The Czechoslovak Review/Volume 3/Sending money to Bohemia

SENDING MONEY TO BOHEMIA.

 

The American Relief Association has taken charge of the sending of money from this country to Central and Eastern Europe. The plan under which it operates deserves to be thoroughly advertised among foreign speaking people of the United States who desire to send food to their relatives in Czechoslovakia and near-by countries.

By an order of Fred I. Kent, director of the Division of Foreign Exchange of the Federal Reserve Board, all dealers in foreign exchange in the United States—and that includes banks, express companies, steamship ticket agencies etc.—must transmit money received by them for payment in Czechoslovakia, Jugoslavia, Poland, Roumania and neighboring states through the American Relief Administration. This organization will periodically notify Mr. Hoover in Paris of the amount of money, received let us say for payment in the Czechoslovak Republic. Mr. Hoover gives the Czechoslovak government the equivalent of this money in American food at whole sale prices, and at the same time a list is mailed to the Czechoslovak government of persons to whom money was sent by their American friends. These individuals then can use their credits to buy at home American food at smaller cost, than if it had been bought here and sent to them by parcel post.

Funds from this country will continue to be sent through bankers, but bankers must transmit exclusively through the Relief Administration. It is very gratifying to the Czechoslovaks that tentative rates announced by the American authorities show the Czechoslovak crown to be worth a great deal more than the Austrian crown. A dollar buys 20 Austrian crowns and only 15 Czechoslovak crowns.

 

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