charles_reed
Active member
One of the problems of trying to draw cash abroad is avoiding paying an unreasonable cut to the banks and credit card companies.
Up until about 10 years ago Eurocards and banks own debit cards appeared to give one a fair deal.
Like many others I'd not done the sums very carefully, until I looked at some of the costs involved with getting cash in Europe now I was there 34 weeks out of 52, and was appalled at the profits the banks were taking off me.
What really brought it home was having a French bank account - every time I paid cheque in £sterling into my account in Credit Agricole they gave me interbank rate and charge a fee +commission which on £1800 amounts to about 1.1%.
However the establishment of the € area, hasn't stopped banks outside France charging for the use of their ATMS. Drawing cash varies between 2-5%, and paying by € cheque also results in a charge, fortunately you can usually get that charge covered by the payee.
When I compared this to the charges made by my UK bank Visa debit card I discovered that the bid/offer spread compared to interbank rate was about 4.8%, in addition to which I had a commission of 2% to pay a total of just on 7% - use a credit card and the cash charge puts the fee up to marginally over 9%.
As a result of airing this discovery on this board I was advised to get a Nationwide Building Society Flex Account debit card. They refund to you the fee charged them by the Visa network.
Having used this card in € and other currency areas I can confirm that this is probably one of the best ways of getting cash - the Visa network tends to smooth prices compared to the interbank rate and the average bid/offer spread is about 2.5%.
From the limited tracking I've done, using a UK credit card to make purchases abroad, costs a premium of about 3.4%, which is preferrable to using cash.
Obviously, the least expensive way for me in France, is to use my Credit Agricole bank account and Maestro debit card. Outside France it seems best to draw and pay cash using the Flex account.
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Up until about 10 years ago Eurocards and banks own debit cards appeared to give one a fair deal.
Like many others I'd not done the sums very carefully, until I looked at some of the costs involved with getting cash in Europe now I was there 34 weeks out of 52, and was appalled at the profits the banks were taking off me.
What really brought it home was having a French bank account - every time I paid cheque in £sterling into my account in Credit Agricole they gave me interbank rate and charge a fee +commission which on £1800 amounts to about 1.1%.
However the establishment of the € area, hasn't stopped banks outside France charging for the use of their ATMS. Drawing cash varies between 2-5%, and paying by € cheque also results in a charge, fortunately you can usually get that charge covered by the payee.
When I compared this to the charges made by my UK bank Visa debit card I discovered that the bid/offer spread compared to interbank rate was about 4.8%, in addition to which I had a commission of 2% to pay a total of just on 7% - use a credit card and the cash charge puts the fee up to marginally over 9%.
As a result of airing this discovery on this board I was advised to get a Nationwide Building Society Flex Account debit card. They refund to you the fee charged them by the Visa network.
Having used this card in € and other currency areas I can confirm that this is probably one of the best ways of getting cash - the Visa network tends to smooth prices compared to the interbank rate and the average bid/offer spread is about 2.5%.
From the limited tracking I've done, using a UK credit card to make purchases abroad, costs a premium of about 3.4%, which is preferrable to using cash.
Obviously, the least expensive way for me in France, is to use my Credit Agricole bank account and Maestro debit card. Outside France it seems best to draw and pay cash using the Flex account.
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