Money transfers from abroad

[novalis]

Hi! Does anybody have any advice about the best way to transfer money from an account overseas to a Japanese account. Specifically, I want to transfer savings from my UK account (so, substantial sums) to my Japanese account without incurring tax penalties. Any advice or pointers gratefully received!

[Beaglehound]

You don’t have to pay tax unless you have earnings overseas in the same year you transfer, in which case you are on the hook for tax on that amount of earnings (including savings interest). If you send direct from your U.K. bank and let them do the currency conversion, the exchange rate is likely to be poor. And also check how your J-bank treats overseas transfers, most will charge to receive and the amounts vary.

Best options are probably either using a currency broker like Wise or Currencies Direct, or opening an account with Sony Bank, which I suspect might work out even better. That way you can send in GBP to a Sony Bank GBP denominated account and let them do the exchange (decent rate) and they don’t charge incoming transfer fees either, though I think there is an intermediary bank fee. Previously I have used a broker for large amounts but in future I would likely go U.K. bank to Sony bank.

[novalis]

Many thanks for your reply. I nothing about Sony Bank. Is it safe and reliable? How does the transfer work? I set up a Sony Bank account here and then instruct my UK bank to send funds there? Then I can get Sony Bank to transfer the money to my normal bank account here in Japan? One last question: is there an upper limit for a transfer beyond which tax becomes an issue? Thanks for any help!

[Beaglehound]

Many thanks for your reply. I nothing about Sony Bank. Is it safe and reliable? How does the transfer work? I set up a Sony Bank account here and then instruct my UK bank to send funds there? Then I can get Sony Bank to transfer the money to my normal bank account here in Japan? One last question: is there an upper limit for a transfer beyond which tax becomes an issue? Thanks for any help!

Disclaimer that I have no interest in promoting Sony Bank, just that it seems a cost effective way for you to send the cash. It may be that your current Japanese bank doesn’t charge punitive receiving fees and your U.K. bank may offer decent exchange rates as well. But Sony Bank is set up for this kind of thing as it is targeting the foreigner market. Whether it is safe and reliable is not something I can 100% answer, but it is a bona fide bank. Here’s a link to how it works:

https://moneykit.net/en/guide/fct_in/

And they have a promotion on just now as well:

https://moneykit.net/en/campaign/fr2021 ... =330720913

Basically you open a yen account with Sony (was a pretty easy process for Japan), and can open a sterling account at the same time. You instruct your U.K. bank to do the transfer, which gets to Sony via an intermediary bank (probably costing a few thousand yen). Then you transfer it into your Sony yen account, getting a very good exchange rate, from where you can transfer it to your existing Japanese account. (Sony Bank gives you a couple of free furikomi a month). It sounds like a faff, and it would be simpler to send direct from your U.K. bank to your Japanese bank, but compare the exchange rates that would apply in either case, it is likely that Sony would give you significant savings on a substantial sum.

As for your final question, as far as I know moving money per se is not taxable, regardless of the sums involved.

[RetireJapan]

I did a few transfers last month with Wise. They have a virtual UK account now, so the process is really easy and very fast.

NatWest -> Wise UK account transfer (pretty much instant, free)
Wise change currency from pounds to yen (you can leave it in pounds if you like, but there is a limit on how much you can keep in a Wise account -think it is a million yen or so) instant
Wise withdrawal to Shinsei Bank here -took five minutes, 200 yen fee

Don't know of anything else as easy/fast as this.

[robster]

I did a few transfers last month with Wise. They have a virtual UK account now, so the process is really easy and very fast.

NatWest -> Wise UK account transfer (pretty much instant, free)
Wise change currency from pounds to yen (you can leave it in pounds if you like, but there is a limit on how much you can keep in a Wise account -think it is a million yen or so) instant
Wise withdrawal to Shinsei Bank here -took five minutes, 200 yen fee

Don't know of anything else as easy/fast as this.

Were those transfers all under 1mil yen？I have used Wise in the past for larger amounts, and the receiving back in Japan charged 4,000yen each time. (even with the 4,000yen fee, the cheaper currency conversion rate from Wise still makes it a good deal).

[RetireJapan]

Were those transfers all under 1mil yen？I have used Wise in the past for larger amounts, and the receiving back in Japan charged 4,000yen each time. (even with the 4,000yen fee, the cheaper currency conversion rate from Wise still makes it a good deal).

Yes, but I'm not sure how the virtual accounts work with larger amounts. That is the real game changer.

Previously large transfers had to be done via Swift, so they were just sent normally as international transfers to Japanese banks (unlike smaller amounts, which are routed through Wise's network). That is where that 4,000 yen fee came from. Shinsei charged me a similar fee when I sent money there from my NatWest account in the UK.

[rasselbiluga]

If you have an account with Interactive Brokers, you apparently can do the conversion at the interbank rate, which is potentially significantly cheaper than even transferwise (especially for large transfers), as described here. I never did it myself so far though, so can't comment on the details.

[beanhead]

Best options are probably either using a currency broker like Wise or Currencies Direct, or opening an account with Sony Bank, which I suspect might work out even better. That way you can send in GBP to a Sony Bank GBP denominated account and let them do the exchange (decent rate) and they don’t charge incoming transfer fees either, though I think there is an intermediary bank fee. Previously I have used a broker for large amounts but in future I would likely go U.K. bank to Sony bank.

I have used Sony Bank for this once or twice. A fee of almost 9,000 yen was charged (on a fairly large amount), which as you said was probably taken by the intermediary bank. They give instructions on their webpage of how to route the transfer to reduce fees, see below.

https://moneykit.net/en/guide/fct_in/

[pfdsa]

+1 for Sony Bank.

Use it sometimes to transfer small quantities from abroad (foreign bank→Sony Bank→Japanese bank that I regularly use). So far didn’t paid any kind of fees. If I’m not wrong, you also have 4 free atm withdrawals per month, as well as 2 free transfers to other Japanese banks. They also have decent conversion fees, so it might be worth to give it a look.