New BOC-L Project - UK/US Currency conversion service.

[M Holmes]

This has been agreed between Doug Pearson (in the US) and myself (in the
UK). Note though that Doug is away for 3 weeks and so it may take a
little time to get things moving.


We all know that bankers charge ridiculous amounts to enable you to
write a cheque in a foreign currency, and that often when buying a CD
privately from someone abroad, this can amount to more than the cost of
the CD.

As some of you know, I've run around that problem when tanks have paid
me Dollars by having those Dollars sent to an account I have at Laissez
Faire Books in the US. That account now holds more than my regular bank
account and my equivalent of Bridget Jones' fear that she'll die alone
and be eaten by alsatians is that I'll die with a "to read" pile that's
taller than I am. Short of taking a year out to do nothing but read and
eat, that's looking like a certainty.

So Doug and I have agreed, initially on an experimental basis, to
facilitate a new arrangement which should be to the benefit of all of
us who buy stuff from across the water.

How this will work is that there will be a facilitator in the US and one
in the UK, these being at least initially, Doug and myself.

Say someone in the US wants to buy something in the UK for 30 Pounds.
They email Doug and I with the details. The 30 Pounds is translated into
Dollars at the current exchange rate. Let's say 48 Dollars. They add 3
Dollars (or 2 Pounds going the other way).

They send 51 Dollars to Doug.  Doug tells me when he has the money and
then I send out a cheque for 30 Pounds to the seller. The buyer arranges
with the seller that the goods will be sent directly to the buyer. What
happens if the goods don't arrive is arranged between the buyer and
seller as usual. Doug and I facilitate only the currency exchange.

Ideally trades on both sides of the atlantic will be roughly equal. What
will happen is that Doug and I will keep a tally of which of us owes the
other what. If this gets too far out of line (say 100 Pounds or
equivalent) then one of us sends money to the other to rebalance this.

Obviously that will cost something in currency exchange too, though by
aggregation it should be a lot less than several small individual
trades..  This cost, plus stationery and stamps, will be paid out of the
accumulating fund of the 2 Pound/3 Dollar addition to each transaction.
It's possible that the timing of this vis a vis currency movements could
see us losing money and this again would be compensated from the account
from the transaction fees.

It may be that this ends up as simply too much work for us.  We'll run
it experimentally to find out.  However, hopefully it'll be a useful
service to us all and save some money from the bankers besides.
Obviously for the rest of you, it does require that you trust both Doug
and myself financially.  That's probably easy for those who have already
dealt with us.  I'd suggest that to reassure others, those who feel they
want to vouch for us should just go ahead and do so.

To get things started I've sent out a 70 Pounds cheque to cover a buy by
Doug himself. Note again though that Doug is away until near the end of
September. Meanwhile let me know of any queries, comments, or
suggestions.

Cheers

FoFP (Co-founder of The First Virtual Bank of Hawkwind)