Sending Money Abroad via Bitcoin from Korea - A Simple Guide

[medicine]

If you work in Korea and want an alternative to sending international wires back to your home country, this is it.

I suggest using the Korean exchange Korbit.co.kr because it is very reliable and fast.  Many of the employees are fluent in English and can be reached on the phone and via email.
Sending Korean won by regular bank transfer is free and very fast (anywhere form 5 minutes to a few hours at most).  There is no trading fee now.  They haven't had any downtime in the past few months that I'm aware of.

Signing up

You will need an AR (alien registration) card an a cell phone under your name.  If you don't have a cell phone, you can email them your details and they will help you in English.
1. From the home page click "회원가입" (member signup)in the top right corner.  
2. lick the big blue button "본인인증 (휴대폰)" (user identification by phone).
3. Enter your information; name, phone number, birthdate, and check all three boxes underneath.  Note: The name you enter must exactly match the name you used to sign up the cell phone.
4.  You will get a text message shortly, enter that number in the next window and that will do it.
I don't remember if there is also an email verification.  There may be.  

They do support 2FA, SMS, and also an automated phone call verification system.  

Depositing Money

Once logged in...
1. On the left side of the screen the 6th blue coloured header reads "KRW 충전/환급" (Korean won deposit/withdraw) with two arrows next to it, click that button.
2. The headers are as follows, the first on the top left is KRW 충전 (deposit Korean won), KRW 환급 (withdraw Korean won).
3. Select KRW 충전 (deposit won) and you will see a blue box which when clicked will generate a bank account number which you will use to send won to Korbit.  You can do this at any bank, or atm in Korea using the transfer option, or use the banking app on your phone to send money from home.  Your 24 hour deposit limit is show on this page and varies depending on your verification level  This is the same for withdraws.

**Be sure that the name you signed up with on Korbit and the name on your bank account are exactly the same. You can see your registered name on the top right hand side of the screen.  On my bank account they had my last name printed first, and on Korbit I wrote my first name first and this caused problem with a transfer.  Korbit quickly adjusted my registered name to match my bank acc.

Buying BTC

1. Click the top header on the left side of the screen "거래" (transact)
2. You will see two options at the top "비트코인 매수" (buy BTC) and "비트코인 매도" (sell BTC).  Click the buying option.
3. Enter the amounts and click the blue button "구매 주문하기" (place buy order)

Note: there is a new feature, a gray button next to whre you enter the amount of bitcoin your want to purchase.  It says 최대 (maximum), clicking this button will automatically enter the maximum number of bitcoins you can buy with your current KRW balance.  This saves the trouble of calculating it yourself.

Withdrawing BTC

1. Again on the left side of the screen click the 4th header "비트코인 지갑" (bitcoin wallet)
2. Select 비트코인 보내기 (send bitcoins)
3. Enter the information.  Once you click send you will have to choose your verification preference, 2fa, email, sms, phone call.

***The withdraw fee is currently 0.0002 BTC and you can withdraw up to 15BTC per day.

BTC withdraws are automatic.  Depositing BTC requires 6 confirmations.

If you have any questions about the site let me know.
Peace.

Updated: July 6th 2014

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[jabo38]

thanks :-)  this is actually a cheaper way to send money overseas..... if..... it works

[medicine]

thanks :-)  this is actually a cheaper way to send money overseas..... if..... it works

I pay my credit card bills most months this way so I know it works.  It's not that hard once you set up the accounts.

[blackvoice]

thanks :-)  this is actually a cheaper way to send money overseas..... if..... it works

I pay my credit card bills most months this way so I know it works.  It's not that hard once you set up the accounts.

Yes, it works

[yslyung]

another option is to use coinplug, no fees now & it have mobile app & it's in english !

can you withdraw funds to overseas account using korbit as per OP ?

if you wanna buy/sell locally, I do have some btc for trading. pls refer to my thread https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=529622.0

I'm also a member of the local bitcoin meeting in seoul.

[medicine]

Yes, Korbit also has zero fees now. I'm too lazy to update the post.

Your a member of the bitcoin meetup in Seoul?  Which one?

[yslyung]

Yes, Korbit also has zero fees now. I'm too lazy to update the post.

Your a member of the bitcoin meetup in Seoul?  Which one?

http://www.meetup.com/Seoul-Bitcoin-Meetup-%EC%84%9C%EC%9A%B8-%EB%B9%84%ED%8A%B8%EC%BD%94%EC%9D%B8-%EB%AA%A8%EC%9E%84/

[medicine]

Yes, Korbit also has zero fees now. I'm too lazy to update the post.

Your a member of the bitcoin meetup in Seoul?  Which one?

http://www.meetup.com/Seoul-Bitcoin-Meetup-%EC%84%9C%EC%9A%B8-%EB%B9%84%ED%8A%B8%EC%BD%94%EC%9D%B8-%EB%AA%A8%EC%9E%84/

Ah yes, that one.  I have attended before. My name is Chris. I cant make the meetings this month, but maybe I'll see you there next month?

[yslyung]

Yes, Korbit also has zero fees now. I'm too lazy to update the post.

Your a member of the bitcoin meetup in Seoul?  Which one?

http://www.meetup.com/Seoul-Bitcoin-Meetup-%EC%84%9C%EC%9A%B8-%EB%B9%84%ED%8A%B8%EC%BD%94%EC%9D%B8-%EB%AA%A8%EC%9E%84/

Ah yes, that one.  I have attended before. My name is Chris. I cant make the meetings this month, but maybe I'll see you there next month?

not too sure but i have to go n meet the guys up. i have good news for the group though. i'm working on it atm. ruben knows abt it. yeah maybe we'll meet in 1 of the meetings

[medicine]

Updated guide May 6th. 

Any questions let me know.

Peace

[medicine]

bump

Doing a presentation on this in Seoul this weekend and want it to be easy to find for newbies.

[hyunsookmom]

i have a few questions about holding bitcoin in Korea. Is it possible to use a bigger exchange out of Korea and then send USD or KRW to my bank in Korea and how does Tax work in that situation. I like Korbit but If I need to sell larger amounts it has limitations of a small vol and min fdaily transaction.


Would be good to get you ideas.

I have lived in Korea for some years, am a British national and want to sell quite a large amount of Bitcoin while sending money to my Korean bank.

[yslyung]

bump

Doing a presentation on this in Seoul this weekend and want it to be easy to find for newbies.

hi, it's me again. are you going to the meetup tmr ? where are you doing the presentation.

[medicine]

bump

Doing a presentation on this in Seoul this weekend and want it to be easy to find for newbies.

hi, it's me again. are you going to the meetup tmr ? where are you doing the presentation.

Yes I will attend the Seoul Tech Society meetup at 1pm.  It's at a building called d.camp in Gangnam.  You can find the details on the meetup website.  Did you rsvp?

[yslyung]

bump

Doing a presentation on this in Seoul this weekend and want it to be easy to find for newbies.

hi, it's me again. are you going to the meetup tmr ? where are you doing the presentation.

Yes I will attend the Seoul Tech Society meetup at 1pm.  It's at a building called d.camp in Gangnam.  You can find the details on the meetup website.  Did you rsvp?

says it's full, i called ruben but he said rvsp is by seoul tech society i'll be coming all the way from busan. if there's a spot i will snap pics n do some interview to feature us on crytpocoinsnews.com as i am in touch with 1 of the author. looks like i will miss it. i'm on the waiting list i think it's a long list ! also i'm helping my buddy running a datacenter here in busan too.

[medicine]

Heard it straight from one of the Korbit developers mouth yesterday, they are about 1 month away from rolling out the English version of their site.

One more month and this thread will be irrelevant. ha ha ha

[medicine]

Updated the guide again, hopefully for the last time.

Peace.

For Foreigners in Korea, Korbit has, as of today, launched their English version website.  As far as I know this is the only Exchange in Korea to have a fully functional English version website.

August 23rd 2014.

Peace

[medicine]

Update above. 

[jabo38]

I'm interested in following this.

[POM]

Some good info in here. Does Korbit offer instant buy?