Wise: The Ultimate Solution for Money Transfer

Wise is an international money transfer service. It is known for its fair and efficient transfer services in comparison to the common method of bank transfer which can be rather expensive. Founded in 2010 by Taavet Hinrikus (Skype’s former founding member) and Kristo Kaarmann (former Deloitte financial analyst), Wise (TransferWise back then) became popular quickly as it is rated as one of the biggest startups by Wired and The Guardian. Since then, Wise has transformed into a giant fintech company and Wise becomes the popular choice for international transfer.

The popularity of Wise is due to its simple process of transfer and cheaper fees compared to the traditional methods of payment. Let’s say I am transferring money from the United States to Canada. The local bank will convert the US dollar to Canadian Dollar (bank exchange rate), and then the converted money will be sent to Canada (transfer fees). In this case, we need to pay for the conversion fee using the bank exchange rate which is relatively expensive, and the transfer fee that can be quite expensive as well.

Using Wise, the above-written example could become cheaper because Wise has banks in many countries using their own local currencies, and therefore, you do not ‘actually’ transfer the money, but instead to the local banks that work with Wise, and then the banks that work with Wise in the country that the person you are sending the money to will send it to that person.

In the above case, I am transferring the money to banks that work with Wise in US (no international transfer fee), and Wise will transfer it to the person in Canada using their banks in Canada (Middle Market Rate). Therefore, you do not need to pay for the expensive fees of bank exchange rate and international transfer fees.

Middle Market Rate is a middle point between the price of buying and selling currencies. Since it is the rate that is used by banks to buy and sell currencies, it is cheaper than the original rate by banks. It is relatively close to the rate you can find by searching on Google. Wise uses this as an opportunity to offer a cheaper service.

Transferring money using Wise is not complicated. It uses a simple interface as you can see above, and Wise even lets you know the money that the recipient will get after you put the currencies and amount of money that you want to transfer which is very convenient. Our fee is basically the service fee that Wise charges and it depends on the amount of money you transfer.

In addition to this, you can see the conversion rate which is using the middle market rate (cheaper than bank rates). The time beside the conversion rate (96 hours) means that the conversion rate will not change during that period. As you can see, using Wise, I could save up to 2596 JPY ($ 23.50). The next steps include filling in the information of you and your recipient (address, bank details, etc.).

Then, on the last page of payment which is Pay, you will need to choose your payment method. The methods depend on each country, but usually, you will have three common options which are credit card, debit card, and bank transfer. Using credit and debit card are relatively easy (just type the card information), and debit card is cheaper than a credit card.

However, the best option is usually to use a bank transfer as it is the cheapest one. By using bank transfer, you will receive the information of bank details (Wise bank details in your and recipient country). Using that information and reference numbers, you pay using your online banking. Wise will also let you know the progress of the bank transfer (whether your recipient has received the money or not) on your account page which is again, extremely convenient.