I’m sending money to another country. How can I figure out which company offers the best price?

If you send money internationally with a remittance transfer provider, you generally will be given information before you pay about the total amount that you will pay, the amount that the recipient will get, and also the transfer fees, taxes, and any exchange rate. Use this information to shop around from one company to the next.

One way to comparison shop is to look at how much money the person at the other end of the transaction will get if you were to give each company the same amount of money to pay for fees and the transfer itself. The company that gets the most money to the recipient is the cheapest.

Example: Let’s say you have $100 in your pocket that you would like to use to pay for a transfer to your brother in Colombia, including the transfer amount, plus any fees and taxes. Company A tells you that your brother would get 175,000 pesos. Company B tells you he would get 180,000 pesos. In this example, Company B’s transfer is cheaper.

Some websites have information about various companies’ prices for sending money internationally. For example, one site provides information about transfers from the United States to countries worldwide . Other sites provide information about transfers from certain cities in the United States to countries in Central America , Africa  and the Pacific , as well as Haiti. All five websites focus on how much a recipient will get if you start with $200 or $500 to both send and cover the costs of sending money.

You might find these or other sources of price information a good starting point for your comparison shopping.

Warning: Remember that these websites may be incomplete. For example, these websites may not include all of the companies in your area. Also, these websites may not reflect the exact amount of money a company would provide to the recipient. The amount of money that someone receives abroad depends on fees, taxes, and any exchange rate. Companies might change their prices and exchange rates frequently or charge different prices at different locations or for transfers of different sizes. Also, companies may charge other fees that are not reflected on these websites. The CFPB is not responsible for these sites and does not endorse them.