Now that I thought I had all my shipping info figured out I wired $3000 to Mochaba Developments in Botswana this was done on the 24th of march, and now my bank confirms its at their bank but Mochaba does not have the $$ in their account. I assume the money is stolen or in the wrong account at this point. Does anyone have info on wire problems or what can be done? has anyone wired to Mochaba in botswana?

My bank basicly says once the money leaves they cant do much. they are tracing the wire but still no update on what account it went into just that its at the destination bank.

I cant beleive it can be this complicated to send some money its been 8 business days and almost a week on the trace, and the money was at there bank the day I sent it according to the trace.

This might be my only trip and I do want my trophies especialy my 63" kudu and buffalo but cant afford to send another $3000.00 to get lost or stolen, and I wont

any one have recomendations on what I can do? should have done?

Some banks will hold the funds from a wire transfer as if it were a check. A mandatory 5,7,10,14 or maybe 30 days waiting for it to"clear". An obvious scam to use the money for a while.

I think it will show up eventually. What is your oufitter doing to help?

[I have avoided wiring money to questionable places, esp for trophies and shipping, and now always have the import agents set up "collect" shipment and Ijust pay them with a credit card in the US.]

Mike,
Electronic transfers are fairly cut and dry, assuming that all of the account information is correct and has not been entered incorrectly by the bank personnel.

However, I have found that banks on the receiving end like to sit and play with the funds for a few days before crediting the recipients account. The banks get your funds within 24 hrs. The end recipients usually get the funds credited within a week, from my experience with Namibia.

If your bank will not assist in tracking, (shame on them), send your recipient an email copy of your wire transaction receipt and have them follow up with their bank.

Aside from the problem, my congratulations to you. A 63" kudu is far rarer than a "hole in one!!"

Geoff

Briefly ...

1) What is the name of the (initiating bank) your bank ?

2) What is the name of the (recipient bank) in Bot's ?

3) Do you know the name of the (intemediary bank) along route

With international money transfers there is ALWAYS an (intemediary bank) through which the t/t has to go to get to the destination bank.

RULE OF THUMB:

When making a t/t (is is best) to ask your initiating bank to make all the necessary deductions or charges at your end prior to them making the t/t, that includes the charges for an intemediary bank. If you dont do that then often the amount sent does not match the amount rec''d.

Also regardless, the (receipient bank) will normally make a (forex fee deduction) at their end as well, this is standard practice and almost impossible to avoid.

In closing, the banks generally like to slip in fees and charges a lot, so make sure you quiz them before making any transfer so there are no unforseen charges to follow / Good Luck ..

JUST out of INTEREST !!

Has anyone considered this method or even used it before, may be an alternate good option ??

Moneygram

Regards, Peter

Bank: First National Bank of Botswana
Branch: Maun
Branch #: 282367

my bank is
Vally bank and trust
strasburg colorado
My bank charges $75 for INT. wires I have at least 4 to do 1 is done 1 is lost and at least 2 to go. I went to high school with everyone that works in the bank and told them I wouldnt pay $75 per transaction they said ok. so I cut out some fees.


I dont know the intermediery bank but someone is taking out fees because when I sent 250 it came up short in mozambique by $15 so if this shows up Iam sure it will be short too. It has $50 extra on it for bank fees. at this point if it shows up a little short I will be happy it made it.

My outfitter is Inafrica safaris and I just sent them an email so we will see what they can do. If Kan Coetzee gets the email he will sort it out no problem. I have known him for 4 years now and he is good at what he does, the problem is iam always talking to a secretary who then has to ask someone else. If she asks Kan coetzee he will handle it no problem or I guess i will have to call him on his cell and see what he says, I dont blame them but they better help.

Iam calling Mochaba Developments tonight and I will ask them for their banks phone number because I will call them my self and if they speak english I might get some answers on where my money is and why its not in the account, if they tell me there is a 10, 20, 30 day hold I am fine with that just so I know whats going on.

My transfer to mozambique took 4 days maybe less

thanks for the info some of the comments at least give me some hope of the money not being gone

Hi Mike ..

It is a damn process unfortunately, good on you for putting some pressure on your local bank about transfer fees.


Anyhow this is what I have found to POSSIBLY help you !!

Branch Name: Maun
Street Address: Shop 1 and 2, Plot 152, Ngami Centre
Postal Address: Private Bag 231
Town: Maun
Telephone Number: 267 6860919
Fax Number: 267 6860920
Email Address: maun@fnbbotswana.co.bw


FNB is also a BIG South African Bank so it should be a reasonable bank to deal with

Cheers, Peter

awesome thats the bank the address is the same except i dont have the private bag number but the ngami center is the same so I think thats the one. Now that i have a phone number i can try to work on it myself instead of asking others then waiting 2-3days or more to see what they found out.

i will be calling the bank, Mochaba, shortly

thanks balla balla

I think you'll find you might be missing a SWIFT code. When you speak to both banks, make a point of asking if that's a required detail....... if you didn't supply one but need to do so then the missing money will probably eventually arrive back at your home bank.

It might also help you to know that Bots tend to be a bit slow when it comes to trophy export and Mochaba who (to the best of my knowledge) are the only company licenced to do dip and ship like to take helluva long holidays over the Christmas period......... so try to do everything you can to get your trophies out of the country as soon as possible.

SWIFT Code was on there. I called the bank from balla balla info and when I gave her there account number they said the money has been their since the 25th of march she asked me my name and I gave it to her and she said the wire was from Mike Cuype my last name is Cuypers so with the language barrier it sounded like she had the right wire and info and the amount was more then the original bill by a couple hundred dollars in botswana money (not much in Us I assume) she didnt know the exchange rate, maybe they got a better exchange rate. unless someone else from the us made a wire the around the same time and for close to the same amount and the bank teller just repeated my name cause she thaought it was close, the money is their

i called mochaba and they said last time they checked last week it wasnt in there, but according to her bank it was. so she is checking again so if she says no its not there i dont know what i will do.

Mike,

Sounds like it's arrived with the BW bank but they haven't put it onto the online banking system yet. If the BW bank is anything like my SA bank then it takes a few days for them to get it showing on the online banking system.

FWIW, when we pay a (Google) cheque from overseas into the bank here it takes 4-6 weeks to clear into the account!

thanks for all the help i cant live without AR! after calling fnb bank and mochaba, leandre just sent me an email telling me that payment has been received and my shipping is paid in full I guess calling them expedited things, she also apologized for the time it took to confirm. so hopefully thats it for Mozambique shipment, now we will start all over with safari cargo in SA for my lifesize bushbuck and blesbok cape, hope its not to bad $$$ and headache

Hi Mike

So glad you got it sorted, it is not a nice feeling when we think our payments might have gone into a Nigerian Bank scam ... All well that ends well

Other Guests & Steve (Shakari)

Steve (this might be of some interest to you) in the future as I believe they MIGHT be setting up an (outlet in South Africa) sometime in not too distant future, maybe you can contact them and talk about becoming an agent in RSA (-:

ANYHOW this the link

OrbitRemit - UK

I am going to use them for my next money transfer from UK to NZ and vice versa

Cheers, Peter

Peter,

I might be missing something on that but what advantage is there is using them over the client just making a payment via his own on-line banking?

As I read it, it's just unnecessarily complicating a relatively simple process by involving another company.

With ordinary online banking the client has the money in his bank account and just sends it to the payee whereas with Remit, he pays Remit and Remit pay the payee.

With smaller/credit card payments you might like to look at www.monsterpay.com if the money is going to Africa or if going elsewhere in the world, good old PayPal...... who don't offer merchant accounts to Africa!

Hi Steve

It is no hassle at all as I do all my transfers from home, via the internet, I never visit a bank to transfer money. It does not make any differance how the money goes it is the COST to transfer that irk's me.

I checked out the OrbitRemit cost to do a standard transfer of money from my local NZ internet bank to my UK bank and vice versa.

The tranfer cost or FEE from Orbit is about 50% of what my banks charge me when I do an online transfer. My UK bank charges me GBP 17.00 and my NZ Bank charges me NZD 25.00 each time I do an internet bank international transfer

So in essenace it is (cheaper to transfer) the money with Orbit than with my banks, especially if one sends smaller amounts frequently

Cheers, Peter

Peter

Surely you still have to pay Remit from your bank account and thus incur the charges for that and then pay the Remit transfer charges?

I'm suprised that after you've done that there's a helluva lot of difference.

BIJOU

I think the answer is it's Africa and things move at a different pace. I remember transfering money to Zambia for two safaris 10-12 years ago and it took a couple of weeks for the process in both cases. I have not sent any money overseas for dip/pack/shipping ever. I get my taxidermist to guarantee payment and the only one I pay is him. No sending CC# overseas or transfer hassles.

Mark

quote:

My bank basicly says once the money leaves they cant do much. they are tracing the wire but still no update on what account it went into just that its at the destination bank.

WRONG!

The bank HAS to be certain the money has gone into the account it is supposed to go to.

Saying that the money is in the foreign bank, and nothing can be done about is certainly NOT acceptable for ANY bank.

I have had money held up in transit for as much as 9 days. other times it was there next day.

quote:

Originally posted by shakari:
Peter

Surely you still have to pay Remit from your bank account and thus incur the charges for that and then pay the Remit transfer charges?

I'm suprised that after you've done that there's a helluva lot of difference.

Hi Steve ..

When I go on line and transfer from my local internet bank here in NZ there is NO CHARGE as the transfer is a LOCAL ONE to Orbit's set up NZ bank account, so there is no fee to me at all. They then do the rest. Same in UK the transfer is from my UK bank locally to their UK holding account.

Also,

I looked at the exchange rate as you will know when we go online to do a standard international internet bank transfer when we put in the amount to transfer it comes up with the exchange rate for our local currency to the country we are sending to (which is important to check) and Orbit are no more or sometime less than the bank

As i mentioned, it is particularily good for those people whom (make small t/t often) as it saves on the transfer fee.

When they open in RSA I will test the waters to confirm that all is OK

Cheers, Peter

Thanks Peter. I'll be interested to hear how it goes for you.

SAEED

Thats what I thought, but when I asked the bank what they could do that was there response, luckly I didnt have to take it any further

MARK

I understand Africa things move a little slower but the fact was the money was there the day after I wired it and My bank and Mochaba were just giving me the run around, My bank just doesnt have a clue, and mochaba was just to lazy to call the bank and find out, but they were telling me they checked, probably like one guy said they were checking online and it just wasnt showing clear on the online banking screen.

I am glad I called the bank in botswana and just found out for myself. My bank still has not called me back to tell me if the funds have made it I think I will just wait and see how long my bank takes to call me and update me and when they do I will tell them I already called botswana and found out for my self, and thanks for nothing and thats why i didnt pay your $75 wire transfer fee for you guys to do nothing, and gaurantee nothing

to everyone thanks for posting and for people having issues in the future this will be a help to them, I know i typed in a search for help and only found a couple threads.

I went through the same thing. Except it was a Bank in S.A. My Bank claimed the Money was sent. The Bank in S.A. claimed they never received it. My Bank told me once it is sent there is nothing they can do. Sure they put a trace on it. I checked all the account numbers and re-checked them? I checked the Swift number. My bank told me someone on the receiving end could lie and say they never received it and there would be nothing I could do!!! I ended up using a Visa/Debit card to pay for my shipment as my 30 days to pay was expiring!!! After about 30 day from the date of the Wire Transfer and still no funds in S.A. My Bank canceled the Wire Transfer. I received the money back in my account 6 weeks after I sent it!!!