It is a little irritating and frustrating that Western Union (WU) is totally gone as the way of payment or to receive money from Google Adsense by many small-time publishers worldwide. Before, when Adsense sent me the payment thru WU, I can instantly go to the town or city and withdraw it by just bringing a valid I.D and knowing the exact amount that I will going to withdraw.

But now, when Adsense switched to bank or wire transfer many things changed, especially the amount of money these greedy banks are deducting from our hard-earned money.


Also read:

How much money banks deduct in the payment sent by Google to Adsense Publishers via wire transfer in the Philippines?

Last month June 2021, I just unlocked my locked Personal Metrodirect account in Metrobank (of course). And because of that I was able to monitor my bank transactions.

Now, this month on July 23, 2021, I just withdrew a small amount of money from Google Adsense using Metrobank. And to my surprised, Metrobank just deducted my money a total of P727.0594 which is kind of big for a small-time blogger like me. My brother is also a Google publisher and he is using Landbank. But he stated that Landbank is only deducting approximately P500. Still, this is way bigger compare to withdrawing using Western Union because they are only deducting approximately about P200.

Here is my frustrating story.

Last month of June 2021, I earned a little amount of $224.78. As we all publishers know, that money will be available for withdrawal the next month which is July.

And July came, as you can see below, Google Payments sent the payment to me via Bank wire transfer using Metrobank last July 22, 2021 at 9:43 AM.
The bad thing about banks is that the money sent by Google will not instantly be processed. You need to wait for at least 1 to 3 days to be able to see that money reflect inside your bank account. As you can on the image below, my bank account statement in Metrobank using Personal Metrodirect account.

The P2,038.59 is the maintaining balance. To be exact Metrobank's maintaining balance in their savings account is P2000.

On July 23, 2021: Metrobank processed the payment from Google Adsense and my account only received P10,563.64. And the P600 and P10,000 are the amount of money that I only got from my July earnings of $224.78.



Why "only" ??? Because I expected that I will going to withdraw more than that (I think). As you can see on the image below, the currency conversion last July 23, 2021 from USD to PHP is P50.23, meaning: $224.78 x 50.23 is equivalent for approximately P11,290.6994.

I am sure that Google will not deduct any money from that because they already did and that finalized earning is already final. That $224.78 or approximately P11,290.6994 is already final.

Now, see the difference below:

👉 If I withdrew the money using Western Union (not available already)
P11,290.6994 - P200 = P11,090.6994 (approximation only)

👉 If I withdrew the money using LandBank:
P11,290.6994 - P500 = P10,790.6994 (approximation only)

👉 My actual withdrawal from Metrobank:
P11,290.6994 (converted amount of money from USD to PHP based on currency conversion last July 23,2021)
P2,038.59 (current balance in my account, so this is not included in the computation)
P10,563.64 (Metrobank processed money from Google Payments/my Google Adsense earnings or money)

Therefore subtracting my own USD to PHP conversion of my earnings and Metrobanks own conversion of my earnings. I computed that they deducted my earnings a total of over P700.00 which is way bigger compared to Western Union and LandBank.

P11,290.6994 - P10,563.64 = P727.0594

I know this nothing to those "Big Time" publishers. But for a small one like me, that means a lot of money. If they will only deduct at least PHP500 like LandBank, then, at least, I still have an additional PHP227.0594 to withdraw.

P727.0594 per month is a whopping PHP8,724.7128 in a year. Nakakapanlumo naman. Kung sa Western Union nasa PHP2,400 lang yun yearly. At kung sa Landbank nasa PHP6K lang.

Advantages and Disadvantages of withdrawing money from a bank and Western Union

Bank or Wire Transfer

Advantages:
👉 When the money is already inside your account, you can easily withdraw it via nearby ATM.
👉 No need to bring ID or fill up a form like in Western Union.

Disadvantages:
👉 You will also wait when the line in ATM is very long
👉 Much higher service rate fee compared to Western Union
👉 You have to wait for at least 1 to 3 days before you can withdraw your money
👉 You first need to open a Savings account from them and connect it to your Google Adsense account to able to start receiving money from Google
👉 If you do not have an online account to know if your money is already inside your bank account, you are like a blind person because you will never know when to withdraw the money. You need to at least try withdrawing in the nearest ATM to see. But, what if the nearest ATM is not near to you at all? That's a hassle!

Western Union

Advantages:
👉 When Google sent the payment you can immediately go the the nearest WU to withdraw it
👉 Lesser service rate fee compared to banks
👉 No need to have a Savings account

Disadvantages:
👉 You need to fill up a form every time you are withdrawing
👉 You need to bring a valid I.D, know the exact amount of money you are withdrawing, who is the sender, who sent the money, etc. before you can withdraw
👉 You need to wait when there are many people that is in the line.

If you have some bad experiences with your bank regarding your Google Adsense earning withdrawal, please, do not hesitate to share it using the comment form below. It can be very useful to me and other publishers or bloggers out there too. Thank you!