For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
Early last year I opened up an account with TD Waterhouse bank (tdwaterhousebank.com). They offer a checking account for Canadians.
The cost is something like $7.00 or $9.00 a month so it certainly is not for everyone but here are the advantages:


1)NO MORE PAYPAL TRANSFER FEES!!!!! Empty your paypal account 20 times a day and you won't pay a cent in transfer fees.

2) Since this bank is on U.S. Soil, you can accept the green "US ONLY" postal money orders with ease.

3) Prepaid if mailed within Canada envelopes are provided free of charge and are used to mail in your deposits of money orders and cheques. The address is to a tdwaterhouse office in Ontario that forwards it on to the U.S. division for you.
4)You receive a TDwaterhouse Visa/Debit card that can be used anywhere. I like having a U.S. Visa (some web sites only accept U.S. issued credit cards) and I like to keep my money in U.S. dollars for when I travel to the U.S.
5)The customer service is excellent and of course you can check your account online like other banks.
Well worth it for me. The ONLY thing I didn't like but I can understand was the lengthy process for signing up. Took about 3 weeks toa month as there is a snail mail verification process.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

e-scrooge
Community Member
Did they do a credit check on you when you signed up for this account? I'm curious, as my credit rating is extremely bad.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
rofl,...no they don't credit check you. Unless of course you want a line of credit etc.
Message 3 of 23
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

Thanks L-4-L that's very useful to know - I would especially like to be able to accept green USMO's.

By the way, just a litle plug for you - the price gun I bought from you early spring is still going strong, despite being kicked around a garden centre, left out in the rain, lost and abandoned in the compost pile for two days and generally mistreated horribly! Excellent product, highly recommended!
Ann
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
Too Funny but Great to hear Ann! Thats why we are able offer the 2 year unconditional warranty. Its much different selling on Ebay "business to business" We found our sales increased when we backed them up with the warranty. Out of 2000 sold on Ebay, probably had to replace 3 total and we were glad to do so.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

can-import
Community Member
HI!
I am very interested in opening a U.S. Account there... but when you click to open an account, you got a notice on top : Please Note: If you do not have an existing relationship with TD Canada Trust or TD Waterhouse, you are required to open your TD Waterhouse bank account by visiting one of our branches at either 100 Wall Street, New York, NY 10005 or 1 Harborside Financial Center, 135 Green Street, Jersey City, NJ 07311.

How did you open you account?

Thanks!

can-import
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

treasure-pot
Community Member
can-import, you should be able to download the application form from the Waterhouse web-site. You then have to mail it to them along with an initial deposit of $100 USD to open the account. It takes about two weeks but is really a pretty smooth transaction.


Bill


Message 7 of 23
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

treasure-pot
Community Member
Sorry, you will also have to have an account with TD/Canada Trust. Thats how the transfers are made from TD Waterhouse into Canada.


Bill


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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

can-import
Community Member
Oki, thanks for information
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
YIKES. Thanks for the update. This is new. I had no relationship with the TD bank when I opened my account last year. I was sure this info was wrong until I checked just now.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
I just emailed tdwaterhousebank to see if this is new. It IS possible that when I opened a tdwaterhousebank account they opened both a td account as well as a tdwaterhousebank account for me at the same time. If this was the case, it was seamless. Will report when I hear back.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

bonzoproducts
Community Member
I sent my application today, a good thing to do is bring it to your local TB bank and they'll send it out free.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

chrispenner
Community Member
Thanks for the info, one question tho.. how do you deposit money orders?
thanks!
Kathleen
Message 13 of 23
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

chrispenner
Community Member
nevermind.. sorry! I did not see that you already said that!
Message 14 of 23
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

treasure-pot
Community Member
Hi Kathleen.

Through TD bank again, I set up a US $ account. I deposit all money orders to this account until I get a reasonable exchange rate and then convert them to CAD in my regular account.

One tip... you will always get a better exchange rate on USPS international money orders at CanadaPost. It's not a huge difference than the banks, but every little bit...


Bill


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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

I been with TD Waterhouse for three years. I'll never look back. 6.95US monthy service charge and they give you a debit card and cheques to access your account. I transfer paypal to TD waterhouse and never had probems. No transfer fees and I can cash all them US postal money orders and US cheques no problem!!
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

acurael
Community Member
As I recall there's also a $3.95 monthly fee plan available too.

And if you keep $1000 (for the $3.95 plan or I think $3000 (for the $6.95 plan) on deposit, you don't pay any fees

I must sound like a waterhouse cheerleader! But I've been with them for over 3 years - couldn't be happier 🙂
Message 17 of 23
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

sunshine9280
Community Member
I've had a TD Waterhouse acct. for several years as well... You can open an Acct. at your TD Branch here - they'll do all the work for you.... Also, I have a US account in my local branch. I can deposit money orders into it and telephone transfer the money to my Waterhouse acct. It's wonderful... Also, you can deposit the green money orders into a TD account here too.... They take them - they'll convert them and put them into your Cdn account too.
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

tomaszczernecki
Community Member
Here's another option which we are using which you might want to consider as well. We signed up for a personal US dollar account at Royal Bank. Took all of half an hour (though we had to make an appointment to see a personal banker to do this). I'm not sure if we can deposit the green USMO's (we always request our customers to mail pink Int'l ones or corner-store MOs), but Paypal transfers are an ease, and they come in right into US dollars.. It's a bit tricky to decipher what numbers to put into Paypal's routing # and acct # fields, but this site: http://policy.ssa.gov/poms.nsf/lnx/0202402300#F

help to explain it, plus if anyone wants to sign up for the account I can help them out getting the numbers right. We can even use this account to accept international wire transfers from our customers abroad. Royal Bank clears their checks through 'Royal Bank of Canada - New York Branch' in New York City, so I'm assuming we could cash USMOs - anyone have any opinions on this?

There are no monthly fees, though there is a charge for withdrawals as with most banks, but I believe you get 2 for free each month, plus one extra for every 'Payroll deposit' into your account.

Just something else to consider, we're quite happy with it!
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For Canadians who want to have a U.S. Account.

www-labels4less-com
Community Member
Tomas, you better take a closer look at your statement. Unless the Royal bank has changed its policy, Paypal is depositing U.S. dollars and it is being exchanged into Canadian and then back into U.S. when it hits your account.
When I was with Royal last year, I was not able to do a direct U.S. transfer into my U.S. Royal account without an exchange.
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