<p>Hey, anyone have any experience with the banks around McGill/how do the majority of US students go about using banks as students?</p>
<p>Basically what I'm asking is: what should I do/what is the best thing to do in terms of bank situations (for US students)?</p>
<p>Replies are greatly appreciated. </p>
<p>p.s. I've seen HSBC, CBC, RBC, insert-any-letter-BC, and B of M. Any input on any of these would also be appreciated.</p>
<p>in my opinion, this is the best setup.</p>
<p>1) most ATMs on campus are RBC. so set it up with RBC.
2) any US cheques you try to deposit have a 21 day hold, so you really want to avoid having to recieve cheques (for example, if your parents are giving you any money on a regular basis).
for me, that is the case, so here's what we did</p>
<p>my father and I went to RBC. we set up 2 accounts.
the first account is my account. i hold the debit (interac) card for the account, and its under my name. but my father also cosigns for it, which means, its technically his account too.
the second account is only my fathers. it has nothing to do with me.</p>
<p>what my father does, to avoid the 21 day hold, he keeps a thousand dollars or so in that account. and since he cosigns on my account, he can transfer money into my account using online banking (which is done instantaneously).
therefore, in the event of an emergency, all i have to do is call him and there can be money in my account in less than a minute. </p>
<p>i;ve found this to be the best option. my friend for example doesnt do this, and several times during the year she's had to borrow money because her parent's cheques were international (and therefore had a 21 day hold)</p>
<p>(in case you dont know, a hold means that the money is technically in the bank, but you cant use it for 21 days).</p>
<p>Is there any chance I can use a debit card from a US bank, or is there something flawed with that set-up?</p>
<p>I wouldn't mind doing the RBC thing, I'd just like to explore the options. </p>
<p>Also, do you know how long money transfers between Canadian and US banks take?</p>
<p>if you use a US bank, you're going to get ripped off on every purchase because they dont always use thebest exchange rate.
you should set up an account here. </p>
<p>what type of money transfers are you talking about?</p>
<p>I was just talking broad/bulk money transfers (tuition fees, and what not). </p>
<p>p.s. What kind of account did you open with RBC?</p>
<p>im not sure about money transfers. </p>
<p>i think ihave a student account with them.</p>
<p>man...shopping for banks is effing confusing...If you don't mind, can I just PM you with more questions as I get them?</p>
<p>just get a student's account and give ur parents ur bank account so they can easily transfer you bulks of money to it. I have a student's account and my parents send me the money through it for the whole semester.</p>
<p>RBC sucks, while HSBC is right across the street...</p>
<p>/and what's with the lack of love for Desjardins? It's just as crooked as the other banks, it just pretends not to be one.</p>
<p>I was actually really considering HSBC...Does anyone know if HSBC is fickle when it comes to money transfers inter-bank + intercountry style?</p>
<p>(aka, If I wanted to transfer from a US bank (the name of a branch), to a Canadian HSBC, would that be a problem?)</p>
<p>Also, do US and Canadian HSBC's work harmoniously (will is money in one as good as money in another?)?</p>
<p>I think the international thing is one of HSBC's strengths, you can access your money no matter where you go in the world. In that case, you probably don't even have to worry about money transfers. I don't keep any money there, so you may want to verify this.</p>
<p>If I were to pick a bank, I would choose Desjardins. It's true that they don't have Guichets on the McGill campus, but they tend to have them everywhere else in Montreal. Combine that with the fact that since they're still nominally a Credit Union, you get money whenever the make a profit, and I would highly recommend them. </p>
<p>The downside is that they're not really an international bank (they have a few branches in Florida to help with snowbirds), so transferring money might pose some problems. They also tend, from my experience, to not have as many English-speaking employees as the other banks, with all the issues that is likely to cause.</p>
<p>My son has two accounts. One with Scotia and the oher with HSBC -both work well. We have an add'l account with B of A whereby we can pay his tuition online. Ther have been no problems</p>
<p>What is the best set up for a student from Florida? Aren't tuition and housing done thru the university and therefore pretty easy.How long does it take for a bank transfer from Bank of America to a Canadian bank . What are the ways that other parents have found most useful? I like the 2 account system one fellow discussed. Does Bank of America have a Montreal affiliated bank? My son in Science and Music for this fall.</p>
<p>There's no perfect way to handle cross-border banking. Transferring funds from a US account to a Canadian account involves a wire transfer, which usually entails a substantial fee of $35 or more. Check with your bank.</p>
<p>If you open a Canadian account, you can deposit a US funds check as long as you don't need to draw the funds for approximately 21 days. There is no, or a small charge for the conversion, but you will get the bank's consumer currency conversion rate, which is more expensive than the wholesale bank rate. Still even with a few thousand dollars, it doesn't add up to much. Just be sure to shop around for a good student account deal -- Canadian banks tend to charge much more for all of their services. If I remember correctly, my son's HSBC student account had no basic fees and allowed him a set number of ATM/Electronic transfers at no charge each month. But check because the deals change all the time. We got a list of all the student banking offers from the student affairs office. </p>
<p>ATMs are a good way to get funds quickly at relatively low cost, but you will be limited to just a few hundred dollars a day in most cases. We simply put money into my son's US bank account and he withdrew them in Canadian funds at the ATM. The exchange rates are very good, however in recent years many of the card managers (VISA in particular) have added 1 to 2% fees on each conversion. Still it was simple and fast. </p>
<p>As for tuition and school fees, I understand that McGill will now allow you to pay them directly from a US account. That's new and I have no experience with it.</p>
<p>As for banks with offices both in the US and Montreal, they are by law separate companies and at present any transfer of funds between them is handled just like any other transfer, i.e. with a wire transfer.</p>
<p>Boysinfirm,
My son is also from Florida, and will be at McGill next year. We just checked out a banking option with RBC Centura, which is the former Centura Bank Co., which has been bought out by Royal Bank of Canada. They have an account access program that was set up to provide banking services for Canadians who live in Florida part time, and it can work in reverse for US students of Canadian colleges. We can have a US account and a Canadian account, and seamlessly transfer money between the two. Here is the link, so you can see if there are branches in your area to explore this option (Central and South Florida only for now). We will know exactly how convenient it turns out to be by the time school starts, but it seems like the best option for us. Good Luck.</p>
<p>sorry, I forgot to attach the link
<a href="http://www.rbccentura.com%5B/url%5D">www.rbccentura.com</a></p>
<p>My wife and i tried to set up an RBC Centura corresponding account to transfer money to Montreal, but the paperwork was very difficult and we started getting letters from all sorts of government agencies wanting us to verify we weren't transferring money for illegal (terrorist) purposes. We just gave up and found the process described by JPM150 above to be the easiest one. My daughter uses the ATM to transfer from our account to cash, up to $300 per day. McGill does have an easy and automatic way to pay tuition,fees and board. It works great and you get a very competitive exchange rate. I recommend it highly.</p>
<p>Orlandymom,</p>
<p>Great to hear about that cross-border banking option. My daughter has been admitted to McGill and I've been thinking about better ways to handle money transfers. When my son started at McGill four years ago, HSBC told us they had to maintain a wall between their Canadian and US operations. I guess that's changed. Now all we have to do is find a bank in the CT/NYC area that has Canadian ties.</p>
<p>McGill Dad and JPM150,
Thanks for that heads up re: your experience with trying to set up the RBC Centura account. We will "proceed with caution" and check carefully to see that the convenience isn't "conveniently" taxed and fee'd to the point where it is no longer a deal. The scenario described by JPM150 seems like a good option, and it will be our first banking alternate if this thing doesn't pan out. Were there any US branch banks in and around Montreal? We forgot to look for banks while there, and that might also be an option for us to switch to a different US bank for conveneince. Thanks for all your help on this stuff, I should probably also ask you about socks.</p>
<p>Orlandymom,</p>
<p>Even if you use the AMT system to transfer daily funds, you'll probably want your student to open a local bank account in case you need to move a substantial amount of money for things like an apartment security fee. If you check out the various student account offers, you should end up with a free one.</p>
<p>While a bank in Montreal may have the same name as one in the US (i.e. HSBC), in my experience they are actually two different companies and have no formal link of any value to you beyond the name. The RBC Centura deal was the first time I'd ever heard of any kind of interoperability between the two countries.</p>