Hi -
I will be traveling to London for a few days then taking the Eurostar to Paris. I'd like to get some Euros before I leave London. Ideally, exchange any British Pounds I have left over for Euros. Any suggestions on where I should go?
Thanks!

My suggestion is to wait until you arrive in Paris. You will get a far better exchange rate by just going to an ATM there. Otherwise (assuming you are not British) you will pay an exchange rate twice - once to get pounds, and again to change pounds to Euros.

This is a virtually unanswerable question.

Inevitably, you'll have a few pounds in your pocket at the end of your stay, and it would be downright insane to plan your holiday to arrive at Waterloo just as you'd spent your last penny.

But even if there were a WalMart equivalent in forex, it'd be equally insane to travel 20 miles out of town to save 2 eurocents in the pound on a £15 transaction.

And, to add to the fun, there isn't a WalMart equivalent. There's a myth in Britain that the Post Office and Marks + Spencer offer the best rates.

Absolutely incorrect: there are hundreds of retail forex opreators, making different new pricing decisions daily in London, and M+S and the Post Office are both far too cumbersome to send investigators round each of their competitors every day to check on prices. (M+S or the Post Office are probably the best choice if you live, like most Britons, in a suburb that doesn't have a million one-man forex operators, but does have a dozen or so major banks that are just as bureaucratic as M+S, but happier about fleecing customers).

Anyway, the likelihood is there won't be an M+S or post office with an exchange facility open near you when you want them.

If it's worth all this hassle, note the net, net rate for how many Euros youi'll get for £50 at your nearest post office or M+S. Then look at the net, net amount you'll get from the one-man kiosks near your hotel. I'd be surprised if the difference, either way, made a journey of more than 100 yds out of your way worthwhile.

And if what Taggie really meant was that you should try to minimise the pounds you convert into Euros by tailoring your British ATM withdrawals, she was absolutely right.

My plan is usually to keep the extra currency if there is a good chance I'll be returning in the next year, rather than exchange it into another currency. But if I'm not planning a return, I'd put virtually all my extra pounds on the last night's hotel bill (allowing whatever it might take to get to the train station and maybe get a cup of coffee in the station. Then I'd simply use my ATM card in Paris at the station there and get some euro.

Alternatively, I'd just exchange the pounds into euro at the train station at a regular change booth. Assuming we aren't talking about several hundred dollars worth, the few cents extra it will cost to convert is a minor consideration. And I doubt you'll get a better rate doing so in Paris than in London.

My guess is that you can use any pound and pence you have left to buy something on the train.
Then get euro in Paris from a normal ATM.

Also, once you leave the country, most banks will NOT exchange coins. Because of the two pound coin, it is easy to forget you have $15 - $20 jingling in your pocket or purse.

I do not know about the Eurostar, but on the TGV in the snack car, I could pay in dollar, pound or euro. I suppose dollar is/are still acceptable!!!!!!!!!

I did once pay in a mixture of currency on an Austrian train. The waiter could figure it up in his head and I ended up paying in dollar, Swiss franc, and euro.
I was glad to get rid of it because the next stop was Vienna and then home.

And yes, I think writing euro in the singular when you mean plural is a form of arrant pedantry. Bet I can touch off all kinds of evil responses with that remark. Who wants to be first? I get a good laugh out of most of it. (I get my jollies that way.)

In some countries when expressing an amount of euro or euros, the plural for euro is euro. In other countries, the plural is euros or euroa. It's similar for cent/cents.

In English, the plural forms are officially euro and cent. However, the EU website recognizes that in general uses for English speakers, euros and cents will probably be used. "However, more general usage of these terms may differ in some languages, such as English, where it is natural practice to refer to the currency in the plural form as ‘euros’ instead of the official form ‘euro’. This is the same practice as used with most currencies in English, as in the plural form 'dollars'.

Since I always fly thru Heathrow but don't stay on in the UK, I'm happy to keep a small amount (>50) of Pounds for the next trip.

As some of the others said - don't exchange £ for € if you can at all help it.

Just don't withdraw too many £ your last few days in London and the few £ you have left you can use for your hotel, your last dinner in town, on the eurostar, etc.

Then when you get to Paris simply get your euro from an ATM in Gere du Nord (or if the queue is too long, there is an ATM across and about a 1/2 block down the street from the taxi rank)

Thank you for the information - It'll come in handy.

You say "euros" and I say "euro"...

...but the Brits use "pounds" and "quid" interchangeably, so what's a person to do?

Kudos to you all...

(That's a joke. "Kudos" is a singular noun with an "s" on the end, not a plural like "congratulations.&quot