I'm working on a newspaper article about dynamic currency conversion and how it affects travelers making purchases abroad. Would anyone be willing to share their experience with me?
I've read about quite a few details about it on this board and thought someone might have a good anecdote they're willing to share.
You can either post an e-mail on this message link or e-mail me directly with contact info at [email protected]. I would like to do a phone interview.
Thanks and best,
Kelly

hate it. Hate it. Hate it. I want to pay in the bank conversion rate and not that of the store/hotel. Usually the person has no choice and the poor clerk or employee has NO idea about the concept. Try arguing this one without being able to speak the local language! Not sure if I can do it in English!
Farvorite anecdote: Being asked in Harrods if I wished to pay in dollars. I live in London and was using my UK bank mastercard. What could be better value than paying twice to have my mony converted! AND the clerk asked like he was doing ME a favor!

Thanks for sharing!

The most interesting question is when and where the DCC is taking place. Does Visa change all transactions into the home country of the Visa Card?
Is the retailer/restaurant/hotel making the charge or is it Visa instigating it?
Do Brits get the DCC charge in France?
Or...is it aimed mostly at Americans?

I would really be interested in seeing your story after it is published. Let us know where we can see it.
I think it is one of the worst scams that has been dumped on travelers.
Needs to be exposed.

We spent a month in Italy and no one tried to charge our Visa in dollars until we reached Venice. We had a lovely dinner in a Taverna in Dorsodoro and my husband realized that the visa charge had been converted to dollars and he had signed it. There was a sentence that said "I was given a choice of what currency I wanted to pay in." When he confronted the owner, he just shrugged and said its done. So my husband went around the restaurant and told all the Americans to watch their bill. When we got back to the hotel, we looked at all our other charges and realized that we had been charged in dollars at a hotel in Lucca. From then on we pretty much paid in cash. One really needs to pay attention and not be intimated by them standing over you waiting for you to sign that little charge slip. If you have any other questions my email is [email protected].

Click on my name at the top of this post if you'd like to read about my experience at a hotel in Orvieto. I was in Italy for almost three weeks and this was the only incident of DCC I experienced. There was no indication on the receipt that I was given a choice regarding currency, and I unfortunately had signed the receipt before I realized what had happened (my bad). Feel free to e-mail at betsyatspeakeasydotorg, making the appropriate changes to the address, of course.

What I'd be interested in knowing is what is VISA's and Mastercard's response to the situations where people have been told they have no choice but to be charged in dollars? Do they prohibit that practice? If so, will they contact those merchants/hotels and threaten to cut them off if they persist?

We spent two weeks in Italy last month and were careful to check our charge slips due to information gathered from this forum but we did not have one merchant try to charge us in dollars.

I got charged in dollars by a little B&B (Garro) in the Basque hinterlands above Bilbao. It was a done deal before I knew it, and as the bill was only 51 euros (41 for the room, and 5 euros ech for breakfasts), I think she made about 3 or 4 dollars off of me. I shrugged it off; the breakfast was rather underpriced, actually.

Best wishes,

Rex

When I was in London about three years ago, Harrods was offering to convert to dollars. I think, but I may not be remembering correctly, they would also take dollar currency..like I say, I may be confused on this part. I paid for all my meals in cash anyway..did charge all my shopping purchases so certainly will be aware next trip.

I'm pretty certain VISA/MC doesn't do DCC. If you do an internet search, you will find a number of companies that sell this service, and how they market it as of benefit to both the merchant and the card holder (for what that is worth).

My understanding is that part of the agreement between VISA/MC and each merchant is that the cardholder will be given the opportunity to opt out of DCC for the transaction, which is probably why they are now printing on the slip that you opt in; it implies that you made the decision.

I think VISA/MC's response to DCC has been to add the 1% commission they charged on transactions in non-US currencies to overseas transactions in US dollars; e.g., those which have been run through the DCC mill.

I like using a credit card while travelling because it gives a good record of what I spent where. If someone asks what a dinner with wine and desert at X restaurant is, I can give an accurate response. My defense against being DCC'd will be to ask if they can charge in the local currency before handing over my card, and reading the slip before signing it. If they DCC me, I will become very demanding and, next, noisy, because I know no merchant wants someone standing in their establishment loudly complaining about having been overcharged.

Thanks very much for all the insightful responses! I now have a good picture of how DCC works. Btw, where are the main places that DCC is being used? So far, I've heard it's mainly prevalent in Western Europe (Ireland, Italy, U.K., etc.) Any other places?
Best,
Kelly

Kelly:

It's almost a given in Ireland; it is very wide spread there. It is also found a lot in Italy; otherwise it is not all that present, at least for now.

You can click on my name and my Italy Trip Report part 1 to get more details, but we were hit with this several times in Rome and Sorrento and Florence, and we were using a Visa card each time. What happens is that you ask for your bill and it arrives with "decision to charge in your home currency is final." This is intimidating enough, and usually it's printed out on the processed approval form you have to sign -- clearly they would have to go through voiding that, etc.. If you want to contest it, you have to be ready for a protracted argument with either the hotel manager (at a time when you may be in a hurry to get a train) or the restaurant manager (and it's late and you're tired). When we protested, the answers we got were along the line of, "I can't make it do anything else; the machine does it" -- i.e., the management set this up and it's what will happen every time you don't pay in cash.

I have to ask what the expectations of those who think Visa "won't allow it" might be if we were to start calling Visa on our return and tell them what happened. Is Visa likely to re-calculate the transaction, or even bother to go after the hotel/restaurant?

Suppose one called VISA in advance to verify what # to call with this sort of problem while in Europe. (Occasionally, we've had to call when the fraud dept decided that charges from Austria were "suspicious" --never mind that they were notified in advance. ) Do you think it would matter if the customer called the customer service number from abroad and the VISA people told them to cease and desist? Or would they not give a hoot? (After all, they lose too, if what would have been a credit payment becomes cash.

The visa web site clearly states you must be given a meaningful choice to accept this scam....the terminal asks the clerk before completing the transaction if the customer has agreed to accept this charge and that's where the near criminal activity begins. They have no bloody right to assume you wish to accept this rip off; they are supposed to ask and then they give you the answer well it's done and can't be undone (wrong, any transaction on the terminal can be cancelled by the press of a button) that it is required by visa (we know it is wrong) that it is a pain in the butt to credit the transaction back, that the terminal does not allow an out of country charge to be written up in local currency (wrong again)...

Kelly, I would hope in your article you speak to merchants in Italy and Ireland and ask them point blank why they carry out this near criminal activity and don't ask the customer whether they wish to be ripped off....

Kelly, I see an opportunity for you to use the power of the press to make a big difference.

Your journalistic credentials will probably gain you access to Visa, Master Card, and American Express at the highest policy-making level.

You can invite them to think about how much they are losing in merchant fees when travelers insist on paying in cash because the merchant refuses to accept the card transaction in local currency.

Then suggest that they can put a stop to the practice once and for all by including a printed card with every monthly statement, laying out their policy in all of the major languages where their cards are accepted. Or maybe on the back of the credit card itself.

There are probably millions of dollars on the table. All the card issuers have to do is pick it up.

VISA/MC do not manage DCC. DCC is offered by the payment processing company and the DCC agreement would be between the merchant and the payment processing service provider.

Visa and the others own the networks, and they get to make the rules, regardless of which primary processor a merchant uses.

My p.p. has been Fifth Third Bank since 1991, but I still have to comply with VisaNet's rules.

<font color="BLUE">VisaNet's rules stipulate that the merchant must offer the customer a choice of payment currencies.</font> Read this:

<b>http://www.corporate.visa.com/pd/consumer_ex_faq.jsp</b>

&quot;Some merchants now offer to convert your bill into your home currency. This is called dynamic currency conversion and means the merchant—and not Visa—is converting the currency. As a consumer you may value knowing the exact price in your home currency at the point of sale but you should also know you may be charged extra for this service by the merchant. <b><font color="RED">Visa requires that you are provided a meaningful choice at the point of sale and you have the right to buy your purchase in the local currency so that you do not incur any additional fees the merchant may assess</font></b>. Visa also requires merchants offering this service to inform you of the exchange rate including any applicable commission being charged.&quot;

DO YOU UNDERSTAND?????

And that is where the ambiguity comes in...

Merchants claim that by presenting the sales slip they are complying with the regulation and at that point it is your obligation not to sign and to insist the merchant write up the charge in local currency.

Of course you get the nonsensical lies...

1. The terminal does not allow us to write up a charge on a US credit card in euro.

2. We cannot undo the charge; it's too late.

3. Or the one they tried to pull on me....you are not being charged in US dollars; the amount listed is just for your convenience. Please sign...

The practice could be made illegal if visa so chose but obviously now that they are collecting 1% on the transactions anyway, there is nothing on their part to force merchants not to pull this garbage so it is up to you to be vigilant.

If a merchant refuses to write the charge up in local currency, on the sales slip cross out you accept the conversion and write in the words do not accept dcc. Under no circumstances would I then pay cash, that is just allowing the merchant to get away with this near criminal activity.