meganboston

I have GEMPLUS written on the back of my Debit bank card. Has anyone used a BOA debit card in Italy? Any trouble with ATMs?

Patrick

That Gemplus is a new one to me. But a BofA debit/ATM card should be no problem in most banks in Italy. You do know that if you use it at a Deutsche Bank or a Barclays or Paribus (I believe there may be some of those last two in Italy as well as in UK and France) that BofA will not charge you anything for using those partner bank ATMs. Otherwise there may be a fee up to $5 per transaction depending on the type of account you have.

I have mentioned having problems at a number of banks with a BofA ATMonly card -- with no debit function. This is a new problem based on some banks switching to Visa services to handle their ATM accounts. But if your card is debit as well as ATM, you should have no problem.

jabez

I've used BOA's debit card all over Europe with no problem. I used ATM's all over the place without a problem.
Last year I called to tell them that I'd be in Italy and they switched me to a security department who noted it in their computers.
With all the stolen identities today banks are being much more cautious.
Note: Make sure your passcode only has 4 characters.

meganboston

Thanks for help Patrick and Jabez. They made me change my pin number when i got a new card - begins with zero and is 6 digits long...

jennymary

I just returned from Tuscany and had no problem using my BOA debit card. It worked in all the ATM's. I did notice when I got home that there was a $5.00 surcharge for each withdrawal.

LoveItaly

Hi meganboston, when using your ATM card in Italy you want one that has ONLY four digit for your PIN. And have this PIN in numbers not letters as the Italian ATM's only show numbers. And the Italian ATM's only allow withdrawal of cash from your checking account..not your saving account.

uhoh_busted

That $5 charge is good to know about! Was it just on cash withdrawals or on charges too?

Nimrod

<i>...when using your ATM card in Italy you want one that has ONLY four digit for your PIN.</i>

My understanding is that when using a six digit PIN on a system that is programmed to accept four digits only, the last two digits are ignored (null) and the transaction goes through.


<i>...the Italian ATM's only allow withdrawal of cash from your checking account..not your saving account.</i>


Almost all banking systems default to the checking account as the primary when using out of area ATMs, I thought, unless another account had been previously designated as the primary.

Am I wrong about these things?

I have never had an ATM card rejected/not accepted at a major bank anywhere while outside the USA.


uhoh_busted: that is $5/ATM machine withdrawal; usually around %3 of purchace for currency conversion when using the card as a Visa or Mastercard.

jody

If you use your BofA card at a partner bank there is NO $5.00 charge,,Barclays's , PNB Parabis, Deutsche, Scotia and a few others..check their website or click on my name. I posted the whole list awhile ago.

jennymary

The fee was only on withdrawals... which were usually made in the middle of nowhere.. i.e. at a bank that is most definitely not an affiliate of B of A!

Patrick

I'll agree you may not find a BofA affiliate in the &quot;middle of nowhere&quot;, but I was amazed how many Deutsche Bank (BofA affiliates) we found all over Italy. We managed over two months in Europe with about 15 ATM withdrawals and only twice did &quot;non affiliate BofA&quot; ones.

tdyls

This past June when I was in Italy, I never got hit with a $5 ATM fee with my BOA debit card. Instead, BOA or Visa tacked on a 1% surcharge only. I have Advantage Checking so that might have had something to do with it, so BOA only charged me their standard non-BOA ATM fee after my third ATM withdrawal. I never used -- much less saw -- a Deutsche Bank ATM.

Assuming a 1:1 exchange rate from euros to dollars, a &euro;200 ATM withdrawal would have cost me $204.50: $200 for the cash, 1% surcharge to Visa ($2.00), and $2.50 to BOA for not using a BOA ATM.

kimberlina01

tdyls- sounds right.
i was just threading on this same subject (see thread: Italy: Cash, Credit, or Travelers Checks?)
My brother works for BOA and we are trying to figure out how to 'escape' the ATM fees for our trip in Italy in 2 weeks.
He told me that there is a $2 fee by BOA + whatever the other bank/visa tack on.
He is supposed to call them today and finf out some info so i will post that as soon as i can.

Patrick

tdyls, your Advantage account with BofA is probably like mine. You are allowed two free ATM withdrawals per month from non affiliate banks (in addition to unlimited affiliate ones). After that, I've always had a $1.50 fee -- in the odd event I couldn't find an affiliate bank more than two times in a month, which is rare. That fee amount may have changed recently though.

I've never heard of this &quot;percentage&quot; add on thing for using an ATM card, although it may be true that all ATM withdrawals handled by Visa Services will include a 1% currency exchange fee.

Meanwhile, if you withdraw $300 worth of foreign currency and they charge you a fee of $5 -- realize that is only a little over 1 and a half percent. Not enough to get emotional about in my opinion.

janis

kimberlina01: &quot;He told me that there is a $2 fee by BOA + whatever the other bank/visa tack on.&quot; The European bank won't tack on anything.

rsb99

One little cautionary note: my husband's wallet with BofA debit card was lost on a trip. We had a VERY hard time coming up with a phone number to reach them that we could dial from Europe (cannot be a US 800 number). We never did find it-- a friend transferred the international call to the 800 number-- it was NOT a free call! So my advice for all your credit or debit cards is to carry the contact numbers with you, somewhere other than your wallet.

Otherwise it should work great!

meganboston

the numbers that BoA gave me in case of emergencys are as follows. Again, I am new to international travel, so the numbers look all screwy to me.

1.800.172.444.800.432.1000
0r in Italy specifically:
800.819.014

Desert_Sue

I just returned from Italy and I have a BofA debit card. It worked fine in the bank machines and was read as a Visa card elsewhere. I would have one other backup card just in case.

The only problem we had was one machine that didn't offer an English menu, so we went one block to another one.

kimberlina01

My brother works for BOA and i am having him do research on this for our own trip.
I sent him the list of affiliates by Janis (i think). he had them already and this is what he said...

&quot; I have a list of these banks already, but the problem is that there are none in Italy. Besides, we've run into the problem of the ATMs only being free in their home countries. Example...Deutsche Bank not free in England. Also, find out when people (that did not get fee'd) traveled. A lot of new fees have been created as of 2005.&quot;

The list of banks is below...
Bank of America
Barclays - United Kingdom
BNP Paribas - France &gt;
Deutsche Bank 24 - Germany &gt;
Scotiabank - Canada &gt;
Westpac - Australia &gt;

kimberlina01

i am pretty sure that the 1% everyone talks about is from VISA specifically. and will show up on anything VISA; debit/credit or otherwise.

Using the ATM card as ahttp://www.fodors.com/forums/images/preview_replybutton_alt.gif 'credit card' will incure the 1% from visa not BOA. Using the card from an ATM machine (debit) will get the $2 or whatever fee for using it at a non-BOA bank.