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Old Sep 21, 2011 | 8:30 am
  #2017  
themicah
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Join Date: Jan 2003
Location: NYC
Posts: 8,688
Originally Posted by rmbl
What's the current wisdom?
There are a number of cards these days that waive forex fees if you pay an annual fee, including affinity cards from Hyatt, BA and others.

But the only cards I know of right now that have no forex fees OR annual fees and are available to most folks with decent credit are the Travel Rewards Amex and Promise Visa (both from PenFed), and almost all cards issued by CapitalOne.

The PenFed Amex is particularly intriguing for big travelers because it has truly global car rental coverage (a feature I don't think I've seen elsewhere--almost all cards carve out some countries from the rental protection). Its rewards program is lame, though. The PenFed Promise Visa has the advantage of being a Visa (more widely accepted than Amex) and is completely fee free, but has no rewards at all, so it's mainly useful as a backup.

In addition to the CapOne Venture and Business Cash cards that pay 2% with an annual fee, CapOne has a no-annual-fee Mastercard with 1.5% effective cash back, which is probably the closest you can get to ex-Schwab without paying an annual fee or forex fees. The big downside is that it's CapOne, which doesn't have the best reputation around here for customer service.
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