When you send an international bank wire, SWIFT lets you specify who pays the intermediary and recipient bank fees — the sender, the receiver, or both. These three options are coded OUR, SHA, and BEN, and choosing the wrong one can mean your recipient gets less than expected or you face surprise charges you did not anticipate.
Every SWIFT transfer includes a charges field with one of three codes. OUR means the sender pays all fees, including any intermediary bank charges — the recipient receives the full transfer amount. SHA (shared) means the sender pays their own bank's fees and the recipient pays any intermediary and receiving bank fees, often deducted silently from the arriving amount. BEN (beneficiary) means the recipient pays all fees, and the sender pays nothing beyond the transfer amount itself. SHA is the most common default and the source of most complaints about unexpected deductions.
SHA is the industry default, but it creates a predictability problem. When a SWIFT transfer routes through one or more correspondent banks, each can deduct its own fee from the principal before passing the funds on. The sender does not know in advance how many intermediary banks are in the routing chain, or what they charge. A $1,000 SHA transfer might arrive as $965 after two intermediary banks each deducted $17.50. The recipient experiences the deduction directly, and neither party was given a clear breakdown before sending.
Use OUR when you are paying a supplier, contractor, or family member a specific amount and need them to receive exactly that figure — the common choice for business payments and rent. Use SHA for general personal transfers when approximate delivery is acceptable and you want to keep your own upfront cost predictable. BEN is rarely used in practice; it maximizes the sender's cost control but can leave the recipient with a substantially reduced amount and is sometimes refused by correspondent banks. For high-value or time-sensitive transfers, OUR is worth the extra cost for certainty.
On digital asset rails like Stellar, Tron, or Solana, there is no correspondent banking chain and no fee-sharing negotiation. The sender pays a small, fixed network fee (typically under $0.01) and the recipient receives the stablecoin amount in full. There are no intermediary institutions that can silently deduct fees mid-transfer. The only costs are the on-ramp exchange fee (typically 0.1–0.5%) and the off-ramp conversion spread. RemitRoutes compares total all-in costs across both SWIFT-based and crypto-rail options for your specific corridor.
OUR means the sender covers all fees — including any intermediary bank charges — so the recipient receives the full instructed amount. It typically costs the sender an additional $10–30 on top of the base wire fee. It is the safest option when you need a precise amount delivered.
SHA (shared charges) means the sender pays their own bank's outgoing fee, and the recipient bears any intermediary and receiving bank fees, which are deducted from the arriving funds. Since the number of intermediary banks and their fees are unpredictable, SHA transfers frequently arrive short of the intended amount.
BEN (beneficiary pays) means all transfer fees are charged to the recipient, who may see significant deductions before the funds arrive. The sender pays no fee beyond the transfer amount itself. It is rarely the right choice for personal remittances because the recipient ends up absorbing potentially large, unknown charges.
Choose OUR if your recipient needs to receive an exact amount — common for business payments or rent. Choose SHA for general transfers where slight variation in the received amount is acceptable. Avoid BEN for personal remittances. When precision matters, OUR's higher cost is often worth avoiding the uncertainty.
With SHA, you generally cannot know the full cost in advance because intermediary bank fees depend on the routing chain, which varies and is not disclosed upfront. OUR gives you more cost certainty since your bank should quote the total outgoing fee. Digital asset rails solve this entirely — fees are deterministic before you send.
Crypto rails have no equivalent to OUR/SHA/BEN because there are no intermediary banks to pay. The sender pays a fixed, transparent network fee (under $0.01 on Stellar or Tron), and the recipient receives the stablecoin amount in full. RemitRoutes shows the all-in cost for both approaches side by side for your corridor.
Compare live rates across 370+ corridors on RemitRoutes · methodology. Last updated 2026-02-16.