Korean Job Discussion Forums

[quercus]

hello,
i have heard that korea will only let you send home $10,000USD per year. i do not know if that is correct or not. does anyone else out there know if there is a limit to the amount of money we can send home in a given period of time?
thanks

[diablo3]

there is no limit. However if you send over USD$10000, they want you to prove that it is not drug or funny money. So, when sending more than this amount, you need your employer (usually hagwon) to verify that you work for your money. So, you need:
1) An employment certificate provided by your employer.
2) Records of payment provided by employer (including tax records). Make this match to the figures in your bank account, they will check.
3) Passport and maybe Alien Registration Card (I forgot if you need one or the other or both)
4) Copy of your contract.

Doing it at the Korean Foreign Bank is the easiest, and transfer will occur quickly, and also at a good price.

I hope this helps.

Good luck

[chronicpride]

The only time this issue comes up is on an ESL forum. I've never heard it from a teller, let alone, enforced. If there is rule/law/limit, it's a soft one, as with virtually every kind of rule/law/limit in Korea. It's not like back home, where the banks have a death grip on your ass with every single contractual caveat.

The way that I look at things like this, is that if you don't hear a whole lot of first-hand accounts of stuff like this on these forums, then don't sweat it, because there are a ton of us who have been sending $10K+ back home for years, and you'd hear about it here if there was anything noteworthy to mention. I just bring my passport and give them my bank info and that's it. I go to Nonghyup, Woori, or KB regularly, depending which is closer to where I happen to be at, and I get no fuss.

Now that I think about it, I've been wiring for over 2 years and my passport has only been stamped twice for wires. It's supposed to stamped each time. That should tell you something.

[Eunoia]

As with most "soft rules", it depends on who you talk to - and more importantly in this case, which bank you deal with.

Like Chronic, I had my passport stamped only once, but you DO need to bring some kind of pay stub / statement from your employer proving that your income is legitimate. Let them stamp it (then again, they might not) and keep a copy of it, but make sure you keep the original for yourself (if they don't stamp it, you can use it again).

Some banks (few, but they're out there) are sticky about the rules and WILL ask for your passport, and there are a few which will try to keep you to that 10K limit. However, most banks are pretty laid back about the whole thing. Ask people in your area which banks are good to deal with.

[chronicpride]

[katydid]

It's all really inconsistent. This is my third year here, and this is the first time I have ever had my passport stamped every time I have sent money home. So, we'll see what happens when I hit that magical $10,000 mark, but I don't think anything will.

I've never had to show my paystub at any of the banks I've gone to in the past either.

[Wangja]

Exchange controls were relaxed about 3 years ago. usually one has to "apply" for permission to send funds abroad but that is a formality and merely for statistical reporting of capital flows.

I have never had any problems and have transferred well in excess of 10,000 USD this year.

The only time I had my passport stamped was 4 years ago when I bought 100 USD cash.

[Sarah-in-Korea]

You can only send up to what you earn at your job in any given year. Obviously if you try to send more you have a secondary income which is a no-no.

I haven't sent money for almost 3 years, so when my partner and I went in last month to send a lump we had to provide a certificate of earnings from our school for the last two completed financial years. Obviously this year hasn't finished so we can't prove that. Once we showed thos it was fine. They didn't write it in our passports tho, they only did that once 3 years ago (the only other time we sent money).

Also, a friend of ours was returning to Canada a few months ago and had to go to immigration to get certificates of all her previous jobs' earnings to give to the bank since she hadn't sent any money for like 5 years.

Maybe if you dribble it home every month they look less closely, but all at once triggers alarm bells for the banks I think.

I was tempted to just have my teeth removed and replaced with bling, might be easier...

SiK

[sadsac]

I'm not sure what the requrement is for US citizens, but I just sent AUD$25,000 home and the bank didn't bat an eye. Just signed the forms as per normal and off it went.

[Wangja]

I do not believe that Americans are treated differently from others, whether Korean or non-Korean.

But maybe someone has a tale to tell??

[kylehawkins2000]

I have had an experience with this. When I was making quite a bit of money and sending alot of it home the Korean Exchange Bank would stamp my passport on the last page and write the amount sent and date each time. Near the end of one year they started adding them all up to see if I was over the limit. I once went just over the limit and they told me that I really wasn't supposed to send more than 10 grand US in a year but they let it go because it was only $50 over or something.

Anyone that is sending smaller amounts home each month is not likely to run into any problems. If you try to send 10grand in one go though you might run into some problems.

Worst case scenario just carry the cash with you. On my last trip home I just carried 5 million won in a paper bag. I felt like I had just robbed a bank or something! I exchanged it at an exchange booth in BC and lost a couple of hundred bucks on the crappy exchange rate. (about $150 - 200)

[sadsac]

You can send more than USD$10,000, as long as you don't let them stamp your passport. This has been bandied about previously.

[snifey]

When you wire money home, are you wiring it directly into your bank account? If you carry a lot of cash home, where is the best place to exchange it? Here before you go, once you get there, at the airport or at your bank?

[McNasty]

You could get internet banking and wire the money home yourself. You can save on the transfer fee and not have to worry about having your passport stamped.
The best part is you don't have to wait in line or have people budding in front of you or breathing down your neck.

[chronicpride]

Good idea. There used to be international banking laws in place prohibiting that, however there have been a lot of changes in that area, over the past couple of years, so I could be wrong about current practices.