i recently hired a team from India to do some basic tasks. I paid them several months ago and just recd this email. WTF!!!???? Dear Dave, This is very important mail informing about your past payments received by us. We have received your payments from different account/name instead of your company’s account against which we have raised an invoice. For Example: Invoice Name: xxxxcccc Payment Received from/Remitter name: Xxxxxxxx As per our Indian Central Bank rules payment must be received as per the invoice name/Company’s account only. As we are following guidelines set up by our central bank for receiving payment from our foreign clients. Because of your payment from different name/account other than invoice/company name, our central bank consider it as “third party payment” and it is breach of foreign exchange law under the purview of money laundering. Hence, our central banks ask us to provide appropriate clarification on such account in which we have received payment from different name. In order to resolve this, we need small clarification from your side on your company/firm letterhead that why it is paid from different name and account and how you are associated with that different name/company. We will also need clarification from that different name/company that they are authorize to make payment on your behalf and they have no ownership in work supplied to you by Hi-Tech. Our central bank has strictly imposed these rules and we are facing great difficulties in our local compliance processes. We therefore, request you to make sure to remit your future payments as per invoice name/Company accounts only so that such clarification should not be arise in future. In case, if you will continue to make payment from different name or some specific account then it is recommended to revise your current SLA and we will generate invoice accordingly in order to get local clearance easily. So we request you to kindly instruct your payable team accordingly so that they can follow appropriate process to remit payment. We hope that you understand magnitude of this and do the needful at your earliest convenience.
Having moved money around globally all I can say is that you have to be careful to follow local rules. If things are not as expected then a case could disappear down a bureaucratic rabbit hole for who knows how long. Seems pretty clear what happened here.
100$ ? Frustrating, but cheap way to learn. If you don't wish to follow their instructions, ask them to invoice you next time from a different, more business friendly country, I suspect most indian companies with international customers can do that. How much is the total cost to settle an international invoice of 100usd ? Once you add wire, intermediary and receiving bank fees ? Aren't there most cost effcient ways to deal with it ? But, indeed, local bureaucracy has been known to harm indian economy - I wouldn't bet the company has ripped you off in any way.