How many of my clients have Citibank dollar accounts?

[Head Boy]

It looks as if I'm going to open a dollar account with Citibank at last.
How useful would this be for my existing clients - I could acept online dollar transfers it seems.

Another possibility is for me to accept endorsed cheques from US sponsors. This might save the fees on small cheques where the funds are destined to be used for domain name renewals. Are there any problems with offering this service?

[rogue]

if you accept endorsed cheques, dont you have to be a registered money broker?

[Head Boy]

Originally Posted by rogue

if you accept endorsed cheques, dont you have to be a registered money broker?

I need to get confirmation of this, but my understanding is that you don't have to have a licence if the payment is for services supplied. However, the gov keep trying to change the rules to scratch extra licence fees, so I could be out of date on this.

[rogue]

the bloke who runs auctionchex makes a big point of being a registered broker
at the bottom of their site they have the following ...
"Auctionpix/Auctionchex are licensed under the Consumer Credit Act 1974 to carry on the business of Consumer Credit and Consumer Brokerage.
Credit Brokers License Class A and C # 248399 issued by the Office of Fair Trading, a UK government department.
Licensed by HM Revenue and Customs as a Bureau de Change, Cheque Casher and Money Transmitter (MSB License Number #12145060)
Auctionchex is PayPal Compliant as a Financial Services Provider"
sounds like it could be complicated!

[Head Boy]

Eddie set up that service to exchange money for Ebayers - he wasn't selling any other products associated with the currency exchange itself. I wasn't thinking of offering a currency exchange, but I just wanted to add another option for the payment of domain reg services. Sending me an small endorsed cheque from a reputable sponsor seemed like a good way to reduce the cost of domain ownership for non-US affiliates.

[rogue]

Originally Posted by Head Boy

Eddie set up that service to exchange money for Ebayers - he wasn't selling any other products associated with the currency exchange itself. I wasn't thinking of offering a currency exchange, but I just wanted to add another option for the payment of domain reg services. Sending me an small endorsed cheque from a reputable sponsor seemed like a good way to reduce the cost of domain ownership for non-US affiliates.

well, if you find it workable, its something i'd consider using myself

[glowlite]

Why not get a merchant account and process credit/debit cards?

[Head Boy]

Originally Posted by glowlite

Why not get a merchant account and process credit/debit cards?

It's too expensive for the volumes that I handle. I'd also need to have a dollar account with it, or I'd be back with the same currency exchange problems.

The accepting of clients' cheques is really a minor side benefit. I really want to be able to write my own dollar cheques without having to pay bank charges.

[daedal]

Endorsing cheques isn't a problem provided the Cheque is not marked Account Payee or Not transferable (According to the Cheque Act 1982). With UK cheques that counts most of them out, however US Cheques and most other currency cheques can be endorsed.

As for registering as a money bureau/currency exchange etc, unless the law has recently changed if you are only accepting payment for a purchase transaction then anyone can accept an endorsed cheque.

[Head Boy]

That was my understanding Daedal. As long as I don't use the prepayments for purposes other than domain registrations, then I can accept them without a problem. There may be a grey area if I accept escrow payments though.