Originally Posted by
s0ssos
If you only go to major cities on the coast, I don't think choice of bank matters that much. Citibank, Bank of America, Wells Fargo, Chase, are all good options.
Capital One lacks presence in California (maybe other places on West Coast as well, I think they were trying to expand).
But I guess the real issue is the lack of cashless payment options in the US, compared to most of the rest of the world. Why would you feel the need to worry about cash? Because some places only take cash.
just to be clear, the issue for UK traveller to the US is ATM charges when withdrawing cash with their UK bank card and forex Fees for using your card at both ATM and Shops/restaurant/hotels etc.
for spending, we have had for quite some time different options that did not charge Forex Fees: My too go cards were the Lloyds Avios Duo, Amex/MasterCard, that were Forex Free and earned Avios. When that was discontinued, Santander Zero MasterCard Credit Card and the MBNA Horizon Visa became my alternatives, with Starling Bank (an app only challenger bank) being my ATM option, although this still incurred the US bank ATM fees..
So, for us, Chase UK (launched as a pilot in October 21, now on a wider launch) it is a great option as it is the most likely to get a Fee free ATM usage (where Chase US are present, and if not, would have still incurred a charge with any other UK bank card being used), plus it currently also give you 1% cashback on forex spending (and not forex fees).
with regards to cash, at least on this trip in LA, we only really withdrew $250 in a week and used it for very small value purchases and tips. Most of the other spending was done on Chase UK debit card, as it was really widely accepted (one restaurant throw out an error as they could not process PIN transactions, but I then used the Apple Pay version and it went through.
PS: I actually came across quite few CapitalOne stand-alone ATM around LA, those in the street without a Bank Branch behind it, so not sure how is their expanding plan working.
Chase US branch locator for reference:
https://locator.chase.com/index.html