Best way to exchange £ to Icelandic Krona?

buel

Hi,
Please can anyone tell me what is the best way to convert Pounds to Icelandic Krona?
Is it best to use a money exchange site or simply use debit cards over there?

Thank you.

NFH

Avoid changing cash, because one currency (either GBP or ISK) will be outside its own country. Extra-territorial cash is expensive to handle, so the rate will be poor. Use a card such as the Halifax Clarity Card. See this page for further advice.

jennifernil

We always use our Clarity card abroad these days,for both spending and cash, but there are a few banks that allow cash withdrawal on debit card without a fee.

hermante

NFH wrote: »

Avoid changing cash, because one currency (either GBP or ISK) will be outside its own country. Extra-territorial cash is expensive to handle, so the rate will be poor.

True for a minor currency like the ISK, and for a small country like Iceland, but otherwise it's not difficult to beat the credit card rate.

NFH

hermante wrote: »

True for a minor currency like the ISK, and for a small country like Iceland, but otherwise it's not difficult to beat the credit card rate.

Can you give an example of where you can get a better EUR/GBP rate for cash than the MasterCard rate used by Halifax Clarity Card?

Also card holders are often given the opposite side of the price, i.e. the bid instead of the offer or the offer instead of the bid. This is because the card networks (Visa, MasterCard etc) only trade net amounts in the FX markets, i.e. the net flow of aggregate bought and sold amounts in a particular currency pair. On the same card network and same day, if for example more money is spent by US-based card holders in the UK than is spent by UK-based card holders in the US, then the card network will sell a net amount of GBP/USD on the market bid. This means that UK-based card holders, who are buying GBP/USD, are given the bid instead of the offer, i.e. a much better GBP/USD rate than the market interbank rate.