Last checked 25 September 2026
Every comparison of money transfer services stops at the moment the money arrives. But a balance in a mobile wallet is not cash, and turning it into cash costs money — between nothing and 2% of the whole transfer, depending on the country, the amount, and which counter your recipient walks up to. That cost is invisible to you, because it is paid by somebody else, after you have stopped paying attention.
This page compares that last step across the three wallets our readers send to most: GCash in the Philippines, bKash in Bangladesh and easypaisa in Pakistan. Every figure is from the operator’s own published schedule.
The short version
| Wallet | Cheapest published route | Most likely route in practice |
|---|---|---|
| GCash (Philippines) | 2% — there is no cheaper tier | 2% |
| bKash (Bangladesh) | 0.70% — remittance money, partner ATM only | 1.85% at an agent |
| easypaisa (Pakistan) | Free — easypaisa Bank branch ATMs | Tiered fee, roughly 1.4–2% |
Three countries, three completely different pricing philosophies. And in two of the three, the cheapest route is not the one your recipient will instinctively use.
GCash: a flat 2%, and it never gets cheaper
GCash is the simplest to describe and the least forgiving. Its help centre states it in one line: a 2% fee applies for all cash outs at partner outlets — Cebuana Lhuillier, M. Lhuillier, Puregold, SM Store, Robinsons, ECPay, PeraHUB, TrueMoney and the rest. The GCash Pera Outlet route, the sari-sari shop network, uses the same 2%.
There is no remittance rate, no loyalty tier, no volume break. ₱1,000 costs ₱20. ₱50,000 costs ₱1,000.
That last figure is worth sitting with. On a large transfer, GCash’s withdrawal cost can comfortably exceed everything you paid your remittance provider — fee and exchange-rate margin combined. You optimised the visible cost and left the invisible one untouched.
Withdrawing via a GCash Card at an ATM works differently and carries the ATM’s own fee, so it is worth your recipient comparing. Money left in the wallet and spent directly — bills, QR payments, transfers — avoids the cash-out step entirely, which on GCash is the single biggest saving available.
bKash: the only one that treats remittance money differently
bKash publishes four rates, and the gap between the best and worst is the widest of any wallet here.
| Route | Per BDT 1,000 | As a percentage |
|---|---|---|
| Remittance money at a partner ATM | 7.00 | 0.70% |
| Priyo Agent (to 50,000/month, 2 agents set) | 13.95 | 1.395% |
| Partner ATM, ordinary balance | 14.90 | 1.49% |
| Any other agent | 18.50 | 1.85% |
bKash is alone among the three in giving remittance money its own discounted rate, and at 0.70% it is by a distance the cheapest paid route on this page. It also covers the government and bank incentives sitting in the wallet, and it does not expire.
But it is ATM-only. Withdraw the same remittance money at an agent — including a Priyo Agent — and ordinary agent charges apply. Agents are how most people in Bangladesh withdraw, so the default behaviour costs more than two and a half times the discounted rate.
There is a second trap. If a withdrawal exceeds the remittance balance, the ordinary charge applies to the entire withdrawal, not just the excess. The full mechanics, including bKash’s own worked examples and the multiple-of-500 rule, are in sending money to bKash from abroad.
easypaisa: flat fees, which means the percentage falls
Pakistan works on a completely different model. easypaisa charges a fixed rupee amount per band rather than a percentage, which changes the arithmetic as the amount rises.
| Withdrawal | Fee (incl. tax) | Effective rate |
|---|---|---|
| Rs 501 – 1,000 | Rs 20 | 2.00% at Rs 1,000 |
| Rs 8,001 – 10,000 | Rs 180 | 1.80% at Rs 10,000 |
| Rs 20,001 – 25,000 | Rs 380 | 1.52% at Rs 25,000 |
| Rs 40,001 – 50,000 | Rs 690 | 1.38% at Rs 50,000 |
| easypaisa Bank branch ATM | Free | 0% |
| Other banks’ ATMs | Rs 35 | Falls with amount |
Two things fall out of this. First, the effective rate drops as the amount rises — the opposite of GCash, where 2% is 2% forever. Withdrawing in one go is cheaper than withdrawing in pieces, which is the reverse of the advice that suits bKash.
Second, easypaisa is the only wallet here with a genuinely free cash-out: ATM withdrawal at easypaisa Bank Ltd. branch ATMs. The schedule also notes cash deposit and withdrawal at easypaisa branches are free for Digital Accounts. Where a branch ATM is reachable, the entire cost of this step disappears.
The Rs 35 flat fee at other banks’ ATMs is worth knowing too — it is a poor deal on Rs 1,000 and a very good one on Rs 50,000.
The same amount, three countries
Comparing across currencies is not meaningful in absolute terms, so here is the percentage each wallet takes on a mid-sized and a large withdrawal, by the routes actually available.
| Best available route | Typical agent/outlet route | |
|---|---|---|
| GCash, any amount | 2.00% | 2.00% |
| bKash, any amount | 0.70% (remittance, ATM) | 1.85% |
| easypaisa, ~10,000 | Free (branch ATM) | 1.80% |
| easypaisa, ~50,000 | Free (branch ATM) | 1.38% |
The spread between the best and worst column is the money nobody talks about. On a transfer worth roughly 50,000 in local currency it is around 2% in the Philippines, 1.15 percentage points in Bangladesh, and the entire fee in Pakistan.
For context: that is the same order of magnitude as the difference between a good and a bad exchange rate, which is what everyone actually shops around for.
What this means when you choose where to send
Four things follow, and none of them appear on a comparison table.
- Ask how the money will be used before choosing a wallet. If your recipient will spend it digitally — bills, shops, transfers — the cash-out cost never arises and none of this matters. If they need physical cash, it always does.
- A wallet is not always the right destination. A bank account may cost nothing to withdraw from. On a large transfer to the Philippines in particular, 2% is a strong argument for sending to a bank instead.
- Withdrawal strategy differs by country. On easypaisa, withdraw in one large movement. On bKash, withdraw up to the remittance balance and never past it. On GCash it makes no difference, because the rate never moves.
- Tell your recipient which counter to use. This is the part you can control and the part almost no sender does. The cheapest route exists in two of these three countries and is not the obvious one in either.
Questions people ask
Which wallet is cheapest to take money out of?
easypaisa, if a branch ATM is reachable, because that route is free. Otherwise bKash’s 0.70% remittance ATM rate is the cheapest paid route. GCash is the most expensive at any amount, at a flat 2%.
Does the sender pay any of this?
No, which is exactly why it goes unnoticed. It comes out of the amount your recipient receives, after the transfer is complete.
Is it cheaper to withdraw in one go or in pieces?
It depends on the country, which is why there is no universal advice. On easypaisa’s flat tiers, one large withdrawal is proportionally cheaper. On GCash’s flat percentage it makes no difference. On bKash the constraint is the remittance balance, not the size.
Can the money be spent without cashing out?
In all three cases yes, and it is the most reliable way to avoid this cost altogether. Bills, merchant payments and transfers do not go through the cash-out schedule.
How we checked this
Read on 25 September 2026: the GCash help centre article “How to cash out at Partner Outlets”, for the 2% fee applying to all cash outs and the list of partner outlets, and its Pera Outlet guidance for the same 2%; bKash’s Cash Out page, for the 13.95, 14.90 and 18.50 per thousand rates, and its Discounted Remittance ATM Cash Out FAQ for the 0.70% remittance rate and the agent exclusion; and easypaisa’s Schedule of Bank Charges — Branchless Banking for July to September 2026, for the full cash withdrawal fee table, the free ATM withdrawal at easypaisa Bank Ltd. branch ATMs, the Rs 35 service fee on other ATM withdrawals, and the note that cash deposit and withdrawal at easypaisa branches are free for Digital Accounts.
What we left out, and a warning about dates
easypaisa’s schedule is quarterly, and the one we read runs to September 2026 — it expires within days of this page being published. The structure is unlikely to change overnight, but the numbers can. Check the current schedule on easypaisa’s own site before relying on a figure here.
We have not published easypaisa’s charge for receiving an international home remittance. The line exists in its schedule, but the published table did not let us map the charge to that line with certainty, and a fee quoted wrongly is worse than one left out.
We have also not covered JazzCash, Maya, GrabPay or ShopeePay here. They are real options; we have not read their current schedules, and we are not going to estimate.
Afromium does not make test transfers. Every fee on this page was read from the operator’s own published schedule on the date given and is quoted, not estimated. Wallet charge schedules change more often than bank ones — treat this as a guide to the structure, and check the current figure before acting.