I recently bought something from a private party in Britain. I have never done this before, and I have ordered from a company (with a credit card) only once before. Normally I rely on the US distributors. But given the behavior of a couple of them who shall remain nameless, I learned how to deal directly with Britain fast. The problem with the purchase was that the seller insisted that he be paid in British Pounds Sterling. After overcoming the impulse to send him a few pieces of the family silver, I investigated my options. One choice would be PayPal. But this fellow did not have a PayPal account. So then I called my bank and asked what my options were. For $30 they would prepare an international money order for me, in British Pounds, or GBP for those of us who do not have European keyboards. Or, for $50 they would perform a wire transfer directly into the seller's bank account. Ouch! Too expensive. Next I called my credit union, which provides money orders and traveller's checks. Sorry, only in dollars, not pounds. In the past I have been able to get "international money orders" from the post office in dollars that the blokes in Canada would take. But the PO doesn't have them in anything other than dollars. I considered going to the American Express travel office, where I could get pounds in cash at their little bank office. But I decided it would be too risky to send the cash through the mail. Finally, I went to a little store in a corner mall near where I live. They have something called a "moneygram". Most of their business is from Latin American immigrants sending money to their families back home. But it turns out that they can send money to other countries too. I checked the web site (http://www.moneygram.com) and discovered that there were three offices that handled moneygrams in the seller's town in the UK. So, I sent him a moneygram. It cost me $14 to do it. (Plus, the way they figured the exchange rate cost me another $3.) I then e-mailed the seller and let him know the offices and their hours and addresses, and the reference number of the moneygram. Ta dah! Back to MWAN # 127 Table of Contents Back to MWAN List of Issues Back to MagWeb Magazine List © Copyright 2004 Hal Thinglum This article appears in MagWeb.com (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other articles from military history and related magazines are available at http://www.magweb.com