Originally Posted by
ft101
The "place at the mall" needs to make money, and that's coming straight out of your pocket every time you use them.
You can minimise it by shopping around, but the only way to eliminate is by using a card such as described here, with either no fees, or fees that are refunded.
Exchanging money at the mall is not as bad as you think. Current example of an exchange place in the mall attached to the hotel I'm going to be staying at-
http://www.algiex.ae/exchange.html
They'll give 3.65 AED per $1 USD when the current conversion rate is 3.67. 0.6% isn't horrible. Checking around at other local exchange houses show the same rates.