Remittances FAQs

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    Your questions answered

Inward Remittance

Please provide your remitter or remitting bank the following information:

For SGD Payments

  • Pay to "UOB Singapore (SWIFT: UOVBSGSG)"
  • Favouring Beneficiary:
    • Full Beneficiary name as per Bank records
    • Account numbers for UOB Current or Savings Account

For foreign currency remittances to accounts with UOB Singapore,

  • Pay through UOB Singapore Nostro Agents for respective currencies. For the list of nostro agents, please refer to List of UOB Agent Banks.
  • Beneficiary Bank: United Overseas Bank Limited Singapore (Swift/BIC: UOVBSGSG)
  • Favouring Beneficiary: 
    • Account numbers for UOB Current or Savings Account
    • Full Beneficiary name as per Bank records

Yes, you will need to inform the remitter or remitting bank to route the payment through The Bank of New York immediately. Otherwise, these payments may be rejected by Citibank / HSBC by Q2 2017. Please refer to question (2) for the payment instructions to be provided.

After the TT is successfully processed, you will be able to receive the hard copy credit advice within 2 – 3 working days. For clients with Business Internet Banking Plus (BIBPlus) access, the electronic credit advice can be retrieved after the TT is successfully processed.

This is a fee charged by our USD agent bank for processing the transaction.

This fee is not new. It is a market practice for intermediary banks to deduct their processing fee from the remittance amount when the remitters indicate charge code SHA or BEN in their payment instructions.

Some agent banks have not been charging this fee in the past but they have started with effect from Jan 2017.

We are unable to waive the fee which is charged by our USD agent bank.

This fee is not deducted by UOB and hence will not be reflected in the credit advice from UOB.

Outward Remittance

TT is a term used for electronic transfer of foreign currency funds from one party (remitter) to another (beneficiary).

Fees are often charged by the Remitting bank, the Correspondent banks, and/or in some cases by the Beneficiary bank.

The type of TT charges which are applicable include:

  • Telex: Remitting Bank's cable charges
  • Commission: Remitting Bank’s handling charges
  • Agent Charge: Charges imposed by UOB Correspondent Bank. This is only applicable if you have indicated charge option 'OUR' in the TT instruction.


Please refer to Question 3 below for further elaboration on 'OUR'.

When payments are made locally and overseas, charges are imposed by various banks e.g. the Remitting bank, the Beneficiary bank, the Intermediary bank, etc. These charges can be paid or settled in one of the following ways:

a) BEN: Charges are borne by the Beneficiary
Your Beneficiary bears all charges of the banks engaged in the transfer of the payment. You only pay the remittance amount. All charges (Remitting bank's as well those of the Intermediary and Beneficiary banks, etc.) will be deducted from the remittance amount and your Beneficiary will receive the remaining balance.

b) SHA: Charges are shared
You pay for the Remitting bank's charges and the remittance amount. Your Beneficiary bears the charges of all the other banks' (the Intermediary and Beneficiary banks, etc.), which will be deducted from the remittance amount. Your Beneficiary will receive the remaining balance. This is the most common type of charge, where each party bears their respective charges.

c) OUR: Charges are borne by the Remitter
You bear all charges of the payment, i.e. the remittance amount, Remitting bank's charges, as well as all the other banks' (Correspondent, Intermediary and Beneficiary banks etc.). The charges will be debited from your indicated account after the exact amount has been identified. For cases where we have "OUR" arrangement with our correspondents, we will debit the agent charges upfront.

UOB shall not be liable if our correspondent or the Beneficiary's bank does not follow the instructions and lifts their fees from the remittance amount or if full payment fails to reach the Beneficiary's account for any other reason.

This form of payment is the most expensive for you; where possible, you should opt for SHA (shared charges) or BEN (charges borne by the Beneficiary).

Please refer to our table of charges on Outward Remittance Fees.

Yes. The applicable bank charges i.e. Commission, Telex and Agent Charge will be reflected accordingly on the debit advice.

The Bank has noticed an increase in the number of Indian Rupees (INR) and Philippine Peso (PHP) outgoing Telegraphic Transfer (TT) payments being returned by our agent bank. This is due to the transaction amount of these TT being less than the agent/correspondent bank fees.

Hence, with effect from 1 November 2017, all outgoing TT transacted in INR and PHP will be subject to a minimum amount of SGD200 or equivalent. Transactions below the stipulated amount will not be effected.

If the TT instruction is submitted at our branches, the TT application form for effecting the payment will not be accepted.

If the TT instruction is submitted via our electronic channels, you will subsequently get a reject status with reason “Payment is below min txn amount of SGD200.” for this payment electronically.

You can consider combining a few payments to the same beneficiary so that the payment amount is at least SGD200. In addition, you can also save on the bank TT fees.

To ensure that your application is processed promptly, please provide the following information accurately:

  • Your name, address and account number
  • The payment currency code and amount
  • The Receiving Bank/Beneficiary bank's name and address
  • Beneficiary bank's routing code
  • Name of Intermediary bank, if available
  • Beneficiary's account number or IBAN for payments to European countries or United Kingdom
  • Full Beneficiary name

 

Notes for cross-border remittances going to or through Mainland China:

According to People’s Bank of China (“PBOC”) Document (2018) No. 130, PBOC is imposing regulatory requirements on customer identification for cross-border transfer business.

With effect from 14 December 2018, the following customer identification requirements will apply for cross-border remittance transactions to or through Mainland China. Payment instructions with missing information will be rejected by the Clearing Bank.  For more information, click here.

There are some countries with payment restrictions, hence additional payment details need to be provided for payments that are being made to beneficiaries in their countries or in their country currencies. Omission / insufficient information will result in the TT payments getting delayed or rejected.

For more information on the additional payment details required for the beneficiary country or remittance currency, please refer to our table on Additional Payment Details.

TT payments may still be rejected if the purposes of payments are not clear and not specific. Some examples of detailed reason of payment to be provided include:

  • Payment for purchase / rental of car/property
  • Investment Income
  • Payment for legal services
  • Housing loan repayment for ABC apartment
  • Donations for 123 charity
  • Inter-company transfer to own current account in Malaysia

Please note that, with immediate effect, in accordance with Bank Negara Malaysia's rules, it is mandatory to provide a detailed reason for Telegraphic Transfer payments made to beneficiaries in Malaysia. Payments without or with an unclear reason may be delayed / rejected. Other documents may be requested to support the payment request.

Payment can be effected in full when you mark "ALL CHARGES INCLUDING THOSE OF OTHER BANKS TO BE PAID BY ME/US". For USD payments sent to us via only SWIFT FIN or SWIFT FIN Plus, please mark as "/FULLPAY/". In both scenarios, the charge code OUR should be indicated. Please refer above to Question 3(c) above for further details.

The payment will generally reach the Beneficiary within 1 to 5 business days. However, this would vary according to the country and beneficiary bank to which payment is made.

The same would apply if you have performed the TT transaction online.

You may refer to our Outward Telegraphic Transfer cut-off timings to determine the value dates which will be applied based on currency and submission timings.

You can download the application form located under the Trade Services / Remittances section.

Alternatively, you can obtain the application form from any of our UOB branches in Singapore.

Only the account Authorised Signatory(s) is / are allowed to sign on the TT application form, subjected to account signing conditions, if any.

This is the same for amendment form. However it is not necessary for the original signers who have signed off on the TT application, to sign on the amendment form, as long as they are the one of the authorised signatories (subjected to the account signing conditions).

After the TT is successfully processed, you will be able to receive the hard copy debit advice within 2 – 3 working days. For clients with Business Internet Banking Plus (BIBPlus) access, the electronic debit advice can be retrieved after the TT is successfully processed.