It seems that you have decided on using an online currency exchange service to send your remittance back home to your family and friends. If you still haven’t made up your mind, we recommend you to check out this article to know why online currency exchange services are the best option for sending your remittance instead of hawala or banks.
Your next logical question will be ‘How do I decide on which remittance service is best suited to my needs?’ What are some of the factors that I should consider when I make the decision of choosing the right currency exchange platform?
In this article, we review the five most important factors that you need to consider before choosing your remittance service.
1. COST EFFECTIVENESS:
This is a no-brainer. If a remittance service charges a higher transaction fee or gives a bad exchange rate, you should not use it to transfer your money. Simple as that!
Transaction fee for most companies range from 15-25 dirhams which is a very small percentage of the amount you want to send.
Often times transfer services have hidden cost that customers usually miss out on when calculating their remit. This is a big downer, especially when you find it out after you have selected your remittance service.
In order to avoid such circumstances we recommend you to sign up with a free Rapid Remit account that displays all hidden charges and transaction fee and shows you the exact amount that will be received in the recipient country.
Pro Tip: Rapid Remit’s live exchange rate comparison feature lets you compare the exchange rate for different transfer services and filter results based on best currency transfer rates to your desired location.
2. SPEED OF TRANSFER:
It becomes very frustrating when you have to check every day with your family whether they have received the money or not. Your family keeps nagging you every day with complaints that the money is still not received and to inquire as to how long will it take.
Speed of transfer is another important factor when sending your remittance, especially when it’s an emergency. Remittance companies in the UAE usually take between 15 minutes to a maximum of one week to transfer your money depending on the recipient’s location.
The Rapid Remit service also gives a fully transparent comparison of the time taken by various remittance services to send money from UAE to your desired location.
3. RELIABILITY:
Personally, this is the biggest factor for me.
Having an unreliable online currency exchange service can put your money and personal financial information at risk. With the ever increasing risk of financial data breach, you need to select an online currency exchange service that protects your money and personal data and offers full-proof security.
4. CONVENIENCE:
Ideally, you should select an online currency exchange service that offers multiple modes of receiving cash like cash payouts, bank transfers and mobile wallets. Moreover, some online currency exchange services in the UAE store your financial information in order to ease the process for returning customers. With this feature, sending remittance takes a couple of minutes.
Some services, like Western Union, also offer options to track the status of your remit so you are always aware of when the money reaches your hometown.
5. CUSTOMER SERVICE:
No matter how reliable or convenient or fast your remittance company is, there always remains a teenie tiny possibility of the ‘one-off unpredictable problem’. Maybe your family members are unable to login to their accounts to access the money or maybe the transfer system is down. You try calling and emailing your transfer service with your query, but you get no response.
When you are transferring big amounts of money, such a situation can make you extremely restless. And in such a restless condition, all you want is your online currency exchange service to be empathetic, communicative and tell you that they are working to resolve your issue.
The quality of a company’s customer service is what differentiates the best from the rest.
Pro Tip: You can read customer reviews for online currency exchange services in the UAE under Rapid Remit’s Our Network tab and pick a service with the best reviews.
All in all, finding the right remittance service can be a hassle especially when there are so many factors to consider. Rapid Remit puts you in control of your transfer experience and helps you compare the most important features of online currency exchange services like exchange rates on one single platform for FREE. Sign up here!
