Originally Posted by
FFMilesJunkie
On a side note, one thing I learned on our trip is that the exchange rate is the same or even a little better when exchanging cash rather than going to the ATM. I wished I had brought more hard currency rather than rely on the ATM. The max I could get out of an ATM was 3million Dong which is about $140. You then get hit with the ATM fee from your bank and my exchange rate ended up a little under 21,000/$. When exchanging CASH, I got 22,500 Dong/$. They gave even better rates if you had 50s or 100s.
Yes, most ATMs have a relatively low limit on how much you can take out, and charge between 20K-40K transaction fee (on top of whatever your bank/cc company may charge you), the trick is to ask around for the ones where you can get more money, some ATMs will allow up to 10M and still charge not more than about 40-50K on top