UK/Europe Travel - Currency Conversion

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  Donaldhump on 09/11/2016 - 01:19

  +1

  i usually just take a little bit with me, and withdraw it from atms as need be taking out $1000 a go or what ever i can, hopefully i wont get robbed. i take 3 cards, and use the cheapest first, and use internet banking to transfer from 1st to 2nd card if first card fails.

  i use the ing card, has small fees, but i could not be a$$ed looking for the best card, there would be better ones i am sure.

  i find crown currency pretty good.

  and one definate, dont give the money to your wife, she will have more hidden fees than any atm machine

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  bengal tiger on 09/11/2016 - 01:39

  Personally I wouldn't carry that much cash over for holiday spending, I usually take a smaller amount and use a debit card to withdraw as I go along but I understand you'd want to consider all your options before departing.

  I'll leave it to others to comment on Sydney exchange locations, but for comparative purposes I used to exchange currency at this place near London Victoria station as it offered the best rates close to one of my old work places.

  http://www.change-link.co.uk/exchange-rates/currency-convert…

  At the time of writing they bought AUD at 1.63934 which converts to GBP 0.62000.

  If you're not staying in London or want a location more accessible to where you're staying then visit Google UK and search for "currency exchange <insert your destination here>" as there's plenty of them scattered around.

  Note this currency exchange, along with most others in London, are good for conversions somewhere under £500. Anything above that and they know they can make their daily commission quota off your transaction and they start to shift the rates against your favour. (If you took $10k in to their store today you wouldn't come out with £6,200, it happened to me once when buying Hungarian Forints when I rang ahead to make sure they could sell me £1k worth of HUF and they came up with a BS excuse when I arrived 30min later that "market rates had moved" while I work in finance and had access to market data to know rates didn't change that day.)

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  che_97 on 09/11/2016 - 02:51

  +3

  I would just use the Citibank visa debit. Take out what you need for a few days (or a bit more if that days exchange rate is particularly favourable) and pay for as much as you can with the card. I've travelled exclusively with that card and it's been the ducks nuts. The rates closely match xe.com and there are no other fees

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  starspawn on 09/11/2016 - 08:34

  Yeah best bet is to pay on card, take out some cash for pints along the way.
  Do any of your cards give you frequent flyer points?
  Qantas cash card give you points if you transfer money onto it and then spend using the card.
  - rates I can see are GBP 0.5882 & EUR 0.6607

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  Gunther on 09/11/2016 - 10:21

  I traveled Europe for 6months. I left the country with AUD$100 in cash and the rest on Citibank Visa Debit card, also having a 28Degrees card as backup. Both cards worked 99% of the time, even in Eastern Europe.

  The rates are pretty much identical to market rates on both the cards, and no fees.

  You are opening yourself to significant risk if you exchange and travel with that much in cash in any currency.

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  enzioFirenze on 09/11/2016 - 10:59

  like many have suggested, citi debit is the way to go :)