The "Official" rate for GBP today is 9.27 pesos to a pound. Dolarblue.net is showing 11.56 for GBP on the blue market. The dollar blue is at 8.89 (retail) or 9.0 wholesale (all buy price). Those rates vary in reality, but maybe 10% or so.
I took a look at Azimo and have to say, I'm impressed! Too bad I don't have a bank in the UK! I looked at sending money here to get 10,000 pesos. The cost was roughly 705 GBP, a fee of 18 GBP, at an exchange rate of 14.18!!!
I didn't compare the dollar to pound rate to see where it lies, but the Azimo rate seems correct, while the dolarblue.rate seems to be showing the GBP is at a disadvantage on the blue market for buying pesos. Probably has to do with the fact that most people here think of dollars when thinking of how they want to hedge inflation and GBP is not in as much demand.
I didn't look to see what kind of limit Azimo has on sending money. Xoom (similar US-based transfer company) has some pretty small limits on how much you can send within a month, a period of months or over a year. It also doesn't (or didn't use to) give nearly as good rates as what I see on the Azimo site. It might indeed be very worthwhile it it's as good as it looks.
Another thing to worry about with these kinds of places, though, are two-fold: 1) the company that disburses the money here will report the transfer to AFIP. Maybe not a problem, maybe a problem. Depends on how much and how frequent, probably. 2) the company that disburses the money here is probably not Azimo (it absolutely IS NOT in the case of Xoom). That may give you various problems.
Another 2nd best option if you have to get money into the country over a long-term basis is to make contacts and get into a cueva. Cuevas are black (or "blue") market folk who trade in currencies here. They accept wire transfers from your bank account to a bank account outside of Argentina and give you the money here in Argentina, at a rate that is just a gnat's ass under the the official rates quoted on sites such as dolarblue.net. By their very nature, they report nothing to AFIP. They usually charge a handling fee as well and/or a percentage of the money you're sending (mine is $100 USD fee minimum - 2% for $5000 USD, but over $10K USD the rate is an even 1%). Depending on how much money you are sending (the more the better), you can get your money in hand (usually in USD if you want, for changing later, or pesos as well) within a day or two, absolutely zero hassle and reporting to the government here.
I send down my monthly expenses each month and the rate I end up with after paying the fee is around .3 under the published blue dollar rates. Not bad at all considering that it includes basically smuggling my money in. I've done this for the last 6 years that I've lived here. I even used a cueva originally to get cash in to pay my programmers.
Cuevas can be hard to get into though. Since they are for circumventing government currency (and other) restrictions, the cuevistas can be a bit paranoid (and I don't blame them). You have to know someone who knows a cueva and convince them to introduce you. It took me about a year to get to that point.
If you are going to live in Argentina, best figure out the "blue" ways to get around tough (and unfair) government restrictions. Argentines do it all the time - you shouldn't feel like you should not do it, because you will be living among them. I don't think it's fair to hold ourselves to a higher standard in someone else's country when they don't hold themselves to the same standard. I've even paid bribes (not related to bringing down money) when necessary even though I find it abhorrent to have to do it - it's how things are done here in some cases. A cop who threatened to impound my car because I didn't have my seat belt buckled and a 100 peso bribe to resolve it comes to mind...
As far as HSBC and other international banks - there have been other posts about this and I believe that it won't work the way you are thinking, even if they tell you at your home branch that it is so. Banks here are not exactly branches of their international organization - Argentine banking laws are too different. I've heard reports (not just on here) of people thinking that because they have an international account at bank X (HSBC has been mentioned many times), they will be able to get money down here through that channel. I only know one guy who was ever successful at something like that on any kind of ongoing basis (there have been a couple of one-time successes that never managed to be repeated, and no one except for the one I mention that I could verify) - he's a multimillionaire who has the highest level of account possible at CitiBank and money always gets through things.
You don't want to bring money into Argentina via ATMs - you'll get a (roughly) 35% haircut on dollars as the current rates are (and you CANNOT get dollars at ANY ATM unless you have an account here, and that doesn't really happen either for a number of restrictive reasons), plus any ATM fees you have to normally pay.
Based on what I see on bluedolar.net, I'd want to be paid by someone here locally in dollars if possible, no other currency, simply because the dollar market is so strong.
