How much cash can you fly with

You must declare cash of £10,000 or more to UK customs if you’re carrying it between Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales) and a country outside the UK.

If you’re travelling to Northern Ireland and carrying more than €10,000 (or equivalent) you must follow the rules for taking cash into Northern Ireland.

The earliest you can make a declaration is 72 hours before you plan to travel.

Taking cash in and out of Northern Ireland

You must declare cash of €10,000 or more if you carry it between Northern Ireland and any non-EU country.

You must also declare cash of €10,000 or more if you’re arriving in Northern Ireland from Great Britain. You do not need to declare any amount of cash when travelling the other way, from Northern Ireland to Great Britain.

Customs authorities may ask you to fill in a cash disclosure form if you send cash by freight, post or parcel between Northern Ireland and any non-EU country. This includes if you send cash from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

Types of cash you must declare

You must declare:

• notes and coins
• bearer bonds
• travellers’ cheques
• cheques (including travellers’ cheques) that are signed but not made out to a person or organisation

If you are carrying cash in or out of Northern Ireland, you must also declare:

• money orders
• gold coins, bullion or nuggets
• prepaid cards

What you’ll need to make a declaration

You’ll need to give details of:

• who’s carrying the cash, the owner of it and the recipient of it - including passport or ID document number, and address
• your journey - with any countries you pass through in transit, including flight numbers or ferry routes
• the amount and type of cash being carried
• the source of the cash - the country it came from and how it was generated (for example, through earnings or selling something)
• what the cash will be used for

How to declare cash

If you’re leaving the UK, you must declare cash before you leave the country.

If you’re coming to the UK you can declare cash before you travel or as soon as you arrive in the UK.

Declare cash before you travel

Declare online for:

If you cannot use the online service you can make your declaration over the phone.

Declare cash when you arrive in the UK

At UK customs, follow ‘goods to declare’ or ‘red channel’ signs, and tell a Border Force officer you want to declare cash. You may have to use a courtesy phone.

They may give you a paper form to fill in or take your declaration themselves.

If there is no way to make a declaration at the port or airport when you arrive, call 0300 322 9434 and make your declaration over the phone.

Penalties

If you do not declare cash that you should have, all the cash you are carrying can be seized by a Border Force officer. You may have to pay a penalty of up to £5,000 to get it back. This can be taken from the cash before the rest is returned.

Any cash can be seized if customs authorities have reasonable grounds to suspect a crime. They can keep the cash for 48 hours - after that they need a court order.

How to appeal a penalty

You can write to the Fraud Investigation Service if you disagree with a penalty. You must state why you disagree with the decision you’ve been given.

In the US, it is completely legal to fly with large amounts of cash. However, if you don’t pay attention to some basic rules, you could easily lose some or all of your money. This is true if you are traveling with US currency, currency from other nations, or other monetary instruments like traveler's checks, and money orders. You should take common sense steps to protect yourself from unwanted attention, but you should also be aware of what legal issues you may have to address. What you have to do will depend on how much money you are carrying and whether you are entering the US.

Cash is just one kind of money
Cash is just a physical form of currency and is typically in the form of paper notes like the US dollar, or in coins that are used as currency. When it comes to US laws and regulations, cash is just one of many things that are considered to be money. Currency, either from the US or from other countries, is money, but so are the following items: coins that are used as currency, traveler's checks, regular checks, promissory notes, or money orders that are endorsed and ready to be cashed. This includes checks that are signed, but with the name of the payee omitted (the “To:” line is blank).

How much is a large amount of money?
What you think is a large amount of money is not important. What law enforcement and security officials think is a large amount of money is. If the physical amount of money you are carrying is enough to draw the attention of officials, it is a large amount. Fat wallet, not noticeable. A backpack full of cash, very noticeable.

The value of your money is important only when entering the U.S. You are required to declare any amount of money over $10,000 when you enter the country, and it doesn’t matter if it is a suitcase full of cash or a single piece of paper.

Travel within the United States
If you are on a domestic flight in the US, there is no limit to the amount of cash or monetary instruments that you can carry. However, the TSA (Transportation Security Administration) security officers at the passenger screening area may ask a passenger who is carrying a large sum of cash to account for the money. If the TSA suspects that the money is related to some kind of criminal activity such as drug trafficking or money laundering, they may turn the issue over to a law enforcement agency at the airport (TSA has no law enforcement powers). If your money is even suspected to be related to criminal activity, that money could be confiscated and you may have to go to court to get that money back.

Remember that if you are flying into the US and changing to another plane after you arrive, you will have to go through TSA before boarding another flight.

Travel to and from the United States
If you are leaving the US, there is no limit to the amount of money you can carry, but you will have to deal with the customs or border officials at your destination. You should check the rules of your destination country, or any country that your plane may visit before reaching your destination, before you go.

When traveling to the US, you have to report the amount of money (see the above definition) to a US customs official if the amount of money is greater than $10,000. This is the case if everyone who is traveling with you as a group (such as your family) has more than $10,000 between them. There is no tax or duty on this money if you report it, but you don’t report the money, it may be confiscated and you could be subject to civil or criminal penalties.