Guest lvdkeyes Posted November 23, 2009 Posted November 23, 2009 My Thai bank account is with Siam Commercial Bank. I went there to get a cash advance with my US bank Debit card. They no longer will give cash advances on debit cards, only on credit cards. I went to Bangkok Bank and got an advance with only my debit card and passport. No fees from SCB or my US bank. Normally, when I use my US ATM card here my US bank charges $5.00 for each transaction. My rate was 33.19/USD. Cash advance from Bangkok is what I will be doing from now on. Quote
Guest Posted November 23, 2009 Posted November 23, 2009 Thanks for the tip. That's a good deal at todays exhange rates. Have you had the chance to verify the costs by checking your bank statement on line? Were they transparent about costs & exchange rates up front? I might be trying this on the next trip. Quote
Guest lvdkeyes Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 Yes, I verified my account online. No fees have been added and the rate was as I stated. Quote
Gaybutton Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 It's one of those "why didn't anyone think of this before?" types of things. I think your post has saved a lot of people a lot of money. Maybe other banks will do this too and I wouldn't be at all surprised if another branch of Siam Commercial would tell you something entirely different from the first one you tried. It seems no more inconvenient to get cash that way than it is for people like me who have to make a physical appearance in the bank to retrieve money from a receive-only account. If you time it right you can be in and out in just a few minutes. I believe there is no particular limit on the amount you can withdraw via cash advance, provided your bank account has the funds to cover it. 6 years ago, when I was ready to make the final payment on my house, I withdrew the equivalent of US $10,000 via cash advance on a debit card and had no problem about it at all. I don't remember whether any fees were involved, but I do remember that I did it at a Bank of Ayudhya branch. Quote
Guest OfficeMax Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 Gaybutton, you may be surprised because I went to different branch than lvdkeyes did (I pm him and he told me the ones he went to), the branch I went to was at the Lotus - Sukhumvit - they have given me cash advances in the past just informed me last week that they no longer do. This branch allowed me to take 200,000 B per day out. Quote
Guest lvdkeyes Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 I went to three different SCB branches and got the same response. Quote
Guest globalwanderer Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 sorry guys, why get large amounts of cash through your ATM card, and pay much more than if you did a transfer. if I use my UK ATM card i get about 51 baht per pound. Transfer cash to my thai bank account I get almost 55 Quote
Gaybutton Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 I went to three different SCB branches and got the same response. I wonder why some banks do and some banks don't. If SCB used to do it, I wonder why they stopped. Quote
Guest Posted November 24, 2009 Posted November 24, 2009 sorry guys, why get large amounts of cash through your ATM card, and pay much more than if you did a transfer. if I use my UK ATM card i get about 51 baht per pound. Transfer cash to my thai bank account I get almost 55 What type of transfer do you do & what does the receiving bank charge? Quote
Guest fountainhall Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 sorry guys, why get large amounts of cash through your ATM card, and pay much more than if you did a transfer. if I use my UK ATM card i get about 51 baht per pound. Transfer cash to my thai bank account I get almost 55 I totally agree. In the ATM Charges thread, I posted the following a few days ago - Typically, banks give a much better exchange rate for foreign currency telegraphic transfers or demand drafts. The TT goes direct from your home bank to your bank in Thailand. A demand draft is similar to a cashier's cheque, so you have to apply for it, go back to the issuing bank to receive it and then hand it in to the bank in Thailand. On the other hand, the cost for issuing a demand draft is far less than for TTs and, I believe, is only levied at the issuing bank. Bank drafts are made out to a specific bank. So you have to have an account here first - it's no use if you are only making one visit. The last time I transferred overseas currency to Thailand (Hong Kong dollars), the bank used their non-note rate of Bt. 4.31 whereas the best cash rate at the usual bank money changers was Bt. 4.20 - so the TT yielded 2.6% more. You get the same rate for a demand draft. The last time I transferred from a UK bank (about 5 months ago), the flat rate charge was Quote
Guest OfficeMax Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 In my limited experience with cash advance on my debit card in US $ (from a US bank to Siam Commercial before they quit doing this last week in the branch I used.) 1. The rate I received was 33.19 = TT rate 2. I was notcharged any fees for this, I checked my US bank and Siam Commerical bank. 3. Getting cash this way you do not incur transfer fees from your home bank nor transfer fees in the receiving Thai bank. Of course all my be different in a different currency/country than my experience with American Bank - US $ Quote
Guest OfficeMax Posted November 25, 2009 Posted November 25, 2009 In my limited experience with cash advance on my debit card in US $ (from a US bank to Siam Commercial before they quit doing this last week in the branch I used.) 1. The rate I received was 33.19 = TT rate 2. I was notcharged any fees for this, I checked my US bank and Siam Commerical bank. 3. Getting cash this way you do not incur transfer fees from your home bank nor transfer fees in the receiving Thai bank. Of course all my be different in a different currency/country than my experience with American Bank - US $ Quote
