Maintenance paid from abroad

[tribpot]

Hi all,

A friend in another EU country is receiving maintenance payments from the UK from the dad of her ds. He is sending her UK cheques on the grounds he shouldn't have to pay the extra charges (although quite clearly why should she?)

Do any MNers have experience, what's the best way of her banking the money and moving it to her country?

Many thanks.

set up an account with western union but that costs, other than that what country is she in? many banks now are cross border and have facilities to have multiple currency accounts

He can pay via paypal if he wants to be nice but sending cheques seems to me ridiculously incosiderate for the receiver, so if he is doing it to annoy her, I assume he will not be inclined to find more efficient ways. However, she may also say she doesn't accept cheques.

thats right, what is needed is a 'fait a conmpli' find as many ways to make it easy for both parents then if he won't play ball, it puts her in a better position at a later stage if she has to take it further say by asking a court to order that the maintainance is increased to cover the costs of conversion

Great - thanks all. She's in Sweden so euros not an option.

I'm surprised given the overseas situation was known when the court order was made the method of payment wasn't specified up front? Hey ho.

I will say something though tribpot. your friend may want to tread carefully on this. as she now lives in sweden, the british court order will be hard to enforce. her ex may then be persuaded to go to sweden to pursue a new order through their courts, and sweden, if I am not mistaken are one of those countries that assume shared care etc on separation and are more ''father friendly''. I have just asked my friend about HSBC but they only have a private bank network in sweden that deals with rich people so that bank is not an option. it may be worth contacting banks such as abbey nat (santander) who have an international presence to see if they can offer an account where you can flit between currencies. I know my uncle had such an account 50 years ago when he moved to australia through the macquarie bank I think but that is likely to be vastly different now, but I have heard you can do this but what bank and which countries is the question!! (also I know sweden does not have the euro but some european banks do offer cross border euro based accounts so look at those banks first as they may be more likely to do multi currency ones to. I have never used payapl but chandra said about this method, worth looking at too to see how much the transactions will cost if they do cost, all worth looking at to stop any future problems that may involve courts etc. (there is a system for enforcing maintainance orders across borders if he stops paying because of this not sure of who or where though but that is another time hopefully if she can propose a solution that is reasonable)

Thanks misi, I've passed on your advice.