***The world of exchanges, banks and cryptocurrency can be daunting at first, if only because of the huge amount of different groups that are offering services to exchange and trade currency into any of the long list of currencies that exist. Since I am currently putting a lot of my time into Steemit, I need to take out a percentage of my Steem payout and convert them into British currency - so it has been important for me to find a way of doing that without incurring huge fees... And now I have!***

I wrote [a few days ago](https://steemit.com/cryptocurrency/@ura-soul/the-reason-why-bittrex-and-poloniex-have-taken-steem-offline-according-to-dan-at-blocktrades-plus-my-tips-for-using-blocktrades) about the problems I had at that time with the Exchanges 'Bittrex' and 'Poloniex', which are two of the biggest exchanges that handle STEEM and SBDs. In the comments I was given some tips from other Steemians as to better options for converting STEEM into GBP£ and having now tested some of them, I can confirm that they are indeed very good options. :)

### Introducing Uphold
---
![uphold](https://uphold.com/images/banner.jpg)

Big shout to @kkro who pointed me to [Uphold](https://uphold.com/) which is an online service that allows me to pay in Cryptocurrency (Currently Bitcoing, Litecoin and Ethereum) and to then withdraw it directly into my local bank account for a fee that is very small. I first converted my Steem, via @Blocktrades into Litecoin and then transferred that to Uphold and the final amount that ended up in my bank account was almost the same as the value of the Steem was measured to be by [SteemDollar](http://www.steemdollar.com/steem.php) when I started the conversion process!

So, in other words, the conversion cost me only a negligable sum - probably less than 1% of the total or even 0.5%!

Compare that to what I was previously charged by Coinsbank to do the same thing - I lost well over 10% of the transaction when I used them! Shocking!

So there we go - a great improvement and a top tip for anyone wanting to exchange their money for fiat currency.

Big thanks to everyone who helped and provided tips, including @barrydutton for mentioning blocktrades and @kkro for uphold. Also worth a mention is @crypto-trail for pointing out Payza, who may accept STEEM and SBD directly - providing a similar service, but I haven't used Payza yet - so maybe I'll use them next time.

Wishing you well,
Ura Soul

<center>[![t-shirt](https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.412935559.3978/rco,mens_premium_t_shirt,mens,x700,fafafa:ca443f4786,front-c,105,120,315,294-bg,ffffff.3u5.jpg)](https://www.redbubble.com/people/neekos/works/27603978-steemit-com-dream-it-meme-it-team-it-steemit-red?asc=u&p=mens-premium-t-shirt&rel=carousel)
[Buy your "Steemit, Dreamit, Memeit, Teamit" T-Shirts, Gifts & Other Clothing Here](https://www.redbubble.com/people/neekos/works/27603978-steemit-com-dream-it-meme-it-team-it-steemit-red?asc=u&p=mens-premium-t-shirt&rel=carousel).
</center>
<br/>
<center>
![signature](http://i.imgur.com/7JZDnAr.gif)
</center>
<br/>
<center>
[![ureka.org](http://i.imgur.com/AzZb55n.jpg)](https://www.ureka.org)
</center>