Sending Money with Brazil's Warranty Seal

Brazilians far away from home have a new, easy and secure
way of sending money to Brazil, They can now use the Bank
of Brazil itself for their remittances. All they need is to go to the
Bank's Internet site. The service uses credit cards and will be
available to the more than two million Brazilians living overseas.

Stenio Ribeiro

The Banco do Brasil (BB) has just inaugurated a service to make the lives of Brazilians living overseas easier. They will be able to transfer funds from wherever they live to Brazil, simply by using the Internet. Caixa Econômica Federal, Brazil's Federal Savings Bank had started a similar program last month.

All Brazilians living overseas need to do is to go to the BB's electronic site _ www.bancodobrasil.com.br - and click on the Banco do Brasil Expresso page, according to the bank's International Director, Augusto Braúna, who informed that, beginning July 6, the service will be available to the more than two million Brazilians who live outside of Brazil.

According to Braúna, any Brazilian who lives abroad and has a foreign Visa credit card can make deposits in checking or savings accounts in Brazil, up to a daily limit of US$ 9.8 thousand (30 thousand reais).

The Banco do Brasil Expresso will allow credit card holders to charge their cards, up to their credit limit, to transfer funds to their Brazilian checking or savings accounts, for a fee equivalent to 2.58 percent of the value of the transfer, says the Executive Manager of Cards, Douglas Macedo. The money, he added, will be available in two business days, which is the time set by the Visa international network to complete transactions.

"This will surely facilitate the lives of nearly 300 thousand Japanese-Brazilians who earn their living in Japan," Macedo observes.

According to Braúna, the dekasseguis—Japanese descendents who work in Japan—have registered savings of approximately US$ 1.5 billion in Japan and remitted around US$ 800 million to Brazil last year.

The presence of Japanese-Brazilians in Japan's major cities is so powerful that 8 of the BB's 20 foreign branches are located in Japan, and the bank also has an agreement with the Japanese postal agency to maintain 25,000 service posts throughout the archipelago, equivalent to the bank correspondents that operate in Brazil.

According to the director, it is likely that the BB will open three more branches in Japan this year, to meet the large demand by Brazilian and Peruvian Japanese descendents, 110 thousand of whom are BB customers, to open new accounts. A clientele that will soon also be able to count on insurance, capitalization, and social security services via internet, Braúna revealed.

He pointed out the BB's activities are also significant in the United States, home to more than half the Brazilians who have emigrated. Their remittances to Brazil each year are the equivalent of the dekasseguis.

The presence of the BB is also strong in Europe, according to Braúna, especially in Portugal, where the bank has six branches and intends to inaugurate another one, in the city of Cascais, in the next few days.

He recognizes, however, that the availability of the new service is not expected to have an immediate impact in terms of increasing the bank's acquisition and consequent incorporation of resources.

"The big impact will be in our relationship with customers, who will be able to count on a secure service with facility for them to carry out transactions at their convenience. The returns will depend upon the propagation," he concluded.

Stenio Ribeiro works for Agência Brasil (AB), the official press agency of the Brazilian government. Comments are welcome at lia@radiobras.gov.br.

Translated from the Portuguese by David Silberstein.