For sometine now we have been getting a good deal from the black market, when sending money to Zimbabwe. Because of the lower government controlled exchange rate, it didn’t make sense to send money through the official channels.
Instead we have relied on the black market that offers a higher and more real exchange rate and even faster transfer of your money to Zimbabwe.
However in the past few weeks, Western Union seems to be offering a better option when sending money to Zimbabwe. They offer you the option of receiving money in US dollars. With the way the Zimbabwean dollar is losing value everyday it makes sense to get money in foreign currency in Zimbabwe. In Zimbabwe your family can shop around and get better exchange rate for their US dollars.
With Western Union you always know your money is safe. Security guarantee is very important for your hard earned money.
There have been delays in inter bank transfers in Zimbabwe for the past week because of problems with the RTGS system, read more here. Which seems to have affected a lot of people who had already send their money. However if you want to send money I think it’s better to send via Western Union because it’s even faster, and is not affected by problems with the inter bank transfers.
Your relatives can collect their money in most towns in Zimbabwe.
I’m sure it will not be long before individuals on the black market start offering, US dollars in Zimbabwe. At the moment I haven’t seen any reliable ones around. Feel free to contribute if you know any reliable companies or individuals offering a good deal when sending money to Zimbabwe.
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Its all well and good that we can send money to Zim via Western Union. But, I do have a friend here who did just that at the end of last year but the WU outlet did not have the hard cash and his relatives had to go to Bots to pick up the cash. But (once again), if people can get their hands on forex it could very well work to their advantage when they are shopping around to change it on the blackmarket.
Heard the same thing. Have you sent money via Western Union and how did it go if you have?
I agree with what Gerri said, I had a problem with western union sometime in October last year when I needed foreign currency urgently. I phoned their offices in Harare and they told me which branch to go and collect the money. That transaction took me 4 days.
However Western Union is what I have been using in my last transactions, the last just last week to Harare. I did not have problems with that, I have friends here in London who have used Western Union without problems as well. Probably it depends with the town you are sending the money to.
In my opinion Western Union is basically a bit of a rip off when it comes to money transfers. Far better to go with one of the smaller guys, I’ve been using Mukuru.com for a while to send money home and found them to be pretty reliable and much cheaper than Western Union. There’s others as well so worth having a shop around, but it seems to me that the big guys generally charge more as they’re relying on people not having heard of their cheaper rivals