Compare rates and fees for sending money to Sweden
There are multiple ways to easily send and receive money in Sweden but these will largely depend on the provider you decide to use.
How to send money to Sweden
Bank Wire Transfers
This option is great for sending large sums of money as it is secure and reliable. However, the fees you will pay, and the exchange rate you will get, largely depends on the country you are transferring from and the currency pair.
Most banks in Europe such as Barclays UK and Santander, allow for internet-based wire transfers, telephone transfers and in-person branch-based transfers. When making any of these transfers, ensure you do a cross-comparison of costs. For instance, telephone and branch-based transfers cost a little more than online-based wire transfers.
Sending money to Sweden from the Bank of America will cost you $45 per transfer if you send in USD. However, if you send in Swedish krona (SEK), you’ll not be charged transfer fees, instead, the bank will make its cut from the exchange rate margin. Most bank transfers take 1 to 3 days to get to Sweden.
Online Money Transfer Services
The growth in technology has created a platform for fintech companies to join the money transfer ecosystem. Companies like Wise, Currencies Direct, Moneycorp, Xoom, and WorldFirst are gaining popularity on the various Swedish remittance corridors.
Some of the companies like OFX serve both individual and corporate needs. You can pay your bills, salaries, mortgages and lots of other obligations straight from most of these platforms. Online money transfer providers make their profits from transfers fees and exchange rates. That being said, there are those like TransferWise that do not charge any exchange rate margins and others that don’t charge transfer fees.
Ensure you check the fee structure of the several providers that you are considering before making a decision.
One of the attractive features of online money transfer providers is that they allow you to make transfers even if you do not have a bank account. For bank-to-bank transfers, both you and the recipient must have bank accounts.
You can pay for your transfer using a credit or debit card, bank wire transfer, or direct bank debit. The choice of your payment method is important because it can either delay or hasten your transfer. If you pay using a debit or credit card, you transfer will get to the recipient faster.
To make a transfer, you’ll need to sign up for an account. This exercise can take anything from minutes to a couple of hours depending on the provider and the verification process. Once the account is operational, you can make your transfer at any time. Most providers have mobile applications that improve the sending experience and give you lots of flexibility with your transfers.
The sender and recipient can opt for direct deposit or cash pickup options. These are the two main transfer payout options in Sweden. You can learn more about direct deposits in our direct deposit vs wire transfer guide.
In-Person Cash Transfer Services
This option requires that you visit a store which could be in a mall, banking hall, or fuel station. Once you fill in the forms and hand over the cash, the transfer is executed.
Western Union, Ria and MoneyGram are some of the top cash transfer companies in this category. When sending money from the UK through MoneyGram, you can choose cash pickup or a direct deposit to the recipient's bank account. Whatever the case, the money should arrive in a couple of hours. Typically, cash pickups take minutes for the transfer to be completed.
MoneyGram and Western Union charge transfer fees and exchange rate margins. They also allow for online transfers or a hybrid of online and agent-based cash transfers.
What is Needed to Send Money to Sweden
For your transfer to Sweden to be successful, you need to provide the following information and documentation:
A government-issued photo ID
The name of the recipient, their address and phone number
The recipient’s bank details. Cash pickups don’t require such information
The reason for the transfer
Usually, it takes a little longer to make the first transfer, but for subsequent transfers, the process is much simpler and fast. Some online transfer platforms allow for recurring transactions.
How to receive money in Sweden
Transfer recipients in Sweden can opt for cash pickups or bank deposits.
Cash pickups
This payout option is suitable for transferring smaller amounts of money. It is convenient in that the transfer time is shorter. Providers like Xoom have partnered with Ria to give their Sweden customers 123 locations where they can pick up their cash.
Bank Deposit
The transfer is deposited directly into the recipient's bank account. This is an excellent payout option when receiving large sums of money. All major banks in Sweden including ICA Banken, Lansforeakringar Bank, Nordea, SEB, Skandiabanken and Svenska Handelsbanken (SHB) support direct bank deposits.
What is Required to Receive Money in Sweden?
You only need the transfer transaction number and your national ID or passport to receive money in Sweden. For bank transfers, you don’t need to provide any information as the money is deposited directly into your account.
Common Reasons for Sending Money to Sweden
Much like transfers to other countries around the world, transfers to Sweden are made in varying amounts and for different reasons. Some of the common reasons underlying transfers to Sweden are:
Family Support
Some Swedes who work out of the country regularly send money to their families and relatives back home. According to Eurostat, the average age at which young people in Sweden leave their parent’s households is about 19 years. Family support plays a critical role to help these young people stabilise.
Paying Employees & Suppliers
Companies overseas that have employees in Sweden can pay their staff wages using online money transfers or bank wire transfers as well as some of the inflows to Sweden are for supplier payments for goods or services sourced from Sweden.
Investment
Sweden is a highly capitalised economy with a low debt-to-GDP ratio. Investors including Swedish nationals living abroad prefer putting their money in exchange-traded funds (ETFs) or American Depository Receipts (ADRs) that track American stocks.
Savings
Part of the money sent to Sweden is directed at savings instruments mostly in the banking sector. Banks and loan companies in Sweden offer some of the best interest rates on deposits in the country thereby attracting inflows from Swedes abroad. Some of the institutions are government-backed.
Home Purchases
Some of the large transfers into Sweden are for outright home purchases or mortgages. Areas in the South of Sweden such as Falsterbo and those near the University town of Lund have become destinations for real estate investors both local and international.
Why Send Money with a Money Transfer Service?
The debate on whether to send money through mainstream banking institutions or money transfer providers boils down to the following factors.
Speed of Transfer
Money transfer operators like Western Union, MoneyGram, and Xoom offer cash pickup and directly to bank options which take minutes to a couple of hours to deliver the transfers. This speed cannot be compared to the 2 -3 days that banks typically take.
Ease of Set-Up
It takes a few minutes to a couple of hours to set up a transfer account and have it verified. The information requested is relatively minimal and you can easily upload it on the provider’s platform. You can even take a photo of your credit or debit card and upload it quickly instead of typing in the details.
Exchange Rates
On average, money transfer services charge 0.5 to 3.5% in exchange rate margins for transfers to Sweden. For instance, Xoom charges 0.283% to transfer money in USD to Swedish Krona. Banks charge upwards of 5%.
MultiCurrency Support
Irrespective of the country you are sending money from, most money transfer providers will support your currency. Swedes in countries as far as Liberia in Africa and the Republic of Vanuatu in the South Pacific can send money to Sweden through money transfer operators, thanks to the multicurrency feature.
Secure and Reliable
Online money transfer service providers are regulated by independent and government-aligned bodies in the different countries they operate. For instance, in the United Kingdom, the FCA and the HMRC are the main regulatory authorities. In the United States, money transfer providers are regulated by FinCEN, and in Canada, they are regulated by FINTRAC.
Transfer Fees
Companies such as Wise charge only 9.13 USD to send 1000 USD to Sweden. WorldRemit charges 3.99 USD for the same transfer. The difference is due to the fact that TransferWise processes all transfers at the midmarket rates. Banks charge anything from 30-$40 per transfer.
Things to Consider When Sending Money to Sweden
When sending money to Sweden, there are certain aspects you must consider so as to ensure your transfer is smooth and with no lost opportunities.
Low-Interest Rates – If you are thinking of saving money in banking institutions in Sweden, you need to make cross-comparisons. The lower rates mean lower earnings on savings. However, when considering taking home loans, Sweden is an ideal country. Rates in the country are as low as 1.6%.
Tax on Transfers – Sweden doesn’t tax remittances whether gifts or cash meant for support. However, it is important for the recipient to give a proper explanation when the transferred amount shows up on the tax statement so that the inflow is not treated as income.
Therefore, when sending money to Sweden, it is not just about the channels, several other factors come to play. It is important that you factor all of them in as they contribute to the overall transfer experience.
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Sending money anywhere else in the world is as easy as sending money to Sweden. If you're looking to send money to another country, here is the list of the most popular destinations.
What’s The Overall Best Way To Send Funds To Sweden?
The overall best way to send money online to Sweden is through OFX. OFX is a great platform when you need to send higher volumes, and it's not a difficult service to use either. When it comes to speed, OFX is usually just as fast as Wise when it comes to sending funds to Sweden. When all the necessary factors are considered, OFX offers the best overall way for money transfers to Sweden.
What’s The Easiest Way To Send Money To Sweden?
The easiest way to send cash online to Sweden is through Wise. Wise makes it very easy to send money through their intuitive peer-to-peer system. After you set up your account, all you need to do is tap in an amount of money and its destination. After that, you just pay Wise for the transaction and wait a day or two for your money to arrive in Sweden.
What’s The Cheapest Way To Send Funds To Sweden?
The cheapest way to transfer funds to Sweden is through OFX. OFX offers very low rates on their currency conversion fees, and they don’t charge any upfront, stated fees. The idea behind OFX is that the more money you send, the less you pay for the transaction. They do have much higher minimum transfer size requirements. On the low end, if you are sending thousands of dollars at once, you will only pay 0.4%. If you are sending an amount closer to their minimum requirement, you will have to pay 1%, which is still cheaper than most of the competition.
What’s The Fastest Way To Transfer Money To Sweden?
The fastest way to send money online to Sweden is through the fast option offered by Ria Money Transfer. With Ria Money Transfer’s fast option, you can expect your money to arrive at its Swedish destination in a matter of minutes. Furthermore, Ria Money Transfer offers very reasonable prices for both their fast and slow option. Ria Money Transfer costs less than most of its slower competition.
Current Exchange Rates For Sweden
The current exchange rate for the Swedish Krona (SEK) is 11.104195 SEK per American Dollar (USD) as of the time this was written. The SEK reached a high of 11.3731 SEK per USD and a low of 10.0526 SEK per USD during the last 90 days. The average exchange rate over the last 90 days was 10.8517 SEK per USD.
The average volatility rate of the SEK against the USD was 0.41%. This is a rather high volatility rate, but the SEK has remained relatively stable in the long term. Going forward, you can expect moderate fluctuations to continue, barring any unforeseen circumstances.
How we compare?
What do we mean by the top provider?
The top provider is the money transfer service that we believe is the most suitable for the country you’re sending money to. In order to keep our service free we factor in the commercial agreements we have with partners into this ranking.
How do we choose providers to display?
We make sure that each table displays the most relevant brands to the country you are sending money to and from. We consider many factors when choosing the providers to display in the table. All of the providers we display are fully regulated to provide money transfer services in the jurisdiction you are searching, relevant regulatory authorities are the FCA, ASIC, Fincen, FINTRAC & AMF. Alongside being regulated the services are manually checked by our team for both quality of service and online trust from such platforms like Trustpilot and Google reviews. We base our rankings primarily on the quality of the service provided, the benefit to the consumer and to keep our service free – the commercial agreements we have.
How do we order our comparisons?
We are affiliated with some of the partners displayed in the tables. However, the order of the providers is based on the quality of the service for the particular country corridor followed by the commercial agreement in place. You don’t pay any extra and the deal you get isn’t affected by our commercial agreement with the money transfer provider. We may receive a commission when you click through to a listing or when you make a transaction. We aim to find the balance between the quality of the service, customer satisfaction and the commercial agreements we have, and continue comparing services in a transparent way. If you have any questions about our listings, please don’t hesitate to email us at contact@moneytransfers.com
Jonathan is the founder and editor of MoneyTransfers.com. Jonathan is highly experienced in the currency transfer market, having previously worked in the FX trading industry, alongside being an avid traveller. Using his knowledge he identified a need for transparency and further education to help people save money on their money transfers, leading to the creation of MoneyTransfers.com
Jonathan is the founder and editor of MoneyTransfers.com. Jonathan is highly experienced in the currency transfer market, having previously worked in the FX trading industry, alongside being an avid traveller. Using his knowledge he identified a need for transparency and further education to help people save money on their money transfers, leading to the creation of MoneyTransfers.com