I've seen/experienced them in Germany when you use an ATM that's not part of your "group".

Also, there was an ATM owner fee for every ATM I used in Vietnam. It was always reimbursed by Bank of Internet.

used my Citi ATM card @ a citiBank ATM in SYD the other day, got hit with the expected 3% fee. Most Exchange places were some 10% off the reg Forex rate. So as much as I hate it 3% is alot better then 10%

Taxis do take CCs but add on a 10% fee then add on to that whatever your CC adds on for a Forex transaction

lastly in regards to Australia 2 weeks ago it was $1 = $1.43 AUD, today its $1.29 AUD

I've had an ATM-owner fee in Spain: warning on the screen that there's a �2 fee, asking if I wanted to continue.

Westpac is everywhere in both Australia and New Zealand. Westpac is member of BofA's Global ATM Network for downunder. There is no fee other than the 1% Visa network fee built in the exchange rate.

Thanks to Fed printing money, the commodities prices have gone back up in the last 2 months. Australia dollar went up 17% since late March. NZ dollar went up 20%. I have some hotels booked prepaid back in March when Accor chain went on sale. The exchange rate was 1AUD = 0.6560 USD on my Citi statement (of course I got hit by the 3% forex as separate item). Yesterday's rate was 0.76893 per XE site. That is 17% increase in about 6 weeks.

P.S. The Schwab Invest First Visa arrived yesterday, in time for the upcoming 6.5 week trip to Asia Pacific. I haven't had time to open Schwab One and their checking account, so the 2% rebate would cumulate on the card but I wouldn't see it until the Schwab One is opened to take the rebate in. Will bring Fidelity's mySmartCash card with us for cash needs. I will try to use CC as much as possible for this trip due to so many currencies involved (11 different currencies!)

Credit Card Charges Results Print

Date on transaction receipt: May 7, 2009
Amount on transaction receipt: 7,900.00 THB
Mid-market rate for THB to USD on 2009.05.07: (Excluding bank charges) 0.0287119
Value of transaction in your currency: (Excluding bank charges) 226.82 USD
Amount shown on credit card statement: 225.95 USD
Your "hidden" fee estimate: 0.00 USD ( 0.000% )
ACTUAL BANK FEES for this purchase: -0.87 USD ( -0.385% )

Card used: Capital One Visa ^ ^ ^

I recently returned from Paris where I used both my Amex Platinum and Citibank Visa. When I received my credit card statements I was shocked to see the fx rates used by American Express (before they added their 3%). The Euro was approx 1.30 on the days I was there. Citibank charged me at 1.32 (before their 3% fee) while American Express charged at 1.40 and above. I challenged the charges and was told that American Express is free to choose whatever benchmark they wish when determining the fx rate to use (before their 3% fee). I asked them to tell me what benchmark they used and it is now 3 weeks and I am still waiting. Even the employee who was investigating for me told me that the rates seemed to be high. I am guessing that they are using the rate one would pay at a cash conversion store to buy euro and then adding on their 3%. The first thing I did when I got my bill was go onto the capital one site and order their card for my next trip to europe in June. BEWARE of AMERICAN EXPRESS>>>>>>>

Capital One did well by you on this THB purchase. However, had you had any sort of problem with the transaction, be forewarned that Capital One's Customer Service is notoriously, and inexcusably, awful (poor telephone skills, poor responses by mail, no follow-up, high rates of card rejection while travelling etc. etc.)

I have observed radically different results in different currencies (i.e. a +2% surcharge in the translation of Korean Won to USD). YMMV.

Forewarned is forearmed.

I would strongly disagree with both of these statements.

CapOne is an okay choice. But as we noted in our shootout a couple months ago, I'd choose Schwab over them, for the better customer service, the better rewards, and at least as good an exchange rate on average.

I have yet to see anybody actually prove that any card consistently gets a better underlying exchange rate (ignoring fees) than any other card. Rates vary widely from transaction to transaction on the same card. I had a trip one time where two purchases made on the same day in the same currency on my CapOne charge hit my account at exchange rates that varied by significantly more than 1%. So you win some, you lose some.

What I am pretty sure about is that CapOne doesn't charge any fee on top of the exchange rate, and AmEx does. But there are cards other than CapOne that don't charge fees (Schwab being my personal favorite) and there are tons of cards that charge more than AmEx. See the list of fees we've been working to compile. So I don't see how anyone can apply such superlative labels to CapOne and Amex.

Hi all! What a great thread...and I wish I had been more pro-active & smart about this. I saw the WSJ article the other day about the forex fees, and that's what triggered my desperate search. I actually had signed up for a CapOne card a few years ago (since I travel to Europe a few times a year for work), but I never ended up using it nor activating it...so I got a letter a few months back that they cancelled my acct. Ddoh! I'm guessing there's no way to call them and 'activate' now, right?

Anyhow...so now I'm desperate. Is there any way you think I can apply & get the new card all within 9 days - before I depart for Japan? ugh... If the answer is no...these are some of the cards we have - which is the best to use while in Japan?

1. Citibank ATM card (which is obviously also a debit MC)
2. Amex Plat & Amex Blue (I'm assuming Amex is Amex)
3. Bank of America - it's black & a credit card (haha! sorry - I know a stupid description, but it's my DH's)
4. Bank of America Platinum Check Card (this is our ATM that's linked to our checking acct#)
5. Discover
6. Bloomingdale's card ( I'm only listing this b/c I saw it on the chart under Dept Stores)

So I guess my questions are:
1. which card should we use to get Yen cash from ATM machines...and what ATMs should we try to use, if possible?
2. For cc purchases - what should we use (when dining, shopping, hotel, etc.)?

Hope some of you can give me some solid advice! Thanks!



6.

You can try and apply for the Schwab High Yield Investor Checking and Schwab Invest First Visa, which are my personal favorite ATM and credit cards for travel. But I don't know if they'll arrive in time. If not, you'll have them for next time.

If you don't get the Schwab cards in time, the wiki should be able to answer your questions.

1. For ATMs, I'd use BoA for ATM withdrawals over US$175 equivalent (since it's 1% + $5/transaction) and Citi for smaller withdrawals (since it's 3% + $1.50/transaction), with two caveats: (a) if you can use a Citi ATM, the threshold where BoA becomes cheaper increases to US$250 since Citi shouldn't charge the $1.50 (only the 3%), and (b) if you have Premier/Citigold/Private Bank status with either bank, you should be able to get the fees waived.

2. For credit card, if you have the Bloomingdale's Visa from Department Stores National Bank, the wiki says that it's only 1%, so I'd use that. If you just have a non-Visa Bloomingdale's store card, you can leave that at home as it probably won't be any use in Japan. You can also leave your Discover at home, as I don't believe it's accepted in Japan either. The second lowest fee would be your Amex cards (if one is a business card, that will be slightly cheaper to use than a personal card). And bring the BoA credit card as backup in case the others don't work.

You are forgetting 1 thing, anyone can chose as I did to get the Cash Rewards cap1 CC, which throws me a 1% rebate. Thusly even the 1% that VISA charges isnt really charged to me since i get it back as the 1% Ca$h Rebate (actually its 1.25% if you leave it by Cap1 till 12/31

i believe you missed the point.
neither cap1 nor charles schwab pass through the 1% visa forex surcharge to their cardholders. both of these visa cards have 0% forex.
however, there is general consensus (and my personal experience certainly supports this) that cap1 is a lot of trouble to use overseas compared to the schwab visa. plus the schwab visa gives you 2% cash back (not just 1 or 1.25% as the cap1 does).

I'm planning on opening a CitiGold account for my trip to Tokyo in 2 weeks. I know they waive ATM fees at Citi-owned ATMs and I noticed there's a ton of 7-11s in Tokyo. Since 7-11 has a relationship with Citi in the states, does anyone know if a 7-11 ATM is considered Citi-owned as well? It would save alot of hassle to not have to go the specific Citi branch in Tokyo.

TIA

How does credit cards compare to cash? I never have been organized enough to compare.

For cash, I found that two exchange places outside Victoria Station in London give better rates than inside the station and Gatwick airport. However, I didn't write down the rate I got compared to credit cards.

This could make a difference in behavior. If cash is cheaper, I might use a credit card for hotel and only expensive meals and cash for everything else.