As an American living in the Philippines and drawing a military pension from the US, I'm obviously concerned about how to get my hands on my money every month. There are several ways to do it, but I'll tell you how I've been banking in the Philippines with US dollars so far and what changes I'm making in the near future.

Prior to Arrival in the Philippines

When I made the decision to sell my house in Phoenix, Arizona (US) and move to the Philippines, I did an Internet search for all of the banks in the Philippines. I needed to open a "dollar account" since I would be depositing a large sum of money (from the sale of the house) in US dollars and also because my monthly pension is in US dollars. I found two branches for the Philippine National Bank (PNB) and they both allowed a person to open dollar accounts in the Philippines from locations in the US. One was in New York, New York and the other was in Los Angeles, California. I couldn't find branches for any other banks from the Philippines, although the banking page for the Retired Activities Office said there were several. Perhaps there were, but they weren't accessible to me without going to great expense.

After I sold my house, I deposited more than 90,000 dollars at the PNB branch in Los Angeles for an account in Olongapo City, Philippines. It's the money I used for the construction of the house I now live in, my 2006 Toyota Corolla Altis, and other things that are too long to list.

After Arrival in the Philippines

A day or two after I arrived, I went to the PNB branch in downtown Olongapo City. My savings bank passbook was already available for me to pick up and it showed all of the money in the account. Since then, I've continued to use PNB because the other choices didn't appear any more attractive.

A week or so ago, my wife (currently in the US) went to the main branch of the Wells Fargo bank to close one account and open another due to the blank checks she ordered disappearing in the mail. The last thing we need is to have someone committing fraud with our checks.

The old account was a custom checking account. The new account is another custom checking account, but this time it has benefits for military personnel on active duty or retired. Telegraphic wire transfers from the old account to PNB required a fee on both ends. The new account requires fees, but not if I change banks here in the Philippines.

Future Banking Plans

According the representative at Wells Fargo, wires from there in the US to the Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI) are free. That's one good reason for switching from PNB to BPI.

There is another PNB branch at the Subic Bay Freeport Zone (SBFZ), but I've been there to inquire and they told me I had to use the branch in downtown Olongapo City for direct deposit of US dollars from my pension. I hate going to the downtown branch because there's never any parking nearby and because there's always a line of people requiring a wait of up to 2 hours. There's never a line at the SBFZ branch and there's always plenty of parking nearby.

There are two branches of BPI at the SBFZ, both of which will service direct deposit accounts for Americans. Add that fact to less fees and I'm sold. I've check out BPI and as far as my pension goes, it's a winning situation.

The Google AdSense, PayPal US and PayPal Philippines Conundrum

In February of 2007, I realized I had a problem if I wanted to use PayPal for anything. A regular PayPal account wasn't available in the Philippines. Even though my direct deposit went to a US-based bank routing number (RTN), PNB could not find the test payment.

I didn't have a problem receiving Google AdSense payments to that RTN for PNB. If I have no problems switching the payments to go to BPI, I'll be able to close the PNB savings account. I would like to have my PayPal US payments going to a dollar account at BPI, but I won't know about it until I try it.

The PayPal Philippines option, which became available sometime before the end of January in 2008, only deposits in Philippine pesos. I really don't want to open a separate account for pesos if I don't have to. If I have to, I have the PayPal bank codes for the Philippines. I think each deposit has to be 7,500 pesos or more (about $170 in US dollars) or else a fee is charged by the bank.

Why the Near Future?

Well, I don't want to be juggling money in August and September because my wife will be here on vacation from the day of her birthday in August until a month later. She'll be returning to the US in September for a period of about 6 months. She has to finish paying off medical bills and such. If it wasn't for that, it would be a one-way flight. I can't tell you exacting when I'm going to make changes because it depends on finances. I can say that it's going to happen as soon as I can make it happen.