How to send money from Malaysia to Overseas using MoneyGram

From our experience in remitting funds, we find that MoneyGram is one of the most efficient means to remit money overseas (compared to Western Union or cable/telegraphic transfer). Since I have the experience of using MoneyGram a few times to transfer funds overseas, I wanted to give a more detailed instruction based on my own personal experience:

In Malaysia, Maybank provides MoneyGram service. There is no cut off time provided you go during banking hours.

Why MoneyGram is better:

• Lower service charge- you can only send up to USD 2500 per day and the recipient can only receive up to USD2500 per day. The service charge for USD2500 is USD15. A friend of mine had previously used Western Union to transfer RM5000 to Thailand and she had to pay about RM500 in service charges.
• Once the transfer is verified and successful, the recipient can withdraw the money from participating MoneyGram banks overseas within 10 minutes. It’s much faster than telegraphic or cable transfer where not only you need to pay for cable charges, but you also need a few days before the money is received.
• The exchange rates are reasonable  

MoneyGram charges

Click HERE to go to MoneyGram’s website to estimate the charges.

Step-by-step process in how to perform transfer via MoneyGram using Maybank:

Information you need from the recipient:

Before you go to Maybank to transfer via MoneyGram, you need to have the following information from the recipient:

• Full name as per country ID/ passport
• Address and ID/ passport number
• Date of birth
• Occupation
• Contact number

Performing the transfer:

• You need not be a Maybank customer to do the transfer. Just bring the cash and your NRIC/ passport
• If you are sending funds, request for the Send Form/ Borang Pengiriman Moneygram and the Permohonan Untuk Kiriman Wang (Application for Remittance)- this is a 4 layered form- you cannot print it from your PC)
• You need to fill up the forms first before the staff will give you a number- therefore, you may collect the forms and fill up in advance so that you can save time.
• At the counter, indicate to the staff clearly that you wish to send via MoneyGram (because Maybank has a number of fund transfer ways- cable transfer, Western Union, foreign draft, etc). Ensure the information- especially the recipient’s name is spelled correctly because you will need to pay additional charges to correct any mistakes.
• Once the staff key in the information and receive your payment, a resit/transaction slip will be issued to you. It’s important that you check again to confirm that the recipient’s name and particulars are correct.
• IMPORTANT: The resit contains a PIN number- it must be provided to the recipient in order for the person to withdraw the money.

Additional information to provide to the recipient after you performed the transfer:

• Your full name, address, birthday, contact number
• PIN number (found in the payment resit)
• The receiving amount (found in the payment resit). For example, if you transfer funds from Malaysia to Thailand, the receiving amount in Thai baht will appear on the resit- you need to provide the amount

Why I recommend that you provide the information above is because once, the recipient who tried to collect money was given a hard time by the bank. The bank staff (probably having a bad day) asked the recipient all sorts of questions aside from the pin number. If you have indicated the recipient’s country ID (like our NRIC number) in the transfer form, it would be clear that the money is really meant for that recipient. I had done that and the money was immediately released to the recipient without much problem.

Currency conversion

Regardless of whether you are using Western Union or MoneyGram, if you are transferring non USD currency, the money you transfer will undergo double conversion.

For example, when I transfer funds to Thailand, it will be Ringgit>> convert to USD>> convert again to Thai baht.

You will know immediately how much of money the recipient will be getting as it will be printed in your transaction slip/ resit.

Note:

The Maybank staff had advised me that due to regulations to curb money laundering, the sender can send via MoneyGram up to once a day to a maximum of USD2500. And the recipient is only allowed to collect from MoneyGram once a day.

Let’s say you plan to send about USD5000 to your friend from overseas. Because the amount exceed the daily limit, you split the transfer to 2 days (because you yourself also cannot transfer more than once a day). Your friend cannot collect the entire USD2500 x 2 on the same day. He still have to go on 2 separate days to collect the money.