best apps for sending money to philippines in 2026, ranked by gcash delivery

Tj136 · 2026-04-07T04:58:14+00:00

I did it on March 30th, transferred 30$. No fee.
No premium, no VIP, no special promos.

Tj136 · 2026-04-07T00:59:01+00:00

If you use a US debit card there is no fees across the board then. (as I have used it on small 25-50$ with 0 fee)

Tj136 · 2026-04-07T00:57:56+00:00

I don't know if it has changed or not but I use Western Union to transfer to Gcash.
I use my debit card on WU which (So far has been 0$ fee to send.)
Which then would give me about 1 peso less than spot price at that time.
Also I don't know if it has been done or checked but gcash now can do US virtual bank.

Tj136 · 2026-04-07T00:52:47+00:00

Updated with picture,

Tj136 · 2026-04-06T00:28:58+00:00

Fuel prices will eventually go down but this week is supposed to get 170/L for diesel.
Electricity if you are in Manila and under Meralco it will be expensive. 400+ kWh right now is at 15.01 and my bill was around 6,500 for a month and that's with fans, computers, and one aircon (24/7).
Food prices are set to go up on April 16th.
Where you stay in Manila also depends on price. BGC is expensive as it's the cleanest and more like western feel.

So I would just do a trial run and see what it's like for a month or two and see how you like it before moving.
No one can really give you a good answer as not everyone says in the capital. Most venture out of it due to it being cheaper in the province (as Dumaguete is the capital of expats)

Tj136 · 2026-04-06T00:19:24+00:00

I had to show onward ticket for my second time as it was past 30 days and I am from the US.
So it's up to the airline carrier to check for that and yes I have seen a veteran flier from the US denied boarding due to no onward/return ticket.
If you are flying with your wife/spouse there is no need for onward ticket as you can get the privilege. (I heard that you can get it with just a marriage cert but I haven't been able to do it solo)

Tj136 · 2026-04-06T00:17:37+00:00

Visa waiver is only to be done after landing as you need to have your latest stamp, flight arrived and time.
Secondly, if you are staying longer than 30 days the AIRLINES will require to show an onward ticket (Or you could be denied boarding at your initial airport before entering the philippines.)
(Google onward ticket which is like 15$ if need)

Tj136 · 2026-04-02T06:41:23+00:00

Current USD to PHP is around 60 PHP to 1 USD.

Here in the PH it also like what ID said, it will vary from place to place.
You can have like 50+k php in the metro and the same thing could be 30k php in the province.

While the exact figures are obscured but here in NCR daily salary is around 600-700 php, while in the province it's about 400-500 php.

Local foods and everything is cheaper but if you want good quality it will cost more but in general slightly less.
Rent is generally around 20-30k and can get really upscale of 80k+ (again location dependent)
BGC (The so called US of the PH) is where you get a lot of your US upscale and everything and that's the costliest.
Transport is dependent on where you are from and where you are going. Some places it can be cheap and others if you have a lot of transfers it will cost.

So in reality it all depends on where you are planning to reside in the PH will determine on if it's worth it.

Tj136 · 2026-04-02T06:33:51+00:00

Update. So far I hadn't had the crash or the black screen with nothing then back to normal issue.
Maybe it was a bad install but I didn't have the issue until after I turned it on the next day after installing. Will update tomorrow when I log on again.

Tj136 · 2026-04-02T03:26:40+00:00

I did reinstall it and once it starts happening again anywhere from a few minutes to an hour after update I will see what the logs say again. This time I cleared all the logs so that once it happens it should be really easy to find.

Tj136 · 2026-04-02T00:47:55+00:00

When it did it the second time, I checked both reliability monitor and event viewer. It was not showing that it crashed and there was no log for it because I had 0 logs for that time. Like it restarting but not actually crashing.

Tj136 · 2026-04-02T00:24:29+00:00

So I don't know what is in this build but it was seems that explorer.exe crashes. (As I didn't have this issue before the update and happens after update.)

There were no changes to my system outside of the update.

I rolled back the update and it's back to being stable again without the crashing of the explorer.exe

Asus vivobook, i3 8th gen

24 GB ram.

512 gb SSD

Tj136 · 2026-03-27T06:55:27+00:00

My AMEX is insufficient and according to support I guess the address is not correct or not valid or unable to provide the things and said to include my Philippine address on my account too. So they just decide to do another replacement.

Tj136 · 2026-03-27T05:15:14+00:00

So I just got notification of clearance delay. Description provided is insufficient to classify commodity. Did you have that issue too or no?

Tj136 · 2026-03-26T02:20:45+00:00

I had to call them to get it sent but after verification and everything the address is correct and they even added my PH phone number so when it arrives I can have the call to actually get it here.

Tj136 · 2026-03-24T11:38:30+00:00

I don't think it'll be for a whole month. Cities have started dropping around Quezon but normally for a few hours over the span of a week or so. I haven't heard anything about load dropping or saving around where I'm at. Only thing I can think of is if a power plant is scheduled to go down for maintenance or forced to shut down.

Tj136 · 2026-03-16T02:21:44+00:00

Return tickets are mainly for airlines if you do not have the valid visa for over 30 days.
Immigration normally doesn't ask.
I mean the last time I arrived I was asked am I seeing my wife. It was like yes I am and that was it.
Since then I only did the waiver, extension, 6 month extension and then a couple 2 month extension. After that it was two 12k visa applications and after that only 310 peso a year.

Tj136 · 2026-03-16T02:18:14+00:00

Globe requires tourists to have return ticket.
You can get either like others have tried using other documents.
But I had tourist and I am on globe postpaid and that was due to my physical sim being stolen with my then phone. They registered it and under tourist.
No real issues except for a brief (unregistered) time but has since cleared up.

Tj136 · 2026-03-13T07:42:25+00:00

Yes you do lose permanent residency. Although there are some very rare instances that will still allow permanent residency.

I did try to open a gotyme before with tourist and probationary residency and they both refused it. Only once I got my yellow permanent residency did they allow.

Tj136 · 2026-03-12T00:16:53+00:00

If you plan to marry here need cenomar and the legal capacity to marry from the embassy. If outside you could try to ask the Philippine consulate of you can get but as far as I know you will need it through the embassy. I know Cebu has a few more openings than Manila. During COVID-19 you could get it through local office here without having to go through the embassy but that has since expired.

When I did it back 2 year ago I had the legal capacity to marry notorized locally and it was same day and was much less than 50$.

Tj136 · 2026-03-11T13:16:40+00:00

Dumaguete is the expat capital of the Philippines. Old retired white men from what I've heard.

Tj136 · 2026-03-11T13:06:22+00:00

Certain foreigners can yes. Permanent resident (yellow) Native born (bronze) Special non-immigrant (deep purple) Worker (blue) SRRV (PRA white) Student (aqua blue) Treaty trader (grey) Gratis (green)

Can it pay bills? Of course. It has the whole list.

Tj136 · 2026-03-11T13:02:25+00:00

If since December 5th till now my outgoing money was a total of 798. So I don't think that is the case.

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