Cards down under

koalabear_3

Hi, what do you think is the best credit/debit cards to use in Australia?

Between us we have Goldfish Barclaycard, Lloydstsb credit and debit and Santander credit and debit cards

Still got my Nationwide account but I believe they charge now for out of Europe:(
tia

NFH

If your Santander credit card is Santander Zero, use that. You'll get a wholesale spot rate obtained by MasterCard.

dzug1

Do youhave a Nationwide credit or debit card or both?

Unless your Santander card is a zero Nationwide is still the best of the bunch - just on the debit card side and by miles as a credit card

koalabear_3

Thanks, I have a Santander zero mastercard ,Santander debit card and a Nationwide debit card.

NFH

Use Santander Zero for purchases and for cash. When you withdraw cash, pay it off from your current account within one working day and you'll pay no interest. When I've made payments from another bank to Santander Zero by FPS, it appeared on my Santander Zero online banking in under 10 seconds. This works even better if you're half a day ahead of the UK banking system by being in Australia.

loobs40

My info may be out of date now , but in Nov/Dec 2010 we used our Halifax Clarity credit card for out trip round the world (including Australia) , and used it for absoutely everything including getting cash out of atms. There were no charges for this, apart from atm charges which are not in the control of the Halifax, and we minimised the effect of that by always taking out large amounts of cash.

I paid into my Halifax credit card every week online or so to minimise the interest charges (12.9%) and over the six weeks period we only racked up about £6 in credit card interest on the cash withdrawals. I believe we also got the best exchange rate at the time by using ATMs.

CountryGoose

loobs40 wrote: »

My info may be out of date now , but in Nov/Dec 2010 we used our Halifax Clarity credit card for out trip round the world (including Australia) , and used it for absoutely everything including getting cash out of atms. There were no charges for this, apart from atm charges which are not in the control of the Halifax, and we minimised the effect of that by always taking out large amounts of cash.

I paid into my Halifax credit card every week online or so to minimise the interest charges (12.9%) and over the six weeks period we only racked up about £6 in credit card interest on the cash withdrawals. I believe we also got the best exchange rate at the time by using ATMs.

This is exactly the way to go!

If the OP had been bothered to do a little reading on the board, they would have found that all this information is there.

ince_mon

I too used my Halifax Clarity Card in Oz. I withdrew over 2 and a half grand in 4 wks,and occured just over £2 interest charges.:j