eTailers – save money on your wire transfers! A guide to making your international payments easier and cheaper.

\If you’re an etailer making profits on overseas sales, and you need to repatriate your earnings, you know what you want - a quick and easy international payments process and, of course, to save a bit of money along the way. Well, we all do, don’t we?

So with that in mind, we’ve decided to take a closer look at the business of eCommerce, and particularly, getting your money home the best way.

Send Your Money Anywhere

When you set up with the likes of Amazon, eBay and Play.com, you can’t always guarantee that you’ll be getting the best price when transferring your currency back home. And though you’re unlikely to have any problems transferring your profits from major currencies back into a US bank account, you may find that you’re unable to transfer international payments into bank accounts in some other countries. The only way to be sure that your funds will be sent wherever you want them is to choose a currency exchange company like, for example, our newest partner World First. They don’t charge to set up - on your behalf - receiving bank accounts in the US, UK, Europe and Canada, which let you receive payments from your marketplace sales.

Get the Best Exchange Rates for Your International Payments

So the money’s going to the right place, and the bank accounts are taken care of. A good start. But the title mentions saving money on your wire transfers, and I’m sure you’re keen to hear more about that. Well, it’s all about the exchange rates, and how some are more competitive than others. The more competitive the rate, the more of your hard-earned money you keep.

When you use some of the bigger marketplaces, they tend to take a bigger spread, and therefore a bigger cut of your cash when you’re sending it home. All of which means you end up with less.

Here’s an example. A client based in the US sells goods on a major marketplace in the UK; let’s say they’ve sold £20,000 worth.  They can upload their home bank account.

Then it’s time to make a choice. Option 1 - they can upload their US account and have the marketplace send them USD. However, they may later find out from the amount of USD/GBP that they’re getting stung for 3.5% on the conversion.  Not good.

Or – option 2 - they get a currency exchange company to open them a UK-based GBP account.  The marketplace sends GBP straight to the account with no conversion.  The funds are then converted back to their home account in the US at a better rate than they would’ve received with the major marketplace, saving them money. I don’t know about you, but that sounds much better to us.

Anything Else to Consider?

Well, you’ve taken care of the currency transfers. Now you just have to worry about the other things. Channel management - which allows you to list all your products in one central location, and it pushes all quantities to all marketplaces simultaneously, shipping – the cost of which can vary dramatically, and inventory and warehouse management. That’s where SkuVault comes in, to make sure that the quantities in your warehouse are accurately reflected on your various marketplaces in real time. That way, you prevent oversells, improve warehouse efficiency, and reduce human error.

It’s all part of making a business work – but don’t forget to ensure that your wire transfers are working for you. These are often left as an afterthought, but getting this part of the jigsaw right can be worth thousands of dollars, so make sure you get it right, and get the experts on the case.