Living expenses for the children in Cebu, land sales, and house construction have so far been sent to a small finance company called Cebuana Lhuillier, and my wife's sister receives the cash at a nearby store.
With this method, the maximum amount of money that can be transferred at one time is 100,000 yen, so if the amount is larger than that, the money must be sent several times, which increases the transfer fee. For example, if you wanted to send 300,000 yen, you would have to send 100,000 yen in 3 installments, so the transfer fee would be 750 yen x 3 installments, or 2,250 yen.
Up to 1,000,000 yen can be transferred to a bank account at one time. The maximum cost is 1,500 yen. In the case of the 300,000 yen transfer mentioned above, the cost is only 1,000 yen.
Therefore, when I returned to Cebu last year, my wife and her sister opened an account at BDO Bank in Toledo City, and from this year, they will be sending money to their bank account.
I sent the money to the account yesterday, but received an e-mail from BDO Remit Japan, the remittance company, saying that they could not find the account number. The email said that the name of the bank might be different.
I checked and found that there is a bank called BDO Network Bank in addition to BDO Bank. When I checked the street view of Google Maps, I found that the signboard did indeed say "BDO Network Bank".
According to Wikipedia, BDO Network Bank was formerly a local bank in Davao that was acquired by BDO Unibank in 2014 and took on its current name in 2019.
It is like a regional bank in Japan, but with 300 branches throughout the Philippines, it is the largest regional bank in the Philippines. On the other hand, BDO Unibank, the parent company of BDO Bank, is a city bank in Japan.
When I sent the money, I specified the Toledo branch of BDO Bank, which is why I was told that they did not have an account.
I replied to BDO Remit Japan with an email of correction and was able to send the money safely.
By the way, when I used to send money to Cebuana Lhuillier, I could receive the cash at the store counter within an hour after sending the money, But it takes 24 hours to receive the money by bank transfer. Moreover, banks are closed on Saturdays and Sundays, so if you are in a hurry, it would be better to send the money to Cebuana Lhuillier as before.
