Job Discussion Forums

[Quibby84]

if I want to change some yen in to USD now, would the best way (with the best rates) be to buy travelers checks in USD?

[johanne]

If you sending money back home regularly or have a big amount to send it's worth it to check out xe.com As well as providing exchange rates on all currencies they will arrange international money transfers. You have to go through a few hoops to sign up with them. You need to send them valid id and then talked to them about what kind of transactions you want. I found them very professional and they answered all my "stupid" questions politely and clearly.

We moved from Vancouver to Japan 3 years ago and send all the proceeds from our condo sale through them and ended up with about 100,000 more yen than if we had done a wire transfer through our bank.

[Quibby84]

I am planning just bringing the money home in december but last time I brought yen in cash and got a horrible exchange rate at my home bank. So I was wondering if I got it changed here into USD travelers checks then when I got home I would the whole amount...is that how it works? Does it cost to get the travelers checks into USD, how about the exchange rate that way?

[J.]

the exchange counter at your bank. There are usually two rates posted for American dollars, the better one is for traveller's checques. They cost something like 1 per cent of the amount you are changing, but that might be covered or more than covered by the difference in exchange rates.You only pay when you are buying them; there aren't any charges for cashing them. (ie Yes, you get the whole amount in USD.)

They won't cash traveller's checques everywhere but they are a bit safer and you can easily change them at a bank or deposit them into an account.

I agree that changing yen has become a nightmare. I actually can't change them at most banks in Canada any more without being an account holder or going there with one. Seriously annoying. I actually had a teller tell me to go to the airport, some 90 miles back the way I had come, a few hours before closing on the week-end. I had already decided not to use the airport because of the terrible rates. You can bet that bank lost my business...forever.

[Dr. Gibbons]

The $US is falling drastically in comparison to virtually every major currency in the world. I few years ago $1US bought 1.50 Cdn. Now it buys about 90cents. I think it's probably best to sell any US currency before it gets worse. The yen isn't getting stronger so much as the $US is getting weaker.

[Quibby84]

But doesnt it mean that if the US is getting weaker that we should sell our yen? Then we would get more USD for our yen? Right? All this stronger and weaker stuff really confuses me....

[J.]

but I won't, seeing as you have decided to ignore the previous answer I did give you. Basic politeness gets more responses.

[Quibby84]

I was responding to the Dr. It seems like now is the time to buy USD instead of selling it...but it looks to me as if Dr. Gibbons things vice versa. So I was asking him what he meant. But I might have just misunderstood him.

[G Cthulhu]

[Jon Taylor]

and the exchange rates contine to get better and better.......

Just how long can this continue ?

US Dollar (USD) 107.64
Pound Sterling (GBP) 211.60
Canadian Dollar (CAD) 106.08
Australian Dollar (AUD) 96.14
New Zealand Dollar (NZD) 84.77