ATM Problem, hopefully avoided...
 

Leaving 3 July for Amsterdam, Bruges, Paris. I just called my credit union to establish how much I can get via my ATM card per day. $500. Last summer in Wales, my card was eaten up when I tried to get less than that. My account had plenty of $$$ in it, so that wasn't the problem. Thankfully, I was traveling with a friend who covered me. Do the European banks have a different acceptable limit withdrawal?

Won't have been a problem with the banks limit - if you had asked for too much it would have told you.

Your problem must have been something else

Some ATM's in Europe have a per-transation limit, so you might have to make 2 transactions to get out your daily limit.

Try to use a bank ATM during normal banking hours. If the machine eats your card, you can go inside the bank to attempt to retrieve it. ((b))

Trying to withdraw more than your limit would not cause the card to be "eaten".

Did you tell your credit union you were traveling overseas? Sometimes when a bank/CU sees unusual activity they will freeze the card/acct.

They may freeze your card but the machine would not eat it because of that.

It should be related to some other problems.

You cannot always get your card back even if you do it during bank hours. The ATMs usually are handled by a separate team and the branch that has it may or may not be able to open the machine, plus the card could have been damaged when the machine ate it.

It is always advisable to travel with at least 2 ATM cards from 2 different issuers. We usually bring 2 ATM cards, and 2 CCs, one MC, one Visa, so in case one does not work, the other one from another issuer may work. Though we have not, knock on wood, encountered any situation like that.

If you do call the issuers ahead of your trip, make sure you ask to talk to the security dept - those are the folks who can CORRECTLY put a notation in your account and temporary "deflag" any security device they put on the account. The ordinary customer service folks only merely relay your message and too often, the request is lost in translation.

For us, we never call, as our spending pattern is very eractic and I guess the banks we use have long accept that and do not flag our accounts.