Send Money from the Philippines to Australia: What’s the Cheapest Remittance Service?

Conor Maloney · 18 Jul 2024

Let’s say you have family or friends in the Philippines, and they want to help you out with some cash. You’re not alone – Australia receives around $1.8 billion AUD in remittance payments each year.

If you’ve been on either side of an overseas transaction, you know the main issue already – cost. Currency conversion fees, transfer fees, and withdrawal fees all add up. It can be difficult to work out the cheapest option due to the complex fee structure. That’s where this article comes in!

We’re going to take the example of someone sending a specific amount of money to Australia.

We’ll going to break down exactly how much it costs in fees, as well as time, for a number of major services with a specific example in our “Full Cost Example” section. 

Here’s a sneak peek:

Don’t worry, we’re going to go into exactly where the fees are going step-by-step for each service further on.

Ready?

Let’s dive in.

Contents

• What is the Cheapest Way to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia?
• 1. Grineo: Receive and Withdraw Funds Instantly for 1% Fee
• 2. Remitly
• 3. Western Union
• 4. Banking Options (BDO, BPI)
• Cheapest Remittance Service in Australia: Full Cost Example for Each Service
• What if the Sender Doesn’t Have Stablecoins?
• What’s the Point of Stablecoins? Benefits over Australian Dollars
• How to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia with Grineo
• Grineo is the Fastest and Cheapest Way to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia
• FAQ

What is the Cheapest Way to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia?

We’ve listed the cheapest services for sending money from the Philippines to Australia below, starting with the cheapest and fastest method, Grineo.

Grineo: Receive and Withdraw Funds Instantly for 1% Fee

Grineo is the cheapest way of sending money from the Philippines to Australia. You can also access your funds within minutes of the transaction!

This service allows users to instantly receive and withdraw remittance payments from the nearest ATM for a flat 1% fee while also accessing Web3 services. Users can also spend the money directly from the Grineo Card for a 1% fee. 

There are no foreign currency charges or deposit charges, and the sender does not need to have a Grineo account.

If the sender needs to purchase USDT to send to Grineo, this may cost another 2.7% of your initial total. These fees are not spent on Grineo, but rather the crypto exchange where the sender is buying their digital assets.

How does it work?

Summary: How to cheaply and instantly send money to Australia from the Philippines

1. Buy USDT or USDC on a licensed and regulated exchange like Coins.ph.
2. Instantly send funds to Grineo Wallet in Australia (funds in minutes)
3. In Australia, simply tap the card to spend funds like cash or withdraw as AUD from any Visa-supported ATM, with a flat 1% fee in each case.

Let’s look at the details.

Grineo is a stablecoin card service and digital assets platform. Don’t worry – you don’t need to have technical know-how to use it, and the funds we’re talking about here are designed to remain stable in price to the US dollar to prevent volatility.

The platform supports USDC and USDT which are always the same value as the US dollar, as well as BTC and ETH. You can cash out of USDC and USDT instantly through Grineo.

When you receive money you simply tap or swipe the card to spend your money like cash in stores worldwide. You can also make online payments and ATM withdrawals.

The Grineo Card is issued by Visa and thus accepted in almost every store and ATM worldwide. Grineo accounts are PassKey protected and the company is regulated by AUSTRAC, the Australian government’s financial regulator, to protect end users.

Deposits are free, and opening an account is also free with no maintenance charges.

Ease of Use

While Grineo does not support fiat currencies like the AUD directly, you can easily send digital assets and cash out to AUD in minutes using the Grineo Card.

The full process involves signing up to a digital assets exchange like Coins.ph, depositing funds, purchasing USDT (the TRC20 version has the cheapest fees) or USDC, and sending it to a Grineo wallet where it will be received in minutes.

After the purchase, withdrawal, and tax costs, Coins.ph takes about 2.7% of the funds, and Grineo charges another 1%, a total of 3.7% on the entire transaction.

When the accounts are registered, the time it takes from the sender logging on to an exchange to buy USDT to the recipient holding AUD in their hand could be about ten minutes, a remarkably fast time frame with a total cost of 3.7% on the total sum being sent.

If the sender already owns stablecoin assets, the total cost is just 1%.

Here’s a handy step-by-step guide on how to buy USDT in minutes.

Fees

• Account: Free
• Card issue fee: Free for virtual card, $5.99 for physical card (free for first 1,000 users)
• Card replacement fee: Free
• Foreign currency conversion charge: None
• Monthly management fee: $0
• Dispute fee: $15
• Card transactions: 1% transaction fee
• ATM withdrawal: 1% fee
• Deposits: Free
• Crypto exchange (BTC, ETC, USDC, USDT) for 0.2% fee
• Time: 10 minutes

There’s a section on the entire process for using Grineo below, which you can find here. Grineo also has the benefit of acting as a bridge to Web3.

You can transfer funds from Grineo to a decentralized finance platform like Aave for yield farming rewards and easily cash out any profits by sending them back to Grineo and withdrawing as AUD.

Let’s take a look at some other options.

Remitly

Remitly is a commonly used remittance service for transfers between the Philippines and Australia. Their fee structure is somewhat opaque, but we’ve done our best to estimate the true cost of sending PHP to Australia with Remitly.

The sender needs to register for a Remitly account, while the recipient does not. A transfer could take anywhere from 6 hours to 5 days, depending on the options selected.

An express transfer is typically done with a debit card and involves debit card fees, currency conversion fees which can be around 2%, and transfer fees to a bank account. This may also involve the Australian bank charging a wire transfer fee of around $30.

• Account Setup and Maintenance: No setup fee, but fees apply per transaction.
• Currency Conversion: Exchange rate markups vary but average around 2%
• Transaction Costs: Fees depend on the transfer method and destination, ranging from a few dollars to over $30. The typical cost is around $6 plus any fees charged by local banks in Australia.
• Time: 1 – 5 days.

Remitly transfers are cheaper than banking solutions, but still take hours or days to process and may cost from $12 – $42 to send $300 worth of AUD.

Western Union

Western Union was once one of the most popular remittance services in Australia, although it has been slowly squeezed out by more cost-effective solutions. Users can go to a local Western Union office or simply send and receive money online.

Users can receive funds to their bank account or bring an ID to a Western Union office to pick up cash in person. There is no fee to join. Western Union is, however, by far the most expensive option on this list and no longer a cost effective option for cheap remittances in 2024 compared to other services.

• Account Setup and Maintenance: No setup fee, but fees apply per transaction.
• Currency Conversion: Exchange rate markups vary but average from 2%- 4%
• Transaction Costs: Fees depend on the transfer method and destination, ranging from a few dollars to over $30. Cash pickup services have higher fees compared to bank transfers.
• Time: 24 hours if you’re picking up cash, 3 days for account transfer

Western Union is known for higher transaction fees and less favorable exchange rates compared to digital-first services. 

One other issue, beyond the high cost, is that different locations may provide different rates, making it next to impossible to judge how much a transaction will cost ahead of time.

Banking Options (BDO, BPI)

There are a wide variety of banking options available for anyone willing to pay a higher rate, although there’s no real benefit in doing so.

The two most popular options are Banco de Oro (BDO) and Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI). Both of these banks can send a wire transfer to an Australian bank account in a matter of days. 

However, this is not typically suitable for remittance payments.

Fees typically cost anywhere from $40 to hundreds of Australian dollars, the service is not fast, and the conversion fee is also above the market rate. Remittance services like the others mentioned here exist specifically to cater to the market of people seeking to avoid the fees charged by banks.

Currently, BPI charges a 2% markup on buying PHP for AUD, while BDO charges around 1%, plus the transfer fees charged by both banks. These fees will depend on what bank the money is being sent to and a number of other market conditions that the bank will judge internally on the day of your transfer.

• Account Setup and Maintenance: Typically free.
• Currency Conversion: Varies by provider, but often around 2% above the mid-market rate.
• Transaction Costs: Bank transaction and card fees in either the Philippines or Australia vary and can include transaction fees and potential cash advance fees for credit cards.
• Transfer costs: 2%
• Time: 1 – 5 days

In short, this is a prohibitively expensive option and only to be used if you cannot access remittance services for whatever reason.

Cheapest Remittance Service in Australia: Receiving $300 AUD to Each Service

Let’s say someone is sending you $300 AUD worth of PHP – here’s how much money you’ll have after receiving the remittance to each service.

Full cost example: Receiving $300 to Australia from the Philippines

As you can see, the cheapest way to receive funds is Grineo, with combined fees between Grineo and a crypto exchange amounting to around $12 AUD.

These fees are calculated for users sending $300 AUD worth of USDT (TRC20 chain) or USDC from the card, and the same fee for simply withdrawing it all as Australian dollars from the nearest ATM. 

Grineo is also by far the fastest solution, with users being able to cash out just minutes after the sender makes the transfer.

What if the Sender Doesn’t Have Stablecoins?

If you’re using Grineo and the sender doesn’t have USDT or USDC already, they’ll have to buy some on an exchange platform.

On the Binance exchange, it would cost an additional $1.70 AUD to buy and withdraw $300 AUD worth of stablecoins.

Purchase costs $0.30 AUD, and withdrawal costs around $1.50, leaving you with $298.30 AUD arriving to your Grineo account, minus 1% for spending or withdrawing the money from an ATM.

So if someone started out with $300 AUD worth of PHP, bought stablecoins on Binance, and sent you the money on Grineo, you’d have $295.31 AUD after any Grineo fees.

Even factoring in the sender needing to buy stablecoins, Grineo is by far the cheapest solution on the list, as well as the fastest.

What’s the Point of Stablecoins? Benefits over Australian Dollars

There are a number of reasons that people actually prefer to use stablelcoins over fiat currencies like the AUD.

Lower Transaction Costs

Transactions involving stablecoins often incur lower fees compared to traditional banking and remittance services. This includes lower transaction, conversion, and intermediary fees.

Many stablecoin platforms also offer transparent fee structures, eliminating the hidden costs associated with some fiat-based transfers.

Faster Transaction Speed

Stablecoin transactions can be processed almost instantly or within a few minutes, whereas traditional bank transfers, especially international ones, can take several days. Unlike banks that operate during business hours, blockchain networks operate 24/7, enabling transactions at any time.

Integration with DeFi and Crypto Services

Users can leverage various decentralized finance (DeFi) platforms for lending, borrowing, and earning higher rates of interest on stablecoin holdings than are available for fiat currencies. This is called yield farming.

Stablecoins can be easily converted into other cryptocurrencies for investment purposes or used in blockchain-based financial services, and you can exchange stablecoins for Bitcoin and Ethereum directly in the Grineo App.

How to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia with Grineo

Here’s how the process works from start to finish.

The Sender

If the sender has stablecoins like USDC or USDT, they can send it to a Grineo account instantly. They’ll need the deposit address which Grineo users can copy and paste by tapping a button in the app.

Otherwise, the sender can buy stablecoins. We’ll use the Coins.ph exchange in this quick guide.

1. Register an account on Coins.ph. The process may take 1 – 3 days, and will not have to be repeated again.

2. Deposit funds to Coins.ph by wire transfer free of charge.
3. Purchase USDT (TRC20) by simply selecting this asset in the exchange section and selecting the desired amount of USDT want to buy, then making the transaction.
4. Go to Withdraw Funds. Select the amount of USDT to be sent. Enter the address of the recipient (the Grineo user simply needs to tap deposit USDT (TRC20) and copy the address.
5. Send the funds which will arrive in minutes.

The Recipient

Grineo users will receive USDT in minutes and can withdraw it as cash from any ATM that supports Visa, or simply spend it in stores across Australia with the Grineo Card.

1. Register an account on Grineo. Like with Coins.ph, this requires an ID and may take around one day.
2. Copy/paste the address of the asset you’re receiving the money to. In our example, it’s USDT (TRC20). Make sure you don’t select a different type of USDT so that the funds match the wallet.
3. That’s it! You’ll receive your funds and can tap and spend with the card anywhere or withdraw Australian dollars from the nearest ATM.

Almost every ATM and store supports VIsa-issued cards. Just spend or withdraw your USDT with no foreign currency conversion rates charged between PHP and AUD, no transfer fees, and just minutes between the start and end of the transfer.

Grineo is the Fastest and Cheapest Way to Send Money from the Philippines to Australia

As you can see, there are enough options on our list to cater to everyone.

Having said that, the cheapest service to instantly receive and spend money from overseas is Grineo, not to mention the access it grants to the exciting world of crypto and Web3.

Looking to receive cheap, instant payments to Australia?

You can sign up to get a Grineo account and card here.

FAQ

Can Remitly send money from Philippines to Australia?

Yes, Remitly can send money from Philippines to Australia. Remitly is not the fastest or cheapest option to do this, that would be Grineo, but Remitly has been around for years and remains a popular option.

Are stablecoins hard to use?

No, stablecoins are money and can be transferred in minutes. Someone can send stablecoins from any wallet to a Grineo wallet where it can be instantly spent for a 1% fee and no hidden fees.

How do I sign up to Grineo?

Sign up to Grineo by downloading the app from the iOS or Android store or visiting the homepage here.

How much does it cost to buy USDT in the Philippines?

On Coins.ph, there is no buy/sell fee. However, USDT is sold at a slightly marked up rate. It will likely cost about 2.7% of your total when buying USDT with PHP on Coins.ph.