Will MasterCard be accepted all over europe? Amex?
 

Will MasterCard be accepted all over europe? Amex?

Some little shops don't accept credit cards but in general visa and mastercard is accepted everywhere. Amex is always a question mark. Its always good to carry about $100-200 in the countries currency for just in case situations. Like bathrooms in europe tend to be cash/coin only.

Which country in Europe are you talking about ? The answer will vary as we are over two dozen different countries !

And more and more places are going touchless, so using an apple pay or equivalent is common.

I am going to Germany, Paris, London, Switzerland, and Italy.

I have this Barclays MasterCard with no foreign transaction fee. Wondered MC may not be widely accepted as Visa?
This MC is touch less. I don't use Apple Pay or another pay.

In terms of carrying local currently, I am planning on taking cash out on ATM, 1% transaction fee with my CU.

Any other tips?
Anything else I should do?

For larger cities such as London, Paris, Barcelona, Berlin, Amsterdam, etc... this is correct but we are in year 2023 and it could the case to not find a credit card transaction device at smaller villages, especially Italy from the list that the OP has provided.

For Europe in general ( continent ), Visa and Mastercard is widely accepted but AMEX wouldn't be an issue at larger cities and chain stores.

Never been somewhere (I am sure I will be corrected) in all my travels that does not accept Visa and MC together (never seen just Visa or just MC, always both), they are ubiquitous. Amex is the only one you have to worry about having an alternative card. With one Visa/MC and AMEX you are covered.

100% this. Set up Apple Pay with your Amex and you can use it almost anywhere.

I w​​​as very surprised the first time I went to Europe. I can't recall a time if ever where I paid to use the washroom. It's also called a "WC". Not sure what that stands for.​​​

water closet

Berlin Central Station is 50 cents to use the WC

What's the origin of the term? I have never seen it in North America?

Just my experiences: YMMV.

In recent trips to the UK, I've several times had my visa card rejected by a contactless reader on a bus but had the same reader accept my mc (both issued in the USA). I've no reason to think mc is more reliable than visa: in my case visa is always my first choice so it has more opportunities to fail. It's not related to a problem with the visa card itself but occasionally, some contactless readers reject it for no apparent reason. I suspect that many credit cards issued outside the country you are travelling in can occasionally fail for unknown reasons but another card will work for equally unknown reasons (unknown that is, to the owner of the card and to the bank that issued the card). As a result, I always try to carry different kinds of cards including at least one visa and one mc.

There are still many places that won't take credit cards. Some are not surprising (eg. mountain restaurants in Switzerland) but some smaller café places in cities are cash only and I've found places I would expect to accept credit cards that don't (eg some funiculars in Switzerland). Unfortunately, there isn't always a sign that says "cash only" or the equivalent in the local language.

I recommend using contactless wherever possible. Using contactless makes travel on some public transport systems such as London much easier and quicker and the automated checkouts in grocery stores are also faster with contactless. There are now WCs/restrooms that require contactless credit/debit cards to use them (eg. Dartmouth in the UK).

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Are you saying that if a merchant does not accept Amex, that same merchant will accept Apple Pay with an Amex card loaded on it? That does not seem right.

But it is. Same with PayPal, although I'm not sure you can add an amex card to PayPal anymore.