepting US cash.
Thanks for the answer: cash it is! I’ll check with the sellers. I can’t believe how difficult it was. My local bank all but kicked me out the door, and the post office would help me if it was ONLY Canada or Mexico; that’s their idea of international. There ARE a few hundred other countries out there you know.
Thanks for the quick replies
You should definitely check with the seller whether cash will be acceptable. Unless he has some obvious use for $8 worth of US notes, then receiving such a small amount of US cash will be useless. Any bank here will charge more than the value of the US to convert it to Australian currency.
I’ve not heard of *PayPal * operating in Australia.
Well! It looks like Australia does not have PayPal as well! I am surprised. It’s in New Zealand…
Australia does have PayPal. I’ve used it to send money to one of my chilldren in Australia, and it worked fine.
Okay, I am blind… there’s a full local PayPal in Australia.
I’ll shut up now.