Paying for Your Money Transfer: ACH Direct Debit, Wire Transfer, or Card Payment?

April 29, 2020 — 3 min read

When you make a money transfer, the money has to come from somewhere. You probably know that you are that “somewhere”, but if you haven’t made any transfers yet, you may not know that you have several options for how you want to provide that money.

During a money transfer with Xe, you can provide the funds by one of three methods:

ACH Direct Debit
Wire Transfer
Credit or Debit Card

At the end of the day, no matter which option you choose, money is moving from your account to your recipient (technically the money isn’t moving at all, but that’s a topic for another blog post). But depending on the option you choose, you could see a difference in how long your transfer takes to initiate and whether or not you get charged any additional fees.

ACH Direct Debit

Automated Clearing House (ACH) payments take funds directly from your bank account, without requiring you to make a card transaction or write a check. Once you’ve authorized your biller (or in this case, your money transfer provider) to take money from your account and signed the agreement, they’ll automatically deduct the funds from your account, without anything else required from you.

In addition to being good for automated payments (which are ideal for regular payments like bills), ACH payments won’t come with any added fees. However, ACH payments typically take longer to process, so this method might not be the best if you’re on a deadline.

Wire Transfer

One of the most well-known payment methods, wire transfers will move money from bank to bank. Wire transfers are one of the faster methods of payment; we typically receive money within 24 hours of the wire being sent. In addition, the other payment methods may have limits to how much money they can move in one go, while wires have no trouble with high-value transfers.

On the other hand, unlike ACH payments, wire transfers aren’t free. In order to move your money quickly between institutions, you will have to pay a small fee.

Credit or Debit Card

When in doubt, you can always turn to your trusty old credit or debit card to make this payment. Like wire transfers, card payments typically offer a quick turnaround for your payment, allowing you to send your transfer ASAP. However, also like wire transfers, card payments come with a small additional fee.