bashuk#

Pinned#

🇺🇦 Supporting Ukraine

Posts#

🇺🇦 Supporting Ukraine#

Small steps that can make a big difference.

💵 Donate to Verified Fundraisers#

United24 - the initiative of the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskyy
Come Back Alive - biggest non-governmental foundation supporting the Armed Forces
KOLO - foundation for rapid support to the Ukrainian military
Hospitallers - volunteer organization of paramedics delivering life-saving support
Serhiy Prytula Foundation - foundation by the well-known volunteer since 2014

💡 Even the smallest donations count. United24 supports monthly credit card payments.

🧐 Stay Informed#

Instagram: @ukraine.ua ⠿ @libkos ⠿ @svidomi_eng ⠿ @ukrainer_en
Twitter/X: Ukraine at War
Reddit: Ukraine ⠿ UkraineWarVideoReport ⠿ UkrainianConflict ⠿ RussiaUkraineWar2022
Web: Ukrainian Truth

💡 Avoid information overload. Follow 1-2 channels that work best for you.

📣 Raise Awareness#

Share posts about the war on social media
Find and join local rallies and protests
Email local politicians, demand to: Arm Ukraine + Boycott Russian oil and gas + Recognise Russia as a terrorist state

🙌 Other Ways to Help#

Purchase Ukrainian goods
Boycott Russian products and services
Ship humanitarian aid to Ukraine
Share the link to this site: bashuk.net/war/

Got feedback? Let me know.

Browse all posts in reverse chronological order.

Regular batches of fresh donation jars from people around me, for anyone who prefers to go through a list once a week and distribute donations.

🗓️ December 27, 2025#

🗓️ December 20, 2025#

🗓️ December 13, 2025#

https://send.monobank.ua/jar/2VNjCmeXY3

🗓️ December 6, 2025#

🗓️ November 29, 2025#

🗓️ November 22, 2025#

🗓️ November 15, 2025#

🗓️ November 8, 2025#

🗓️ November 1, 2025#

🗓️ October 25, 2025#

🗓️ October 18, 2025#

🗓️ October 11, 2025#

🗓️ October 4, 2025#

🗓️ September 27, 2025#

🗓️ September 20, 2025#

🗓️ September 13, 2025#

🗓️ September 6, 2025#

I did not see any new jars.

🗓️ August 30, 2025#

🗓️ August 23, 2025#

🗓️ August 16, 2025#

🗓️ August 9, 2025#

🗓️ August 2, 2025#

🗓️ July 26, 2025#

🗓️ July 19, 2025#

🗓️ July 12, 2025#

🗓️ July 5, 2025#

🗓️ June 28, 2025#

🗓️ June 21, 2025#

🗓️ June 14, 2025#

🗓️ June 7, 2025#

🗓️ May 31, 2025#

🗓️ May 24, 2025#

🗓️ May 17, 2025#

🗓️ May 10, 2025#

🗓️ May 3, 2025#

🗓️ April 26, 2025#

🗓️ April 19, 2025#

🗓️ April 12, 2025#

🗓️ April 5, 2025#

🗓️ March 29, 2025#

🗓️ March 22, 2025#

🗓️ March 15, 2025#

🗓️ March 8, 2025#

🗓️ March 1, 2025#

🗓️ February 22, 2025#

🗓️ February 15, 2025#

🗓️ February 8, 2025#

🗓️ February 1, 2025#

🗓️ January 25, 2025#

🗓️ January 18, 2025#

🗓️ January 11, 2025#

🗓️ January 4, 2025#

🗓️ December 28, 2024#

🗓️ December 21, 2024#

🗓️ December 14, 2024#

🗓️ December 7, 2024#

🗓️ November 30, 2024#

🗓️ November 23, 2024#

🗓️ November 16, 2024#

🗓️ November 9, 2024#

🗓️ November 2, 2024#

🗓️ October 26, 2024#

🗓️ October 19, 2024#

Goal#

Transfer GBP to UAH on a Monobank card with minimal losses, and preferably quickly.

Exchange rate#

As of Sunday, October 12, 2025, 12:00:

	Google	Wise
GBP → EUR	1.1494	1.1490
GBP → UAH	55.2353	55.1079
EUR → UAH	48.19	47.9408

Comparison table#

Method	Rate	Fee	Composite exchange rate	Speed	Notes
Apple Pay	55.1572	1.768%	54.182 🔴	Instant	Fixed fee
Revolut (EUR SEPA)	55.05147	1%	54.500 🟡	45 min	Weekend fee
Revolut (EUR SEPA)	55.05147	0%	55.052 🟢	45 min	No fee on weekdays
Wise (IBAN)*	55.1079	1.52%	54.270 🔴	25 min	Fee for £100
Wise (IBAN)*	55.1079	0.796%	54.669 🟡	25 min	Fee for £500

* – Wise allows a maximum of ₴30k = £543 per transfer.

Details about each method#

Via Chase - Apple Pay#

Requested top up with 5500.00 UAH
Chase charged 5599.00 UAH (exactly +1.8% by Apply Pay)
- Reverse fee would be 0.01768173 (= 1 - 1 / 1.018) ~= 1.8% anyway
Chase charged £101.51 (converted at 55.1572)
Arrived instantly.

Via Revolut - Mono:#

Revolut 100 GBP to EUR:
- rate 100 gbp = 114.93 eur
- Weekend fee 1% = 1.15 eur
- Received €113.78
- Instant
Revolut eur to Mono eur:
- Sent €113.78
- Sent Sun 11:54
- Received 12:39
Mono Eur to Mono UAH:
- Rate 47.90
- No fees
- Instant
- €113.78 = 5450.06

Via Wise - Mono UAH (via bank transfer):#

Sending £100
- NOTE: currently can only send no more than 30k UAH ~= £543
Fee £1.52
- NOTE: the fee is progressively lower the more you send: £100 - £1.52, £500 - £3.98, £900 - £6.44
Exchange 55.1079
Receiving (100-1.52)*55.1079 = 5,427.026
Sent Sun 12:13
Received 12:36

Referral program#

Please ping me if you’re interested in IBKR after reading this note, and I’ll share a referral link.

Main use case#

Deposit USD from the US;
Convert USD to GBP;
Buy UCITS ETFs using GBP, potentially (but not necessarily) within an ISA;
Eventually sell the ETFs and withdraw GBP.

⚠️ IBKR is not happy when you only use their services to convert the currencies without further investing on their platform – they’ll be sending you a warning if you do so. If you’re not planning to use IBKR for investing, you should not use them for currency conversion either.

Commissions and fees#

Main source page: ibkr.co.uk/commissions

Depositing USD (via linked US account): free
Converting USD to GBP: 0.002% (min $2)
Trading ETFs in GBP (source):
- Tiered: 0.05% (min £1) + exchange (0.0045%) + clearing fees (£0.06 flat)
- Fixed - SmartRouting: 0.05% (min £3), no fees ← which is why I’m currently on Fixed
- Fixed - Direct routing: 0.10% (min £4), no fees
Withdrawing GBP: 1 free per month, then £1 per withdrawal
Account maintenance fees:
- General Investment Account fee: none
- ISA fee (source): minimum monthly activity fee of £3

USD-GBP conversion example#

On March 30, 2023, based on $10k conversion:

Google rate: GBP 1 = USD 1.23489, fee: N/A
IBKR rate: GBP 1 = USD 1.23504, fee: $2 (fixed)
Revolut rate: GBP 1 = 1.2357 USD, fee: £84 / year (fixed)
Wise rate: GBP 1 = USD 1.23500, fee: $32.89 (variable)

Time frames#

Depositing USD (via linked US account): 1 business day
Converting USD to GBP: instant
Trading ETFs in GBP: instant
Withdrawing GBP: 3 business days

Pros and cons#

✅ Low fees.
✅ Very detailed reports in the Performance & Reports tab.
🚫 You can’t use IBKR to transfer-convert-withdraw GBP immediately.
- IBKR is not just a bank, it’s primarily an investment platform, so if you don’t invest GBP and instead just withdraw it immediately – you’ll get a warning from IBKR, and eventually will have your account restricted.
👎 Crappy UI:
- Slow to load, sometimes just loads forever after navigating to a page;
- Not noob-friendly;
- The “Transfer & Pay” tab just doesn’t load half of the times.
- Does crazy rounding on mobile app

💡 The best way to see the activity and the snapshot of the account is to generate an activity statement: Performance & Reports → Statements → Activity → Year to Date.

FAQ#

What does PRO mean in IBKR PRO?
- In the US, there is an IBKR Lite version. But it’s not available for UK-domiciled customers.
What is SmartRouting?
- SmartRouting is an automated system that searches multiple market centers and exchanges to identify the best available bid and ask prices for a given security.
- SmartRouting was applied to my purchase of VUSA ETF on the Fixed tier.
What is the interest rate on the cash credit?
- For GBP, it’s 3.275% for credit above £8,000 (source).
What are Live and Paper options?
- Live is your real account. Paper is a simulator where you start with 1M GBP.
Do I need to file a W8-BEN form?
- Upon creating an account, a Combined CRS/IRS Tax Form is created that is a substitute for W8-BEN. To view the form, go to Settings → click on your name above the ‘Account Holder’, check the ‘Tax Forms’ list item (last row of the list).

🇺🇦 Читати інструкцію українською: bashuk.net/uk/posts/crypto/
🤝 Credits for translation: Ivan Mylianyk, Kateryna Tverdokhlib
🔍 Spotted a mistake? Let me know: hello@bashuk.net

ℹ️ Why crypto?#

The Guide below describes purchase and transfer of stable cryptocurrency Tether (1 USDT = $1) in GBP via Kraken platform (FCA regulated).

✅ Relevant: Chmut is grateful for donations in crypto and uses it to by “specific products”. Prytula asks for crypto, prays for it, uses it to buy thermal imagers and “hell cars”. Chobanian explains how crypto can save lives.
✅ Fast: works 24/7, transfers in minutes.
✅ Cheap: total fee = 0.2% of total amount + $4 flat rate.
✅ Efficient: fair exchange rate, no double conversion.
✅ Simple: only the address of the crypto wallet is required.
✅ Confirmation: transaction is traceable in public blockchain explorers.

🪜 Step-by-step guide#

ℹ️ Note. The author is not responsible for potential fuck-ups. And generally is not responsible for anything. Please be careful and exercise caution.

Register on Kraken: https://www.kraken.com/
Verify your account: Menu in top right → Get Verified → Intermediate → follow the instructions.
Add GBP to your account: Funding tab at the top → Deposit → GBP → follow the instructions. Once the top-up payment is made, it may take 5-10 minutes for the account balance to update.
ℹ️ Note. I used the Fund with Plaid option → Monzo, works perfectly.
Buy USDT: At the top left corner under the kraken-button press Market → enter “USDT GBP” → Trade → Simple tab:
- Order: Buy
- Volume: <transfer-amount-in-pounds> GBP
- Order type: Market
- Press Buy USDT with GBP
Find the wallet address of the recipient: We need the USDT TRC-20 address (a.k.a. Tether TRC-20):
- Example #2: TX9aN...BXWzon for Come Back Alive fund (Povernys Zhyvym)
⚠️ CAUTION! USDT ERC-20, Tether ERC-20, TUSD – all of these are completely different currencies. It must say specifically “USDT” or “Tether”, AND specifically “TRC-20”.
Send USDT: Funding tab → Withdraw → USDT:
- Withdrawal type: Tether USD (TRC20)
- Withdrawal address: <address-from-step-5-above>
- Withdrawal amount: <transfer-amount-in-dollars> USDT
- Press Withdraw USDT
Now wait: It usually takes a few minutes for the the transaction to be completed and for the status to change to Success.
Check the transaction: Funding tab → Recent transactions → click on the ID → click on Transaction ID to be transferred to tronscan.org, where you can check your transaction on blockchain.
ℹ️ Note. You need to use the Funding tab, and not the History tab. The latter shows all the transactions, but won’t give you the blockchain transaction ID.
ℹ️ Note. Alternatively, visit tronscan.org, enter the recipient’s wallet address, and then navigate to the Transfers tab. You should see your transaction there.

👛 Who accepts crypto?#

Ministry of Digital Transformation of Ukraine – the mail official crypto-wallet of Ukraine
Come Back Alive (Повернись Живим) – biggest non-governmental organization providing support to the Armed Forces of Ukraine
Prytula Foundation – another big and reliable fund
KOLO – smaller foundation specialised in rapid support to the Ukrainian military

🤔 Why this way and not that way?#

All the fancy details for the most curious folks.

Why…#

… crypto? 🪙#

Transfers in ordinary (fiat) currencies have significant disadvantages. I have compared several payment methods accepted by several well-known funds, and every single one of them isn’t that great:

Any transfers to hryvnia (UAH) accounts: Double conversion into hryvnia and back. You pay in pounds, the fund receives hryvnias and then exchanges them for pounds / dollars / euros and buys ammunition in Europe for them. Given the volatility of the hryvnia exchange rate, double conversion is, to put it mildly, suboptimal.
Card systems: Moderate fees (1-3%) + potential limits on cards. For example, the Fondy card system used by the Come Back Alive foundation takes more than 2% of the transfer amount in fees.
Paypal: High fees (3-4%).
SWIFT: Unpredictable flat fee not known beforehand (0-25 USD), takes long time, not working on weekends. Lack of payment confirmation, payments sometimes get lost, and you won’t even know unless you’re in direct contact with the recipient.

The crypto solves all these problems. It is fast (arrives in minutes, works 24/7), cheap (fees about 0.2% - read more below), optimal (avoids conversion into hryvnia), and with confirmation of delivery via a public blockchain explorer.

For completeness, it is necessary to describe the shortcomings of the crypto:

Learning curve: It takes a little time and caution to understand everything, but it’s not that difficult, and it’s worth it. IT folks should definitely be okay with it.
Higher cost of error: Theoretically, you can accidentally send money to the wrong address, and then it’s definitely lost forever. But given the confusing details of SWIFT, it’s quite easy to mess up a SWIFT payment too - and you won’t even know if your money has arrived.
Currency stability: No one gives a full guarantee that your crypto will cost as much tomorrow as it does today. But there is such a risk with ordinary currencies. In addition, we do not invest in the crypto for the long run: you send it today – it’ll be put to use by foundations tomorrow.

If you are looking for more motivation - check this quote from Mykhailo Fedorov, the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine, as well as this appeal by Serhii Prytula, one of the best-known volunteers of Ukraine right now.

… USDT? 💲#

Let’s check out the top-3 cryptocurrencies on the market:

BTC (Bitcoin): High volatility due to the speculative price, is not backed up by material goods. Can grow 24% in three weeks, but can also drop as fast.
ETC (Ether): Same as BTC, just a different currency.
USDT (Tether): Cryptocurrency that is backed by real US Dollars (according to claims by the issuing company). By design, 1 USDT = $1, and the creators claim that thy have enough cash to back every issued crypto coin. That said, there is no confirmation to that, and it’s quite easy to find sceptical reviews on YouTube. That said, it’s been working for many years now without any major incidents ¯\(ツ)/¯

The first two are good for long-run optimistic investments, the latter – for making payments to charities and merchants. Charity funds sometimes buy stuff using crypto, but even if they need to convert your crypto to real cash/fiat currencies – crypto is still the optimal medium for transferring money.

… TRC-20? ⛓️#

Alrighty, so we know that we want to buy USDT. But there are several variations of it, in particular – TRC-20 and ERC-20. So what’s the difference?

It’s worth explaining the basics of crypto (at least the way I understood it). Blockchain itself is just a technology which allows to reliably and transparently save information about transactions: who gave who and what. Blockchains are not always restricted by a single currency. In fact, they are not limited by currencies in general: NFT tokens are transferred via blockchains too.

That being said, every blockchain has its “major” currency – the one which it started with. For Ethereum (blockchain) that’s Ether (cryptocurrency), and for Tron (blockchain) that’s TRX (cryptocurrency).

Coming back to Tether (USDT), it has two main implementations: one is implemented on Ethereum, and is denoted as ERC-20, the other one – on the Tron blockchain, and is denoted as TRC-20.

Transfers within Tron are faster and cheaper, which is why I picked specifically USDT TRC-20 as the main cryptocurrency for donations.

⚠️ CAUTION! You can only make transfers within a single blockchain. To send USDT onto TRC-20 wallet (within the Tron blockchain), you need to send it from a TRC-20 wallet. Despite Tether being a “single” cryptocurrency, it has several absolutely independent implementations.

… Kraken? 🐙#

Our goals is to legally convert GBP into USDT TRC-20, and then send it. So I optimised for the following signals:

Registration with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA);
Fee for purchasing crypto;
Fee for sending (”withdrawing”) crypto from your account onto another account.

Optimal choice within the UK is Kraken: it’s registered with the FCA (FCA page, Kraken page), has the record-beating low fees for purchasing stablecoins, including USDT (0.2%), and offers cheap transfers in USDT ($3).

I also looked into Coinbase and Binance, but they have slightly worse fees, and they are not registered with the FCA.

They fit my lifestyle really well, though I admit this kind of device is not for everyone.

👍 Pros#

Why I like them, in no particular order:

They look stylish, so I can wear them even when I am not filming anything.
Built-in speakers let me listen to music without losing touch with the real world. That is useful while running or cycling, when I still need to hear what is happening around me.
I have used them as an action camera on a bicycle, roller skates, climbing / via ferrata, unstable motor boats, sports games, while driving, and in many other situations where both hands are needed or holding a phone feels risky. I recently realized they could also be useful for recording myself playing guitar.
When traveling, they are convenient as a camera that is always ready. You walk around a new city and know that something interesting can happen any second. Taking out a phone, waking it, and launching the camera takes two or three seconds that you sometimes do not have. If I am already wearing the glasses, pressing the button without looking is easy.
The videos are first-person, which sometimes helps preserve memories from my actual point of view: where I looked, what caught my attention, how I experienced a place. It also works well for recording first moments of warm meetings with friends you have not seen for years, or just having a beer with friends at Oktoberfest. That is harder to do naturally with a phone.

👎 Cons#

There are drawbacks, some obvious and some less so:

Videos are limited to 60 seconds.
The videos are square, optimized for Instagram.
The glasses can store maybe around 20 minutes of video before memory runs out and you need to transfer files to the phone.
Stabilization is decent and resolution is acceptable, but it is nowhere near modern smartphones or GoPro.
Unlike real action cameras, they are delicate, afraid of water, and afraid of drops, like normal glasses.

⚖️ RB Stories vs iPhone vs GoPro#

I love this device because it fills the gap between smartphones, action cameras, stylish glasses, and wireless headphones. In each category there are devices that are much better at the specialized job, but these glasses combine the tradeoffs nicely.

I am not an extreme-sports person. I need hands-free filming at most once every few months, so buying a GoPro and dealing with mounts and spare batteries feels like too much work.
I always have a phone with me, but it needs hands and does not really give the same first-person view.
I do not need another pair of glasses.
I do have separate running headphones, but they look very sporty and do not work with normal non-sports clothes.

A demo instead of a thousand words#

One of my favorite videos: I am the camera operator. You cannot really shoot that on a phone. 🙂

Well, maybe you can, but I would worry about the phone, and probably about myself too. 😄

💡 Don’t forget to select the highest quality on YouTube.

🧐 Bonus for the curious#

Q: What about the camera being shifted to the side? Does the video look off-center because you record slightly to the right of your focus?

A: I have never noticed it in practice.

Q: Does transferring videos to the phone take long?

A: Transferring 15-20 videos takes about two minutes total. Not instant, but not painful either.

Q: How long does the battery last?

A: The battery lasts a long time if you take photos and listen to music, but drains faster when filming video. Memory is usually the bigger limitation than battery.

They also charge from the case, which has a large battery. One full case charge is probably around ten charges for the glasses. So it is enough to put them in the case occasionally when you are not filming, and then battery is not really a problem.

Referral program#

Please ping me if you’re interested in Amex after reading this note, and I’ll share a referral link. You’ll get £25, I’ll get £30, everyone’s happy. 🎉

My personal use case#

Buy stuff online and in stores using Amex credit card;
Get cashback.

Which Amex card should I get?#

Amex offers several different types of cards with different benefits. Some of them reward you with miles and discounts in selected stores, but I was primarily interested in cashback.

Amex has two main types of cashback credit cards:

Platinum Cashback Everyday:
- No fees.
- 0.5% cashback on first £10k of purchases every year, 1% over £10k.
- New customers get 5% cashback on your purchases (up to £100) in the first 3 months.
Platinum Cashback:
- Annual £25 fee.
- 0.75% cashback on first £10k, 1.25% over £10k.
- New customers get 5% cashback on your purchases (up to £125) in the first 3 months.

Simple arithmetic shows that if you’re planning to spend £10k/year or more, it’s worth getting the Platinum Cashback card with a fee and higher rates, if less – then the free Everyday version will work better.

I heard that Amex isn’t accepted everywhere, is that so?#

The only places where Amex isn’t accepted are usually small non-chain no-name grocery stores or family restaurants. So yes, occasionally I buy stuff in places where Amex isn’t accepted, but it’s quite rare.

More importantly, most of the places where you’re likely to spend most of your money on the large purchases all accept Amex. A few examples:

Big sellers-of-everything like Amazon and Argos;
Airlines and hotels;
Brand stores like Gap, Mango, Zara, Nike, etc.;
Chains stores like M&S, Waitrose, Sainsbury’s, Tesco, Boots, etc.;
Chain restaurants like Flat Iron, Honest Burgers, Five Guys, etc.;
Subscription services like Spotify, Netflix, etc.;
TFL;
Ukrainian social club @ Holland Park.

Are there any other alternatives for cashback cards?#

There’s one other card you should know about: Chase debit card. It offers 1% cashback on any purchases you make with it, with no annual fees. And it’s a Mastercard, so it’s accepted everywhere.

There’s one major downside: 1% cashback is only offered on your first year with Chase.

For me, it’s a very nice addition to my Amex card (I always have them both on me), but not a replacement. Several reasons:

Convenience. I never have to worry about topping it up, I just spend the bank’s money, and they charge my linked bank account once a month.
Credit score. No one can tell for sure how big of a deal it is in the UK, but I did notice that my Experian score bumped when I started using Amex.
Bank’s money. Using Amex’s money for entire month allows me to keep my money on my accounts for a bit longer, which yields interest/gains from investments. It’s almost like I’m borrowing Amex’s money every month to make gains from it and they return it back to them.

✅ UPDATE 2022/09/07: Money reached the NBU!#

Accidents happen. Luckily, the world is full of great people to help with the recovery.

Turns out, some folks in J.P. Morgan Chase noticed the payments early on, and took an action fairly quickly to forward the funds to the National Bank of Ukraine.

Quote from a J.P. Morgan Chase employee:

The issue was resolved and the funds were credited to the correct account of Bank of Ukraine.
The account quoted wasn’t a valid account so they did not go into an incorrect account but went into a repair queue.
There was enough referencing in the payments to conclude that the ultimate beneficiary of the intended payments was Bank Of Ukraine’s account held with JPMorgan and following much internal consultation the funds were applied correctly.

Quote from another employee regarding my individual donation:

We have been continuing our investigation into this matter and have more positive news.
The transaction in question for GBP x,xxx.xx with related reference SUPPORTING UA ARMY, remittance info RC/xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx was part of bulk credit for GBP xxx,xxx.xx. This was applied on the 07th March to National Bank of Ukraine’s account with a back value date of 28th Feb. We hope with this information that you can reassure the remitter that the funds were received by National Bank of Ukraine, even though the account number quoted in the instruction was incorrect.

I feel deeply grateful to everyone who was involved in the investigation and the recovery of these misdirected funds. Thanks to your efforts, the defenders of Ukraine received the critical support they desperately needed in the very first days of the war, and the volunteers can finally have a peace of mind that their donations indeed reached Ukraine.

Thank you. ✊🇺🇦❤️

I’ll keep this page alive for historical purpose, but I’m feeling relieved to finally say that this problem is solved and the case is closed.

🎯 TL;DR:#

I have reasons to believe that £422,800 worth of donations to Ukraine is currently stuck with J.P. Morgan Chase due to a mistake.
All the requests and complaints to J.P. Morgan Chase are being ignored for 6 months now.
If you can, please help the money to reach the intended destination.

📚 Context#

Fact 1: UK wire transfers should bounce back if an account doesn’t exist#

Click the arrow to learn where John Smith keeps his money.

In the UK, domestic wire transfers (a.k.a. Faster Payments, FPS) are made using the following payee details:

Recipient’s name (e.g. John Smith);
Sort code – 6-digit identifier of a specific bank branch (e.g. 12-34-56);
Account number – 8-digit identifier of an account within the branch (e.g. 12345678).

That’s all you need to know to make a payment – a name, a sort code, and an account number.

If an account matching the details doesn’t exist, the recipient bank is supposed to reject the transaction. In this case, the sender observes the payment “bouncing back” into their account shortly after it is sent.

Fact 2: National Bank of Ukraine is running fundraisers since February#

Click the arrow to learn how NBU is helping Ukraine.

The National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) is Ukraine’s primary governmental financial institution – similar to the Bank of England here in England.

Since 25th February 2022, shortly after Russia started the full-scale invasion of Ukraine, NBU has been running the official governmental fundraiser campaigns for the Armed Forces and Humanitarian Aid. In the first days of the full-scale war, NBU was the single most trustworthy fundraiser at the time.

There were many British citizens and Ukrainian residents of the UK who wanted to help Ukraine. For fundraising in British pounds (GBP), NBU opened an account in J.P. Morgan Chase. The account details are available by the links at the top of the bank’s homepage.

🧐 Crucial mistake of the National Bank of Ukraine#

Non-existent account details provided by NBU#

In the first days of war, due to the chaos and human error, the maintainers of the official NBU website listed incorrect information for GBP payments for about 2 days.

During February 25-26, the payment details mentioned the correct sort-code in J.P. Morgan Chase bank, but an account number from their other account with the Bank of England.

Click the image to enlarge and see the details:

NBU payment details showing the incorrect GBP account number

Evidence of the honest mistake#

Click the arrow to learn more.

There’s plenty of evidence confirming what happened:

Internet Archive snapshots of the NBU’s website shows that incorrect account details remained published for about 18 hours on Feb 25-26

Feb 25, 17:57 GMT – no FPS (8-digit) account number
Feb 25, 18:21 GMT – non-existent FPS account number (first confirmed occurrence)
Feb 26, 11:32 GMT – non-existent FPS account number (last confirmed occurrence)
Feb 26, 13:49 GMT – no FPS account number

The official website of the Government of Ukraine shows that the “incorrect” account number is taken from the NBU’s account in the Bank of England

Government portal (Internet Archive snapshot)

Random third-party websites that copied the incorrect details and surface them up to this day

All of the above clearly shows that account number 40000982 exists in the Bank of England, but doesn’t exist in J.P. Morgan Chase’s branch with sort code 60-92-42, and never did.

Probabilistic proof of non-existence of the account#

There’s some boring pseudo-math inside, click the arrow if you’re really curious.

Let’s ignore the name on the account for a second. What are the chances that account number 40000982 exists in J.P. Morgan Chase’s branch 60-92-42 at all, under some other name?

I found several websites providing the list of all UK sort codes – around 18,100 sort codes in total (source 1, source 2).

HM Treasury reports that as of June 2020, the 9 largest banks had a total of 7.2M basic accounts opened with them. This figure doesn’t include business accounts and smaller banks, so to be safe, let’s just make it 10x larger, estimating that there are 72M bank accounts opened in the UK.

72M accounts in 18k branches means that on average, there is roughly 4000 accounts per sort code. Obviously, high street banks will have more customers, and specialised institutions serving National Banks of other countries will have fewer accounts, but let’s ignore that.

Finally, each sort code can have any 8-digit combination as an account number – that’s 100M combinations.

If the sort code 60-92-42 has 4000 existing accounts, and you send money to one of the 100M possible account numbers – your chances of hitting a real account are 4000 our of 100,000,000.

That’s 0.004%.

And that’s based on some optimistic assumptions. The fewer real accounts within a sort code – the lower your chances will be.

The point is that, probabilistically speaking, it’s very unlikely that an account 40000982 exists at all, even under a different owner.

My own payment info#

Below is the information about a specific payment I made on the 26th February 2022. Some information is hidden for privacy purposes, but I’m ready to provide the complete details to anyone with a @jpmorgan.com or @chase.com email address, or similar.

Click the arrow to learn more.

Sender info
Sender	Oleksandr Bashuk
Sender bank name	Santander UK PLC
Sender bank BIC	ABBYGB2LXXX
Sender bank sort code	09-01-29
Sender account number	(hidden)
Non-existing recipient info
Beneficiary name	National Bank of Ukraine
Beneficiary bank name	JP Morgan Chase
Beneficiary bank BIC	CHASGB2L
Beneficiary sort code	60-92-42
Beneficiary account number	40000982 (wrong)
Payment info
Payment amount	(hidden)
Payment date	26th February 2022
Payment reference	SUPPORTING UA ARMY
Transaction reference number	(hidden)

⚠️ Why J.P. Morgan Chase is also responsible#

Firstly, since account number 40000982 (wrong) was taken from a different bank, it most likely doesn’t exist in J.P. Morgan Chase’s branch with sort code 60-92-42. J.P. Morgan Chase should’ve declined the incoming payment, but it didn’t.

Secondly, even after J.P. Morgan Chase accepted the payment, it should’ve reverted it after numerous requests from Santander (sender bank) and the National Bank of Ukraine (intended beneficiary) – because quite evidently, this money was sent to a wrong, non-existent account. But J.P. Morgan Chase didn’t.

After 6 months of ignoring all the requests and complaints from both the NBU representatives and me, J.P. Morgan Chase still keeps the money.

📊 Impact estimation#

Estimation for the whole UK#

There are around 42,280 Ukrainians living in the UK.

Click the arrow to learn how I figured that out.

According to 2021 census data, approximately 37,530 people were born in Ukraine and were usual residents in England and Wales in March 2021.

According to Wikipedia summary based on the same 2021 census, the total population of England and Wales combined is 56.17M people, while the total for Scotland and Northern Ireland is 7.11M.

Assuming that the density of Ukrainians throughout the UK roughly matches the density of overall population, it’s fair to estimate that in 2021 there were 42,280 Ukrainians residing in the UK:

	Total Population (source)	Ukrainians
England + Wales	53.11M + 3.06M = 56.17M	37,530 (source)
Scotland + Northern Ireland	5.30M + 1.81M = 7.11M	4,750 (est.)
Total in the UK	63,285,145	42,280 (est.)

If every 10th Ukrainian donated £100 on average, then we’re talking about £422,800 that was lost and never reached Ukraine. I firmly believe this estimation is a lower bound, as it doesn’t take into account hundreds of non-Ukrainians who also helped Ukraine.

None of the donations reached their destination. NBU hasn’t received the money, and senders neither got it back nor were notified that the recipient account doesn’t exist – most people aren’t even aware of the problem up to this day.

Within my circle of about 15 Ukrainian friends in London, 3 of us sent money to this non-existing payee, totalling £11,900 in donations. We all discovered and used these payee details separately and independently, without talking to each other.

That’s roughly one out of five people, with an average donation of almost £4,000 per person.

📣 Requests and complaints (spoiler: no results)#

For the last 6 months I’ve been trying to get J.P. Morgan Chase’s attention to the problem. They rejected my bank’s requests to recall the payment, ignored my emails and letters, and gave very unclear and indefinitive replies to NBU.

Click the arrow to see a looong list of complaints.

When	Who to whom	What	Response
February 26, 2022	Alex → Santander (sender bank)	Request to recall the payment	Santander: “J.P. Morgan Chase refused to revert the transaction”
February 28, 2022	Alex → NBU	Request to confirm the receipt of funds.	NBU: “NBU hasn’t received the payment, as wrong account number was used”
April 11, 2022	NBU → J.P. Morgan Chase	Request to locate and forward the payment from Alex	J.P. Morgan Chase: “We’re looking into it”
April 20, 2022	NBU → J.P. Morgan Chase	Request to locate and forward the payment from Alex	J.P. Morgan Chase: “We’re looking into it”
May 23, 2022	NBU → J.P. Morgan Chase	Request to locate and forward the payment from Alex	J.P. Morgan Chase: “We couldn’t locate the payment, but we’ll try to escalate this case”
June 17, 2022	Alex → Santander (sender bank)	Request to recall the payment or forward the transaction to the correct account number	Santander: “J.P. Morgan Chase refused to look into the duplicate request”
July 13, 2022	Alex → Santander (sender bank)	Written complaint via letter with a request to recall the payment	Santander: “The beneficiary has declined to return the funds and Santander are not able to assist further”
July 13, 2022	NBU → J.P. Morgan Chase	Request to provide an official written reply to the requests from the past	J.P. Morgan Chase: “Can’t provide a final reply yet, still looking into it”
July 22, 2022	Alex → J.P. Morgan Chase	Written complaint via letter with a request to recall the payment	None.

🙏 Help needed#

✅ NOTE: This case is closed, help is no longer required – please check out the top of the page. I thank everyone who helped to investigate and recover the misdirected payments!
The section below is preserved as-is for historical purpose, please take no further action.

This money doesn’t belong to anyone but the people of Ukraine who desperately need it right now. Recovering these payments is vitally important and will help to save many Ukrainians lives.

If you work for J.P. Morgan Chase (or know anyone who does)#

Please help me to get the attention of the bank to this issue. I’m ready to provide any details from my side about my individual donation, but generally, we need to recover any payments sent using the following details:

Beneficiary name: National Bank of Ukraine
Beneficiary sort code: 60-92-42
Beneficiary account number: 40000982 (wrong)

All such payments need to be forwarded to the correct account of the National Bank of Ukraine, using the up-to-date payment details from the NBU’s website.

If you know anyone who works for J.P. Morgan Chase, please share the link to this page with them, and ask them to help. Thanks!

https://bashuk.net/posts/donations-to-ukraine-stuck-in-jpmorgan/

If you’re a journalist or a public figure#

Please help me to raise the awareness of this issue. The more people know about the problem, the sooner we’ll get this resolved by J.P. Morgan Chase.

If you donated funds to Ukraine in February#

First of all, a massive thank you. It was a critical time for our country, and all donations were invaluable.

Second of all, please check the details of your payments, there is a chance that your donation was also affected by the same problem.

If you sent any money to the account 40000982, please let me know. The more people we find, the stronger the case, the higher the chances for a successful outcome.

✉️ My contact info#

Here’s how you can get in touch with me:

Email: (hidden)
Facebook: (hidden)

Glory to Ukraine! Слава Україні! ✊🇺🇦❤️