I traveled to Kazakhstan this month. At all places including the hotel I stayed in I always asked to pay in local currency. I was never given a USD bill. But I did see my colleagues who were not that alert, who paid in USD. What I found was that the DCC in Almaty and Astana was actually better than the converted rate. While in India it was horrible. When I checked in, they do a hold in USD and I do not protest DCC there, because it gives me a look in to the DCC rates. The USD rate was above 62 and the DCC rate was around 59 Rupees. DCC varies from country to country.