Skip to main content

Send money abroad with more confidence

Today, you have new rights if you send money to family or others outside the United States.

These protections come from a new rule that applies to electronic money transfers sent by consumers in the United States to people or businesses in other countries. In general, the rule covers transfers sent by companies – such as money transmitters, banks, credit unions, and other financial services companies – that consistently send more than 100 international money transfers each year.

Your rights

If you make transfers covered by the rule, you will receive a number of new protections, including free, upfront information about the exchange rate, fees, and taxes you will pay, and the amount to be received. Here’s an example of what you will see.

You’ll also have the right to cancel transfers, generally within 30 minutes, at no cost.

If there’s an error, you’ll have 180 days to report the problem to the company. Once you contact the company, it has 90 days to investigate the matter and tell you what it finds. In some cases, you could receive a refund or have the transfer sent again.

Getting the word out

People send tens of billions of dollars from the United States to foreign countries each year, and we are doing our best to get the word out about the new consumer protections they now have. We’re working with nonprofit organizations, state agencies, churches, consulates, and others to distribute posters, brochures and other materials to the communities they serve.

These materials will are available in English, Spanish, Chinese, French-Creole, and Tagalog. You can download these materials using the links in the table below or place orders for multiple copies in the coming weeks.

Material Downloads        
Poster English Spanish French-Creole Chinese Tagalog
Flier English Spanish French-Creole Chinese Tagalog
Brochure English Spanish French-Creole Chinese Tagalog
Consumer Factsheet English Spanish French-Creole Chinese Tagalog
Stakeholder factsheet English Spanish

We’re also adding several new questions and answers to Ask CFPB and to consumerfinance.gov/es. And, in the coming weeks, we’ll begin advertising these new consumer protections as more people begin sending money to friends and families around the holidays. You can learn more about the rule here.

Share this graphic with the people you know and help us spread the word on Facebook and Twitter .

201310_cfpb_share_money-transfers

Join the conversation. Follow CFPB on Twitter and Facebook .