Dollar Shortage??

[Old55]

26 minutes ago, hk blues said:

Not an insignificant amount so your practice makes perfect sense.  

Exactly. 

[Dave Hounddriver]

5 hours ago, OnMyWay said:

To exchange them outside the bank.

Have you told your bank manager what you are doing?  I had a friend who did.  The bank manager (at Metrobank in Dumaguete about 7 years ago) said they could beat that price by a few centavos and from then on Lou exchanged all his dollars right there at the bank.

[hk blues]

26 minutes ago, Dave Hounddriver said:

Have you told your bank manager what you are doing?  I had a friend who did.  The bank manager (at Metrobank in Dumaguete about 7 years ago) said they could beat that price by a few centavos and from then on Lou exchanged all his dollars right there at the bank.

I did exactly this when I was in Hong Kong at the BPI there - he was able to match the rate from the various money changers there.  I'm sure if he was able to do it the guys here could too.

[OnMyWay]

2 hours ago, Dave Hounddriver said:

Have you told your bank manager what you are doing?  I had a friend who did.  The bank manager (at Metrobank in Dumaguete about 7 years ago) said they could beat that price by a few centavos and from then on Lou exchanged all his dollars right there at the bank.

 

1 hour ago, hk blues said:

I did exactly this when I was in Hong Kong at the BPI there - he was able to match the rate from the various money changers there.  I'm sure if he was able to do it the guys here could too.

At our BPI, any exchanges above the daily given rate have to be ok'd by the central BPI exchange office.   So you have to go in, sit at CS, and wait a bit.  Longer if there is a line.  Like I said, I used to do this and exchange larger amounts.  The larger the amount, the better the rate.

However, recently the spread between BPI and XE, and BPI and Villarica, has widened.  BPI, most days, can't come close to the Villarica rate.   It doesn't matter if you try to get a bit higher rate.  That will only be 2 to 6 centavos better than the regular rate.  Villarica is usually at least 20 centavos better than BPI.  On a good day, Villarica can be close to the XE mid-market rate.

[Shady]

10 hours ago, OnMyWay said:

To exchange them outside the bank.

Since you have USD and Peso accounts, do you ever watch the currency rates and time big transfers between the two accounts?

[OnMyWay]

11 minutes ago, Shady said:

Since you have USD and Peso accounts, do you ever watch the currency rates and time big transfers between the two accounts?

Sure, that is the way I used to do it.  I don't think you have been a member long, but if you look back, I was always posting about the exchange rates.  It was much more fun when the rate was going up!  Now, since Oct. 5th, 2018, many tears!  

[Mike J]

18 hours ago, OnMyWay said:

I never used to take $ out of BPI to exchange.  I used to wait for a good exchange rate and exchange a large amount that would last us for months.  Now we have a different scenario I won't get into, and it is worth it to withdraw the $ before exchanging.  We usually exchange $2000 and 20-30 centavos gets you 400-600 pesos more.  That is enough to pay for my eggs and fruits at the wet market, which is where the changer is.

Word gets around.  Locals may know that you sometimes carry up to $2000 when you go to change money?    You could end up getting robbed shortly after doing the exchange. 

[OnMyWay]

2 hours ago, Mike J said:

Word gets around.  Locals may know that you sometimes carry up to $2000 when you go to change money?    You could end up getting robbed shortly after doing the exchange. 

I used to worry about that and that was one reason I did larger exchanges less often, at the bank.  You would have to see where we live to understand why we have less risk of somebody knowing what we are doing.  My wife does the exchanges and we park about 20 feet from the security guard, so I feel reasonably safe about that part.  We are careful.

If people are doing exchanges at money changers, how much are they usually changing?  I remember stories of members getting their pension money and exchanging once a month, so I would guess that most exchange at least $1000 at a time.