Passing money through a different account to avoid cash pay-in fees
"Let me do the math. .6% * (not large) = really tiny. Since ""not large"" = ""small"" , etc.  I suggest that even a small chance that you need to explain this to anyone in the future is a sign to avoid the risk. Yes, there are times that it's illegal. A real estate office may not deposit escrow funds into anything but a segregated escrow account.  In your case, even if legal, it messes up 'the books' and can cost you more in grief than the 'tiny amount' saves you in cash." buy a cashiers check with the cash (a CRT will be nec if over 10 K) and deposit the cashiers check
"A couple of thoughts and experiences (Germany/Italy): First of all, I recommend talking to the Belgian bank (and possibly to a Dutch bank of your choice). I have similar conditions for my German bank accounts. But even though they talk about it as salary account (""Gehaltskonto"") all they really ask for is a monthly inflow of more than xxxx € - which can be satisfied with an automatic direct transfer (I have some money automatically circulating for this reason which ""earns"" about 4% p.a. by saving fees). In that case it may be a feasible way to have a Belgian and a Dutch bank account and set up some money circulation.  Experiences working in Italy (some years ago, SEPA payments were kind of new and the debits weren't implemented then):  My guess with your service providers is that they are allowed to offer you contracts that are bound to rather arbitrary payment conditions. After all, you probably can also get a prepaid phone or a contract with a bill that you can then pay by wire transfer - however, AFAIK they are allowed to offer discounts/ask fees for different payment methods. Just like there is no law that forces the store around your corner to accept credit cards or even large EUR denominations as long as they tell you so beforehand.   AFAIK, there is EU regulation saying your bank isn't allowed to charge you more for wire transger to foreign country within the SEPA zone than a national wire transfer." "This seems like a risky setup.  All it takes is one missed or delayed transfer for you to overdraw your ""savings"".  There is a benefit to keeping your regular expenses and savings separate, and I can see some benefits in having multiple checking accounts depending on how you organize your finances, but I don't see a benefit to having a paycheck go to one account and all regular spending (and ""savings"") come from another.  It requires some regular maintenance to transfer money over to use for regular spending.  I suppose if you have a checking account that earns interest, but requires direct deposits, and a savings account that earns slightly higher interest you could squeeze out a bit, but it's probably not worth the effort these days unless you have a LOT of money going in and out. Also, it should not be easy to tap into savings, but your day-to-day spending should be very accessible.  All those factors suggest (to me) that your paycheck should go into your regular spending account, and keep your savings separate." You're buying the operations of firm A for $450, or 4.5x EBITDA. You're buying the operations of firm B for $500, or 5.0x EBITDA.  You're paying a higher multiple for firm B.  Of couse subtracting cash 'skews multiples' - but you need to pull it out. You're paying for a business' ability generate that EBITDA over time. Cash is a one-shot deal. You need to pull it out to get the value of what you're actually investing in. Margin accounts do not have the problem you are imagining, which is unique to cash accounts "Wells Fargo uses a service called clearXchange (update: it is now called Zelle) to do this transfer without an account number. This is the same service Bank of America uses, so when you configured your account to be linked to clearXchange, Wells Fargo customers can use it the same way Bank of America customers can.  This also applies to Chase bank. Since your bank is a member, they've integrated the service into your online bill pay: If your bank is a clearXchange member, you will need to use your current online or mobile banking service to send and receive payments. If you hadn't previously configured it through BofA, you'd have been taken to their site to register an account in order to receive the money, it seems. They explicitly point out here that they will automatically deposit any money you receive through their service without your having to ""accept"" the payment like you would from other P2P pay services.  If you don't want to use this service anymore, I suggest contacting your bank, but if they can't or won't help you, you can contact clearXchange customer service to have your account closed." Yes, I've done this. Just added the borderless account into Paypal as a new bank account and the money has now showed up in my borderless account. I used the ACH Routing Number for my USD account. Atm machine and my Credit Union account. Low fees (often zero, if the machine is on any of the same networks) and decent exchange rate, and no need to carry cash or traveler's checks to be exchanged. Alternatively, pay by credit card, though there is a foreign transaction fee on that. "I added ""Shared money in account"" (SMIA) as sub-account of my bank checking (CA) account and moved current difference to that account so total of CA was not changed but now private and shared money is separated. My cases would be handled the following The only downside I see is that now my balance in CA transaction log do not match exactly with bank so reconciliation will be slightly harder." "It's possible to cash cheques by post. When I did this, it involved filling out a ""paying-in slip"" (I had a book of these provided by the bank) and posting the cheque together with the slip to an address provided by the bank. You could also bring the paying-in slip and the cheque to a branch and deposit them there, and it wasn't necessary that you were the account holder, just that the details on the slip matched the account you were paying into. I Googled ""paying-in slip"" and found the instructions for HSBC as an example: Paying-In Slips. It explicitly mentions that you don't need to be the account holder to do this, and moreover there are even blank slips in the branch, which you just need to fill in with the correct account details. I think the procedure is much the same for other banks, but presumably you could check the relevant bank's website for specific guidance." The simplest thing to do is still one of the oldest: Write a check.  If you don't have a checking account, you can still probably enter the payment in your bank's online bill pay - In this case they will send him a paper check. There's an irrational desire these days to avoid checks at all costs, which I don't understand.  There's a time and place for electronic transfers and there's no doubt they're often very useful.  This is probably not one of those cases, however, since neither you nor your friend are set up for it. The bottom line is to keep most of your money in accounts with no check privileges and to not give the account numbers for these accounts to anyone. Keep just enough in your checking account for the checks you are going to write. "I am not a lawyer, but I can't think of a reason this is illegal (something that would be illegal would be to ""trade with yourself"" across the accounts to try to manipulate stock or option prices). I don't think you're ""funneling,"" you're doing ""asset location"" which is a standard tax planning strategy. http://news.morningstar.com/articlenet/article.aspx?id=154126&t1=1303874170 discusses asset location. I'd be more concerned about whether it makes sense." "Another option is to set up an accoutn with Western Union Bill Payment Solutions, where your customer could go to one of their locations and pay in cash and then the cash is transferred to your account. See ""Walk in Cash Payments"" on their site." Do you have direct deposit of your paycheck? If so, almost every employer will allow you to split the paycheck into two accounts. You could open one account for savings, and one for spending. Put $x from each paycheck into the savings account, and the rest into the spending account. Keep the savings account totally separate, with its own ATM card. There should be no way to get money out of this account except by using the SEPARATE ATM card. Now, get a dish of water. Put the ATM card in the dish of water. Put the dish of water in the freezer.  If you are ever tempted to spend your savings, you'll have to wait for the block of ice to defrost. Hopefully, while the ice is defrosting, the urge to waste money will pass :) Many banks will allow you to open multiple accounts.  Create a secondary checking account that has no automatic withdrawals and doesn't allow overdraft.  This is the account you'll use for you discretionary spending.  Get an account with a debit card and always use it as a debit card (never as a credit card, even if it allows that). Your employer may allow you to split your direct deposit so that a certain amount of money goes into this account each month.  When it gets to $0, you have to stop spending.  It will automatically refill when you get your paycheck.