Paying a US dollar cheque into a UK bank account

[JessBrs]

I have just inherited a largeish sum from a relative who lived in the US. The cheque is being paid to me in US dollars (they can't wire to the UK apparently).
Is it best to just pay this into my normal bank account and let them deal with the conversion? A family member has suggested opening a US bank account over here and then I can control when the conversion happens in an attempt to get the best rate. I didn't realise you could do this. Can anyone advise please? I've had a look online and it doesn't seem straightforward. Thanks

I have a LLOyds US dollar account. It was opened when I was in a very similar position to you. Thing is I honestly cannot recall much about how I opened it, how tricky it was etc and so forth. I think I just went to my local branch and they started the process for me. The account is out of their Channel islands service (I am not in the Channel Islands).

Some banks do not deal with foreign cheques so the first action would be to ask if your current bank will let you pay in a foreign cheque

Lots of banks have stopped dealing with foreign cheques - TSB didn't a couple of years ago, RBS did, but I'm sure they were talking about stopping.

You should get it paid into TransferWise account. Super easy, cheap rates for exchange and can convert to any currency

I’ve just had the exact same situation and we were able to pay the cheque into a Barclays account. It took several weeks to clear and there was a small fee but it wasn’t as expensive as I initially feared. I would check with your bank in the first instance, the online chat wasn’t very helpful when I first looked into it either. But it is doable. Good luck.

I assume your relative can wire it to a US account, so a Wise account (formerly Transferwise) would work. You can get different currencies with them and exchange from USD to GBP when you feel the time is best. Their fees are very low compared with other banks.

Bank of Scotland have a form you have to fill in to get it paid in. It's a faff but works.

Is this the money-laundering one where the money went through several family members first? If not, apologies.

No

We pay our US dollar checks into our Barclays Current Account at the foreign window. It usually takes a couple of weeks to get the money credited.

We were really lucky with the low exchange rate.

My husband is paid in dollars every month and the bank converts it for him. It's not a issue at all.

He works for a usa company.

Just pay the cheque in your bank.

You can pay it into your normal bank account but may need to pay it in using a specific form rather than just handing it over. We (my place of work) bank with Barclays and regularly get $ and € cheques to pay in. Barclays use a form called “Currency Deferred Lodgement”, if I recall correctly. You just fill in the cheque details, your bank account number and hand it over at the foreign till in branch. The cheques can take up to 6 weeks to clear and you usually get a letter from the bank to confirm it has gone through.

The bank will charge you for converting the currency (can’t remember how much, for some reason £9 rings a bell) and you are beholden to the exchange rate on the day they do it.

From our experience US banks are really funny about wire/online transfers. We have issues every year moving money out of our US bank account to our UK account - they charge us $150 for the privilege of moving our own money! For some reason they just don’t like moving money that way.