Quick question about Eurozone money transfer

in euros to a bank in the Netherlands? I have an

Found the info at last. 25 Abbey & 20 Barclays. Same rate for Worldwide Xfer apparently. Seems a bit steep for a Euro zone transfer though.

I don't think you'll get it any cheaper. This is just one of those things that UK banks keep high but I don't think there is any reason it should cost more than GBP 1.

We in the UK missed out on reasonably priced inter-EU payments because the government did not implement the relevant EU legislation. They didn't have to as we are not in the Euro but it would have helped if they did.

For small amounts you may be better off just posting the cash. Even for larger amounts you could insure the letter (International Signed For) and it will be cheaper than the transfer fee. I have sent and received cash without problems. Obviously disguise it well if you're not insuring it.

I used to have a Eurocheque book and card. Something so simple, useful and straightforward that they had to abolish it!

We're part of the Single Euro Payments Area which should (eventually) streamline all of this:

Sounds like the sorts of things I used to do in the mid 90s - getting European customers to put pound notes in envelopes. And Eurocheques were quite expensive to cash as I recall (maybe it was cheaper if you were a business or shopped around, but shopping around wasn't as easy as it is now).

Another option might be Paypal - the fee is something like 3.4% which might be cheaper for small amounts than a fixed fee. Requires a bit of faff setting up an account for each end if you don't already have one.

Theo