Cheap Travel Money Discussion Area

joneeboy

Val Parry
NEVER buy foreign currency with you credit card if you can avoid it. It will cost you an arm and a leg in interest.I assume you have money in your bank account so just use your debit card.

CountryGoose

joneeboy wrote: »

Val Parry
NEVER buy foreign currency with you credit card if you can avoid it. It will cost you an arm and a leg in interest.I assume you have money in your bank account so just use your debit card.

Do not use your Debit Card either! A&L have a load of 2.95%. If you use it to draw cash, you will pay an additional 2% (min £2).

Load money on a FairFx Anywhere card and you will pay 1.5% loading only, with no charges for ATM use.

Assuming you're repaying every month, spend all you can on your Post Office card. It has 0% loading.

grainy_2

Is the Nationwide credit card better for spending and taking cash out of an atm in europe than the FairFX preloaded card? If so why? I dont get it!! help!

CountryGoose

grainy wrote: »

Is the Nationwide credit card better for spending and taking cash out of an atm in europe than the FairFX preloaded card? If so why? I dont get it!! help!

For spending, you are better off using the Nationwide Credit Card. The conversion of the € to £ is done with no loading at a very good rate. Providing you clear the balance every month, you will pay no interest.

If you draw cash on the credit card, you will be charged £3 or 2.5% as a fee. You will also pay interest on the cash until it's repaid.

The FairFx £ Anywhere Card will charge you a 1.5% fee each time you take out cash from the machine - a lot less than Nationwide without thinking about the interest. The rate is about the same.

However, if you spend on the FairFX card, you still pay the 1.5% fee on your spending. This is a worse deal than the Nationwide Card.

So FairFX for cash, Nationwide for other spending - providing you pay the bill each month!

si-erk

Does anybody know what happens if you load your credit card before you travel and then use it to withdraw cash (e.g. Halifax Clarity - No loading, No withdrawl fee, 12.9% APR charged on withdralws) - If your account is still in credit, what can they charge you??

Simon

luci

Putting your account in credit is againt their T&C's.

dzug1

si-erk wrote: »

Does anybody know what happens if you load your credit card before you travel and then use it to withdraw cash (e.g. Halifax Clarity - No loading, No withdrawl fee, 12.9% APR charged on withdralws) - If your account is still in credit, what can they charge you??

Simon

It's against the T&C of most cards.

Halifax say they MAY return any overpayment

Santander zero say they MAY ignore the payment and charge interest regardless

What they WILL do is anyone's guess and unlikely to be consistent

malc_b

si-erk wrote: »

Does anybody know what happens if you load your credit card before you travel and then use it to withdraw cash (e.g. Halifax Clarity - No loading, No withdrawl fee, 12.9% APR charged on withdralws) - If your account is still in credit, what can they charge you??

Simon

As has been said before positive balances are in violation of the card T&Cs. What they will do about it I don't know. In theory they could cancel the card I guess. As a minimum they might refund it. If the positive balance is because you returned an item that had been paid for then you'd be ok with that but over paying would be a clear breach of T&Cs.

The simplest method is to pay off the Clarity as soon as you get back and perhaps use another good credit card for purchases and the Clarity just for cash. If you have net access abroad then you could pay the clarity off as you withdraw the cash. If you keep the time when the balance is negative to a minimum then the cost is not that much.

DJFearRoss

I already have a Nationwide Debit Card and travel alot around Europe. I'm bit confused with this 'loading' thing, does this apply to purchases or cash withdrawls? I ONLY withdraw cash and rarely pay with the card, is it now worth me ditching this card? If so, which card would best suit me? Again, I gernerally only make cash machine withdrawls.

luci

I believe the loading applies to both purchases and cash withdrawals.

The Halifax Clarity card has no fees for cash withdrawals with an interest rate typically 12.9%. If you paid in full within a month it would cost 1% or less if you paid it off sooner.