Remittance man

“ Yes—he had curtly told Jack Henderson and his other friends—he had married in China. And—yes—his wife had died in childbirth.
To-day the beginnings of his fortune seemed very far away; very far away, almost unreal, seemed the days when he had been a remittance-man.
But he was an honest man.
“Yes,” he said to his daughter; “once I was a remittance-man, and my father sent me a thousand dollars every three months.”
“Very well,” she went on coolly. “You promised me the same chance you had. Only—make it fifteen hundred a quarter instead of a thousand.” ”

“ He told me how irresponsible you had been for years after leaving college—how at last, in desperation, he asked you to leave Scotland for Scotland’s good. In fact, you came over to America as a remittance-man, didn’t you? ”

“ A man brings money to the bank to meet a payment which he desires to make at a great distance, and the bank, having a connection with other banks, sends it where it is wanted. As soon as bills of exchange are given upon a large scale, this remittance is a very pressing requirement. Such bills must be made payable at a place convenient to the seller of the goods in payment of which they are given, perhaps at the great town where his warehouse is. But this may be very far from the retail shop of the buyer who bought those goods to sell them again in the country. ”

“ To a man possessed of only forty pounds any bill will seem tremendous. This one was for nearly two hundred; and at the end of the long list of items, the biggest of which was that bathroom without water that had sent Annalise out on strike, was the information that a remittance would oblige. A remittance! Poor Fritzing. ”

“ Oh! go, wake the old people up,
To send a remittance from home.
I hope that they’ll send a good lot;
The last time they wrote to me here,
A blessing was all that I got
From father and mother so dear.
They hoped I’d be honest and true,
And ne’er in extravagance roam,
But what’s a poor devil to do
Without a remittance from home?
Post Office Orders or stamps, &c.
I have not the money for stamps,
So when I write home ev’ry day,
They think me the worst of young scamps,
For twopence each time they’ve to pay. ”

“ It makes the merchant unable to remit, when remittance is necessary for his own credit, and for the general adjustment of commercial balances. I am not now discussing the general question, whether prices must not come down, and adjust themselves anew to the amount of bullion existing in Europe and America. I am dealing only with the measures of our own government on the subject of the currency, and I insist that these measures have been most unfortunate, and most ruinous in their effects on the ordinary means of our circulation at home, and on our ability of remittance abroad. ”

“ It will not prevent any solvent man from making remittances, for if he has a deposit in his local bank and his local bank has a deposit in New York he can buy a draft to send as a remittance, which will pass through the New York Clearing House without question or expense. Yet, in spite of these plausible arguments, we believe the action of the New York banks to be a mistake of very serious magnitude, an inconvenience to the public, a probable loss to deposit banking in the long run, and, worst of all, a serious blow to the cause of sound currency throughout the country. ”

“ He therefore personally advised every married man before embarking, as to the course he ought to pursue during his absence from England, and obtained from him an agreement to make a monthly remittance, suitable to his means, for the support of his wife and family. ”

“ A foreigner thinks "an Exchange business"—that is, the buying and selling bills on foreign countries—a main part of banking. As I have explained, remittance is one of the subsidiary conveniences which early banks subserve before deposit banking begins. But the mass of English country bankers only give bills on places in England or on London, and in London the principal remittance business has escaped out of the hands of the bankers. Most of them would not know how to carry through a great "Exchange operation," or to "bring home the returns." They would as soon think of turning silk merchants. ”

“ The supposed annual remittances being made in commodities, and being exports for which there is to be no return, it is no longer requisite that the imports and exports should pay for one another: on the contrary, there must be an annual excess of exports over imports, equal to the value of the remittance. ”

“ But if there is a greater sum due from England to France, than is due from France to England, or vice versâ, the debts cannot be simply written off against one another. After the one has been applied, as far as it will go, towards covering the other, the balance must be transmitted in the precious metals. In point of fact, the merchant who has the amount to pay, will even then pay for it by a bill. When a person has a remittance to make to a foreign country, he does not himself search for some one who has money to receive from that country, and ask him for a bill of exchange. ”

“ They say that the first of the two remittances under consideration is not proved to have been other than money, but as it was only $10,000 its application to the note could not be required. The larger remittance was in drafts, and their application could not be required. ”

“ This article by no means proves, that no remittances were to be made of proceeds on sales in a neutral country; tho’ the children might have had remittances in that train of intercourse, yet the mode might have been thought too circuitous and dilatory. A remittance in a direct line was more eligible. Besides, remittances on sales abroad could only be in money or bills ”

“ Now, in the first place, there is nothing more objectionable in a money payment than in payment by any other medium, if the state of the market makes it the most advantageous remittance; and the money itself was first acquired, and would again be replenished, by the export of an equivalent value of our own products. But, in the next place, a very short interval of paying in money would so lower prices as either to stop a part of the importation, or raise up a foreign demand for our produce, sufficient to pay for the imports. ”

“ But one franc apiece remained out of the fifteen with which we left Marseilles. B—— wrote home some time ago, directing a remittance to be forwarded to a merchant at Paris, to whom he had a letter of introduction, and in the hope that this had arrived, he determined to enclose the letter in a note, stating our circumstances, and requesting him to forward a part of the remittance to Lyons. We had then to wait at least four days; people are suspicious and mistrustful in cities, and if no relief should come, what was to be done? ”

“ Whoever, with the intent to evade a remittance fee to be collected in accordance with this subsection, and who has knowledge that, at the time of a remittance transfer, the value of the funds involved in the transfer will be further transferred to a recipient located outside of the United States, requests or facilitates such remittance transfer to a recipient located outside of the United States shall be subject to a penalty of not more than $500,000 or twice the value of the funds involved in the remittance transfer, whichever is greater, or imprisonment for not more than 20 years, or both. ”

“ So much for the transaction from the importer's standpoint—‌what does the seller of the goods get out of it? Payment for his goods as soon as he is ready to ship them. No waiting for a remittance, no drawing of a dollar-draft on an obscure firm in Paterson, N.J., which no Canton bank will be willing to buy at any price. The credit constitutes authority for the shipper to draw in pounds sterling on London—‌the one kind of draft which he can always be sure of turning at once into local currency and at the most favorable rate of exchange. ”

“ The same results follow on the supposition of money. Commerce being supposed to be in a state of equilibrium when the obligatory remittances begin, the first remittance is necessarily made in money. This lowers prices in the remitting country, and raises them in the receiving. ”

“ The foreign sales agency often collects the accounts and remits total collections periodically by purchase of one bill or draft on its local bank for the total. There must, of course, accompany each such remittance a statement of the detailed receipts for proper credit to individual accounts. The general cash book will show only the total remittance, however. Regular agency accounts as explained in Chapter XXX will secure the control of the home office over the agency’s expenditures.
It is usually best to make the foreign customers ledger self-balancing. ”

“ Whenever the shop-keepers in general discover that my paper will answer as a remittance to the principal ports, and will be readily exchanged by the receivers, they will as readily exchange it for other people. When the people in general, find that the shop-keepers receive it freely, they will begin to look after it, and not before. For you must know, whatever fine plausible speeches may be made on this subject, the farmers will not give full credit to money merely because it will pay taxes, for that is an object they are not very violently devoted to ”

“ An exchange draft is used more frequently than a shipment of currency.'
It thus appears that the custom, if otherwise established, does not fix a definite and uniform method of remittance. When checks are sent for collection and return, the bank is expected to cancel the checks, and charge them to the account of the drawers, and remit 'by means of its exchange draft of by a shipment of currency,' the former being used more frequently than the latter. Whether the choice of methods is at the election of the drawee bank or the collecting bank does not appear. ”

“ In all which places we receive either money, bills of exchange, or commodities that suit for remittance to Britain; which, together with all the profits on the industry of our merchants and mariners, arising in those circuitous voyages, and the freights made by their ships, centre finally in Britain to discharge the balance, and pay for British manufactures continually used in the province, or sold to foreigners by our traders. ”

“ That no remittance or payment in Money, Merchandize, or Bills of Exchange, shall be made by any of the Citizens, or Subjects, of any of the Powers composing this Association, to the Citizens or Subjects of the offending Nation, for the Term of one year, or until reparation be made. ”

“ The result is a moral certainty that no such remittance as you mention can have reached our house, and a literal certainty that no such remittance has been paid to our account at the bank.
“It is needless, at this stage of the proceedings, to trouble you with details. The money has unquestionably been stolen in the course of its transit from you to us. ”

“ Now, they are rich, and can afford it; and if they have bought up Irish estates to get the rents out of them, I 'd like to know what's to be the great benefit of the change. "Pay up the arrears," says I; but if my Lord Somebody from England says the same, I think there 's no use in selling me out, and taking him in my place. And this brings me to asking when I'm to get another remittance? I am thinking seriously of retrenchment; but first, Tom, one must have something to retrench upon. You must possess a salary before you can stand "stoppages." ”

“ The Secretary of State is in effect the ultimate source of supply for bills on India, and the banks, after securing what private bills are available, even up their demands for remittance to India by buying bills from him,— provided he is selling them at a rate which makes this form of remittance cheaper than the alternative one of sending sovereigns. ”

“ When a country is habituated to the use of notes for making payments, they can be very usefully employed for purposes of remittance also. But a note-issuing authority puts itself in a difficulty if it provides facilities for remittance before a general habit has grown up of using notes for other purposes. If, on the other hand, the notes had been made universal legal tender, but only encashable at Presidency towns, there would undoubtedly have been a premium on coin at certain times of the year. ”

“ If money is generally preferred, the rate of exchange rises against the parties remitting; and a demand is created for produce, as offering at least a chance of a profitable result. If, on the other hand, produce is recklessly competed for, the money remittance to the exporter is lessened, and the purchases of the importer are bought high, and arrive at a ruinously losing market. ”

“ You will be pleased, Gentlemen, to give me very early notice of your situation, and to point out very particularly the sums which may be needful, and also the articles of this country, which will probably form the best remittance, and on my part I promise to take the earliest measures for making you such remittances. ”

“ It seems to us that these authorities are founded in good sense and convenience: until the parties, receiving the consignment or remittance, had done some act recognising the appropriation of it to the particular purposes specified, and the persons claiming had signified their acceptance of it, so as to create a priority between them; the property and proceeds remained at the risk and on the account of the remitter, or owner. ”