This has probably been covered in another thread. I haven't found the exact question.

I'd like to send a somewhat large sum of to a friend in need. He's in the U.S. Please don't ask why. Let's just say the price of gasoline went up.

I'm looking at my options, and am looking for the quickest and cheapest way of doing this. I also don't want to raise suspicions and complicated paperwork. The options I'm considering are:

1) Western Union
Western Union seems to charge a LOT for the service, but is pretty quick.

2) Paypal
Paypal is suspect, and has all kinds of charges and conversion fees. I'm not sure how quick it is.

3) Bank Transfer
Bank transfer might be the cheapest, but previous experience took many weeks.

Has anyone out there compared methods and come to the best process for remitting funds?

TIA

Even though western Union is expensive is the "best" and "most" rapid way to get it to the US. Banks will take forever, specially if you are planning to do it today (as monday is a holiday) the transfer wont go until tuesday morning, that means that you wont get it until friday of next week.
Paypal I never used.
Now, im not going to ask what you are using this for, but if you are sending money to the US, dont send anything near 9,000 USD (I KNOW 10,000) is the norm, but trust me . If you need to send more, send it to separate accounts (or the person receiving)
But if you need quick and fast and dont care that the IRS sees it then you can send it all on western union (ask about membership as you could save in % of sending the first time)

Which bank are you with? i am with UBS, and I know that transferring money to the UK takes a few days, and I personally wouldn't use paypay.

In my huble opinion. Bank transfer can be the easyest way. It should take 2 working days.

To avoid any suspicions you could send 10.000 usd at a time. However, I do not know if that fits you.

Post office international transfer. Far cheaper than Western Union extortionate rates.

Western Union seems to be the preferred method of transfer for Nigerian 419 scam perpetrators. Therefore I would assume that it is secure, quick and untraceable

Sorry to disappoint you but sending multiple wires as you mentioned is a surefire way to get done. Ask Elliot Spitzer.

I transfer with Credit Suisse quite often to the US. There is an "Expedited" and a "Normal". The "Expedited" takes 4 business days
and the "Normal" takes 5 business days.

"Expedited" costs twice as much for one day quicker.

Cheers,
Grant

I've sent up to 9000 chf to the US without any problem. If your friend is banking at a larger US bank with its own respective IBAN it will be very quick, if is a smaller institution it will take longer as it is routed via another bank.

good luck.

It is only untraceable if you use fake ID. Else it is very much traceable.

I have an account with about 4 banks, none of which is UBS.


Well, I do want to make sure it gets to my buddy. Fortunately, I'm not falling for a scam. Unfortunately, its a distress call. You know, I only expected these distress calls from those in third world countries.


Thanks. I assume this is through die Schweizerische Post. I'll inquire there.

http://www.postfinance.ch/pf/content...ash/offer.html

You'll also be better off paying all the fees and converting to dollars at this end, as the US banks tend to add questionable charges to the transfers, and not add line-items that they've removed the fees.

Thanks Shorrick! That looks a lot better than Western Union. I'll just make sure he can receive cash in hand in the required timeframe.