koryandleslie

I am spending 3 days in London ($200 or so USD)

I am spending 7 days in France ($800 or so USD)

I am spending 3 days in Belgium ($400 or so USD)

I am spending 5 days in Prague ($500 or so USD)

Do I need to exchange money in each country? Are USD accepted? What do you suggest? Any certain places that I would receive the best exchange rate?

ParisAmsterdam

Nobody will be interested in US dollars... it's not 1945. ;^)

You will get the best exchange using your own bank card in an ATM. Notify your bank of your travel plans.

London will be pounds. France and Belgium use Euros,
the Czech Republic korunas. Try to minimize the amounts left over between countries with different currencies... you always lose when exchanging money.

charnees

No, US dollars are NOT accepted. No, you do not have to exchange cash for other currency. Yes, you get cash in the country's currency from an ATM at the airport, or train station, or local bank. just make sure your bank knows where you are going for what dates so they don't think someone is stealing your money when the transactions show up.

koryandleslie

I'm not using ATM or credit card. What's my other options?

koryandleslie

I don't have an ATM card. If I get one by next week, do all ATM's charge the same fee and have the same exchange rate?

P_M

This must be your first trip to Europe. Once again, nobody will accept US $ just as we do not accept euros, pounds or Czech korunas. I realize US $ are widely accepted in North America and the Caribbean but that is not the case in other parts of the world.

I hope you will open your mind to using ATM and credit cards, otherwise you will lose a considerable amount of money on exchange fees. If you insist on doing it the old fashioned way then I hope someone can help. Unfortunately so few people do that anymore you might be hard pressed to find anyone who can offer advice on good places to exchange. Quite honestly, this is no good way to exchange other than using your ATM and credit cards.

Enjoy your trip.

P_M

I just saw your second post about ATM cards. Your bank will charge the ATM fee so you need to ask that question to the bank. Credit unions tend to have the lowest fees. If you use Bank of America you can use Barclay's ATMs in the UK and BNP Paribas in France and you will pay no fees at all. Unfortunately there are no partners in Belgium or Czech Republic so the charge will be $5/withdrawal.

NOTE: When I was in Belgium I had trouble with my ATM card because it was a regular ATM card and not a debit card. Our poster Patrick had the same problem. Please be sure to ask your bank for a debit card and not a regular ATM card.

DebitNM

Just as an aside - do those amounts include hotels, meals, transportation, admissions [museums etc], meals, etc cause they seem awful low. Carrying all that cash is not a smart idea, if you must do it, be sure to use a safe and secure means of carrying the cash: use something like this for most cash:
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Protege-Ai...older/17119287

and keep only what you will need in public in a wallet secured in a zipped inside pocket.

DebitNM

If you are leaving next week, chances of getting an account opened and an debit card are slim. If you live near a Capital One bank, they have no fee debit cards when you open a checking account. You can do it online, but not in a week.

nytraveler

You should pay for any sizable charges - hotels, meals etc with a credit card and pull walking around money from your checking account with an ATM card at the machine in any bank - just as in the US.

If you insist on taking that amount of cash with you (highly NOT recommended since it is too risky) you can change at bureaux de changes or larger banks when they are open - but you will lose about 10% of your money that way.

I'm curious how you decided on those amounts of money for those cities? Are you taking a tour? If so - they should certainly have given you an info pack including how best to obtain foreign currency.

If you're not taking a tour - can;t imagine the amounts you have listed are nearly enough to do anything with.

koryandleslie

thanks, I'm going to see what my bank can do. I have already bought all my train tickets, my hotels are paid for and my tours are all bought. This is just spending money for food, etc.
I just don't want to spend $100 in fees. Not even sure I have a debit card. Never used one.

koryandleslie

Yes, I am green at all this.

Do all ATM give the same rate? I don't know if I'm even asking that right? Need a debit card, not an ATM card, right?

Guenmai

Koryandleslie: For possible future reference, no, those particular countries don't take dollars, but there are countries that do, like Argentina where, although I exchanged money into pesos, for nearly a week, I used cash, U.S. dollars, in Buenos Aires. This was in 2008. I shopped with them at the mall, paid tours with them, and used them for a variety of other things. When I asked if I could pay in dollars, people were more than willing to take them. There are other countries in the world that I have also used dollars. I've been on all of the continents. Happy Travels!

koryandleslie

Let me see if I can make some of you understand....I live way out in the county. We have 1 bank about 15 minutes from my house. The refuse to have an ATM there because it kept getting broken into at night and the money was long gone before the cops made it in from "town" which is 25 minutes away. I know that sounds strange to some, but we work with cash money or credit cards on-line here. Simple way of life.

fmpden

.....I just don't want to spend $100 in fees....... But what you do not understand is that you will spend lots of fees in exchanging dollars for local currency at the various money exchange bureaus. Use a debit card at a local ATM is the cheapest and most convenient way to obtain local currency. All ATMs have the same exchange rate which is within one percent of the interbank rate. After that the card issuer determines all fees so ask them. Even with the average fees on debit cards is still much cheaper than the fees and/or poor exchange your receive from exchange bureaus.

Anytime a country takes dollars in lieu of their currency, the exchange rate will be very poor so I would not do that. So you pay even more.

koryandleslie

Ok....now I just need to get an ATM card.

ellenem

Here's a primer about the choices you have . . .

No matter the method, the entity that exchanges your dollars for the local currency abroad will make money doing so. It is difficult to avoid fees entirely, but you can make smart choices to keep fees very low.

Many people here are referring to an ATM or debit card, which are probably the same thing. The important fact is that it is the card that accesses your bank account and you use it to draw money from ATMs at home and worldwide. Using this card to get cash in a foreign land will probably be the least expensive way to do so as fmpden said, because it is using a computer to draw money directly from your bank account—low effort. Some bank accounts charge higher fees than others, so shop around for the lowest rates.

Credit cards are good for charging larger expenses. Credit cards also charge fees for international use, and again the fees vary by issuer, so it pays to shop around. While you can use a credit card to get cash, it is a very, very, very, very, very bad idea. A cash advance from a credit card is considered a loan and an especially high finance charge kicks in at the moment you withdraw the money. Getting a cash advance from a credit card is truly for dire emergencies only.

Travelers checks still exist, but few banks and exchange bureaus want to handle them because it is labor intensive to do so. Therefore, if you find a place to change travelers checks, you will also find fees attached to the transaction that are higher than those for using an ATM card. Plus you pay a fee to get the checks in the first place.

I suppose one could carry the $1900 you estimate you need as cash, but then you run the risk of losing it. How savvy are you about minding your belongings in unfamiliar large cities? By your own admission, you are from a pretty small town with no experience of international travel. Personally, I am from NYC, have been to Europe about 40 times, and do an excellent job of keeping alert about my belongings, but I would never want to chance carrying that amount of currency on vacation to multiple countries, even in a money belt.

flanneruk

Well, I live a great deal more than 15 mins from the nearest bank, but I still find having a debit card essential to daily life. What do you buy groceries with?

But if you can't get one in time, let's look at the hysterical (and downright innumerate) overreaction that's a feature of this forum at the suggestion of using credit cards for cash.

For most of the $2000 you want to spend, credit cards are just fine.It's really very difficult indeed to think of anything you can't use credit cards for - unless you're one of those imperialist Americans who believe they've got a moral responsibility to infect the civilised world with their filthy tipping disease (simple rule of thumb: we don't tip. Not 100% the case - but no-one cares)

So let's imagine you just need a couple of hundred dollars in cash, really. Get it from a cash machine on your credit card and you're charged what? 15% until you get home and pay it off? 15% of $200 for one 25th of the year?

Cost you about $1.

Infinitely less than it'd cost you to change travellers' cheques if you managed to find the only bank in Europe that'll have anything to do with these dinosaurs of the financial system. And less still (I know: if you're bashing other people's innumeracy you can't, with consistency, go on about about "more than infinity". But why be consistent?) than the cost of having your cash stolen.

So trivial indeed that it really isn't worth the hassle of trying to get a debit card before you leave. Charge everything, make sure your card works abroad (tell your bank before you go) and just take with you a few hundred dollars (as well as a bit in the currency of the first country you're calling at to guard against the supremely unlikely eventuality that the bureaux de change aren't open at your first European airport. A phenomenon I've never once encountered in my life)

Incidentally, unless she's just sloppy in her writing, the poster who claimed that " Unfortunately so few people do that anymore you might be hard pressed to find anyone who can offer advice on good places to exchange" has clearly not visited a major European city in centuries.

Bureaux de change are far more pestiferously ubiquitous than Starbucks and McD put together. If the poster meant "places to change travellers' cheques", though: too right.

If she meant "no-one on this forum can advise about bureaux de change", she might be right. The simple way of finding the best place is to walk up and down the street comparing how much, net, you'll get for your $100 or whatever. Ignore "no commission" signs (they are, in effect playing with words to deceive you, but that doesn't mean they're offering a bad rate).

Southam

Flanneruk's calculations of the cost of borrowing money on a credit card do not fit my experiences. The rate of interest is likely to be closer to 20 per cent and some if not all cards charge that amount on the entire credit card balance, not just the amount withdrawn as cash. Keep in mind that the cash is indeed a loan whereas a debit card withdraws your owm money from your account.
The only economical way to use a credit card for cash advances is to pay off your credit card in full just before you leave home, and also pay the extra amount you think you may need while travelling. Then you can withdraw that surplus without interest charges. Keep in mind that any purchases on the credit card will reduce that surplus. And fees for foreign transactions still apply, as they will for debit withdrawals.
It is certainly true that travel cheques are outdated. They are certainly inconvenient. Many Paris bank branches now won't touch foreign exchange in any form. Merchants don't want to play banker for tourists. And non-bank exchange bureaux exist to take your money away from you.
Two other points that haven't been mentioned: Be sure to have a four-digit PIN number for any card. And an American ATM/debit card may or may not be accepted in stores or restaurants -- that's why carrying both an ATM and a credit card gives the most peace of mind.

ellenem

"The rate of interest is likely to be closer to 20 per cent and some if not all cards charge that amount on the entire credit card balance, not just the amount withdrawn as cash."

That is my experience as well. The finance charge applies to the balance, not just the withdrawal.