Opening a Sun Trust Account - Info for those thinking about it

[Everything Eeyore]

Originally Posted by susieh

We had to put about £10 in to open it but now that it is open there is no minimum amount

Popped into a HSBC branch yesterday to enquire about opening a US account and they said there would be monthly fees involved. Not sure if they really knew what they were talking about though to be honest....

So, Susieh do you know the exact name of the HSBC US account please? I can then ask again. Thanks

[susieh]

Originally Posted by Everything Eeyore

Popped into a HSBC branch yesterday to enquire about opening a US account and they said there would be monthly fees involved. Not sure if they really knew what they were talking about though to be honest....

So, Susieh do you know the exact name of the HSBC US account please? I can then ask again. Thanks

Our US account is a Premier Account (we have a UK Premier account). We don't pay a monthly fee for either account but I know that HSBC does charge for UK Premier accounts unless you meet their criteria so maybe that's what she was referring to.

I have no idea about US accounts linked to other HSBC Current account types.

Good luck with your searching - we've been really pleased with the way ours has worked out. We also discovered that we get free withdrawals from ATMs - all the fees we paid when we withdrew cash in Colorado in January have been refunded on our latest bank statement.

[leise]

Thanks for all the info in this thread. We opened a SunTrust account when we went at Easter. All ok so far, but we are trying to work out how to transfer money into it, especially as the pound is strengthening!
Our bank (Barclays) will charge us £25 a go.

Some of you mentioned using Paypal - how do you do this? We have a UK Paypal account we can use, but how do we pay into the SunTrust account?

Any advice would be very gratefully received

[Elise79]

Originally Posted by leise

Thanks for all the info in this thread. We opened a SunTrust account when we went at Easter. All ok so far, but we are trying to work out how to transfer money into it, especially as the pound is strengthening!
Our bank (Barclays) will charge us £25 a go.

Some of you mentioned using Paypal - how do you do this? We have a UK Paypal account we can use, but how do we pay into the SunTrust account?

Any advice would be very gratefully received

Hi

We opened our SunTrust account in March

We have funded it using Paypal. To do it you need to have funds in your paypal account (you can add funds by DD from your bank account but this takes ages so as me & DH have a Paypal account each DH sends me a instant transfer using the bank account as funding done as a gift so there are no paypal fees) you can then transfer them to Dollars using the manage currency option. Then you need to add your SunTrust account onto your bank account to withdraw the funds to.

In the 'Add account' option there is a drop down box where you can select a US bank account.

Be warned the rate PayPal gives is about 4 cents lower than current market rate but for transfering smaller amounts (less than about £500) it is cheaper than the bank charges.

We use if for transferring money we get from selling stuff on Ebay as that is our holiday spending money anyway.

HTH

[leise]

Elise, many thanks for that info - I have now managed to transfer money in via Paypal. Now to save up for more points!

[Brandis]

I also plan to open a Suntrust account when I'm at WDW next May.

Does anyone here have experience with cashing in checks?

As a WDC shareholder, every year I get a check for $0.73. Until now I didn't bother as cashing in the check in Switzerland would habe been much too expensive.

But with a US bank account I was wondering if there would be any charges involved if I send a check issued by Citibank Delaware to Suntrust.

[Elise79]

Originally Posted by Brandis

I also plan to open a Suntrust account when I'm at WDW next May.

Does anyone here have experience with cashing in checks?

As a WDC shareholder, every year I get a check for $0.73. Until now I didn't bother as cashing in the check in Switzerland would habe been much too expensive.

But with a US bank account I was wondering if there would be any charges involved if I send a check issued by Citibank Delaware to Suntrust.

I think you will be fine there are no charges as far as I can remember - check with the person that opens your account.

[jharrowell]

One thing about the Paypal route (which I've been using for a couple of years now) is that you need to plan ahead.

It takes 7 - 9 working days to transfer money out of your UK account into your PayPal account, then another 1 - 3 days to transfer it into Suntrust.

So you need to plan this in time to make sure you don't miss a dues payment, or for those like me who are a bit paranoid about that type of stuff, stay 1 month ahead.

Once you've got that US bank account though it leaves things open to getting all sorts of stuff where you can't use a UK account.

US Cell phone
(go PayandGo and the money stacks up for you as you do the periodic payments, there's no roaming charges, when ppl phone you from the UK it's on their dime, and it's so cool having an orlando area code!)

Getting APs at Seaworld & US on EZPay
(Hey if you're a DVC member you're probably out there enough to need one. )

There's more but I'd be here all day.

[Brandis]

Just looked at the Paypal website. So if I want to transfer money into my Sunbank account, I would first top up my Paypal account by paying money into Paypal's Bank of America account in Geneva, which doesn't cost me any fees when doing it online.

Then, once the funds are added to my Paypal account, I could withdraw them again by transfering to Suntrust, right?

Under fees, it says: Personal payments Send money / Receive money: Free when you use your Paypal balance.

So I just have to pay the 1% fee for cross-border personal transactions, right?

[Sid74]

I've just spoken on the phone to someone at HSBC International banking about a US account.

It costs £100 to open from the UK, £50 for advance account customers. I believe that the Premier account is the step up from advance so that is probably why it didn't cost anything. There is a monthly $8 fee unless you have over $2500 in the account or pay your salary in each month.

You can go into any US branch of HSBC and open the account for free, but they don't have any Orlando branches. The $8 monthly fee still applies.

It is a checking account, which gives you a check book and a debit card, and also pays direct debits.

It would definately be useful for paying dues, but as the Sun Trust accounts seem to be free, I am a bit torn.
There is the ease of just transfering money every month between HSBC accounts, rather than the hassle of juggling paypal payments, versus the fee.

I could just stick to my Citibank US account, but that means paying dues in a lump sum each January. As it is also my dollar saving account for holiday spending money, there is the danger of overspending and being short on the dues.
If I go with the HSBC account I will have 2 different US accounts. I suppose I could use one just for dues and one just for spending money.

Isn't it a good thing that the holidays are worth the extra thinking, lol.

[Elise79]

The Suntrust account is free - I wouldn't be paying an $8 a month fee just to be able to pay your dues monthly.
Using someone like XE makes transfering the money fairly painless too.

[D1znee]

Where is the one in DTD ??? Also are these single accounts or joint acounts with same or different surnames. We will be there in June

[Brandis]

Sun Trust at DTD is opposite the Ghirardelli / Team Mickey building, on the other side of Buena Vista Dr, in between Disney Casting and Hilton Hotel.

It's a big square mirror glass building with drive-thru teller plaza in front.

Don't know about the different type of accounts they have, I would write them an e-mail, they are pretty fast answering them.

I will go there on the last day of my stay in May, before leaving to the airport. Will drop the ladies at DTD so they won't get bored.

[Bumbleink]

Hi

Not wishing to be nosey but can anyone tell me what the questionaire is like for opening an American Bank Account. I know what type of questions you get asked when you open a UK account but is it a similar set up.

Also apart from id is there anything else you need to take with you.

Just wondered as not being a home owner i wondered if that went against you like it can in the scoring system here in the UK.

Thanks

[Elise79]

Hi

They didn't ask us hardly anything - they just wanted to know we would be using the account regularly.

We took Passports and photo driving licences for ID.

HTH