Citibank Service Lets Californians Transfer Money to Vietnam

Citibank began a service Monday that allows Vietnamese-Americans in California to transfer money directly to relatives in Vietnam.

The program, which restricts transfers to $300 for each family every three months, is the first such service provided by a major U.S. bank since the end of the Vietnam War.

Citibank, the nation’s largest bank, tested the service in December in New York, where it is based, and is now making it available to Californians, said Nancy Goodman, vice president in charge of the program.

Citibank has three offices in Orange County--which has the nation’s highest concentration of Vietnamese immigrants--and 27 offices in Los Angeles County. Statewide, Citibank has 115 branches. The closest Citibank operation to the Little Saigon district of Westminster is in Huntington Beach.

“We’re on-line, and we’re getting ready to roll,” said Dan Anderson, manager of the bank’s Huntington Beach and Orange branches. The bank does not plan to open a Little Saigon office soon because of budgetary constraints, he said.

California has more than 280,000 residents of Vietnamese origin, according to the 1990 census. At least half of them live in Orange and Los Angeles counties.

Before Citibank was granted a U.S. Treasury license for Vietnam transfers, Vietnamese-Americans had used third parties to send money to relatives in their homeland, usually couriers, informal channels or transfers through third-country banks, such as those in Canada and Hong Kong.

Because the Citibank transfers are restricted to $300 each quarter for humanitarian purposes and for supporting family members, the current methods for sending money are not likely to end, said Co Long Pham, president of the Vietnamese Chamber of Commerce in Orange County.

The new service “won’t stop people from sending money through third-party banks,” Pham said. He said he expects courier money transfers to continue to thrive because there is no limit to the amount sent that way.

Those sending money “don’t have to go through the U.S. and Vietnamese government, and their transfers will not be tracked down, nor can they be taxed” by either government, Pham said. He estimated that Vietnamese-Americans in Little Saigon send at least $30 million annually to relatives in Vietnam. Yen Do, editor of Nguoi Viet Daily News in Westminster, said that about $160 million of the more than $200 million transferred to Vietnam each year is sent from the United States.

Citibank’s new service, which will be available soon in Texas, Illinois and the District of Columbia, is not going unnoticed. In late April, Bank of America began a pilot program and expects to introduce transfer service across California soon, said Russ Yarrow, a spokesman for the bank at its San Francisco headquarters.

Citibank customers will be able to transfer money directly from their checking accounts, while non-customers will have to pay cash for transfers, said Tonia Freeman, a Citibank spokeswoman.

Citibank’s $27.50 charge for international fund transfers includes a $2 service fee that goes to Citibank’s counterpart in Hanoi, the Bank of Foreign Trade of Vietnam. Citibank’s service fee, equal to 9.8% of $300, is considered reasonable by Vietnamese immigrants, who may pay as much as 15% for each $100 sent through third parties.

Direct Money Transfers

Citibank, which began offering direct money transfers to Vietnam from California, has 115 branches in the state and 37 in Southern California, including three in Orange County.

Huntington Beach: 7552 Edinger Ave., (714) 848-1131

Orange: 2 City Blvd. E., Suite 178, (714) 937-0287

Tustin: 18232 Irvine Blvd., (714) 838-8773

Source: Citibank