Post Office rip-off buy back rates

ArJay_2

I bought Thai Baht online through the PO a few weeks back at what was a reasonable rate vs. competitors and the money market. I was happy with the deal. Today I went to exchange a small amount of residual Baht back into pounds. The rate I was given is quite honestly a rip-off to my mind. I think what the PO is doing is offering a decent rate to sell Sterling / buy foreign currency, then hiking up their margins enormously on buy back (which has to be done over the counter as far as I know). Here are the values for today:

Money market rate TB/£ = 48.09
PO sell TB = 45.14 (6% margin vs. MM rate)
PO buy TB = 54.75!! (14% margin vs. MM rate)

I complained about this at the counter today and was told "well that's the money market for you!" ...NO...it's the PO ripping me off. Anybody see it differently?

malkie76

You do appreciate they are a business, and are designed to make money ?
Assuming no-one had a gun to your head you could have refused their offer.

ArJay_2

malkie76 wrote: »

You do appreciate they are a business, and are designed to make money ?
Assuming no-one had a gun to your head you could have refused their offer.

So you think this is a perfectly acceptable business practice...oh and by the way, the buy-back rate was not obvious to me or the counter lady until after the transaction. I thought I could trust the PO...never again!! I'll be much more wary in future.

Anyway, in spite of the fact you think I'm a dimwit for accepting this, hopefully my experience will warn others.

benjus

The PO's exchange rates are mediocre at best, terrible at worst. They rely on people assuming that they'll be cheaper than other places because they're "The People's Post Office".

If you walked into a car showroom and said "I want a car", then bought whichever model the salesman showed you, would you be surprised if that model turned out to be the one that got him the most comission?

Having said that, unless you live in London it's not easy to find places that will exchange currency with really tight spreads. If it's a large amount of money it's worth sending it via insured delivery to one of the places in London that will give better rates, but otherwise you might as well just bite the bullet and find the cheapest place on your local high street - which could end up being the Post Office, even with a 14% spread.

_Andy_

Yet again we see a 'rip off' thread where there is no rip off.

VestanPance

ArJay wrote: »

So you think this is a perfectly acceptable business practice...oh and by the way, the buy-back rate was not obvious to me or the counter lady until after the transaction. I thought I could trust the PO...never again!! I'll be much more wary in future.

Anyway, in spite of the fact you think I'm a dimwit for accepting this, hopefully my experience will warn others.

I think it's just a life lesson for you. The buy back rate is always far far lower than the selling rate, seasoned travellers expect that.

That's not the Post Office, that is standard practice at every currency exchange.

photome

Where is the rip off as others said you didnt have to shop at the post office, in all honesty I dont know why people do!

A quick look at the travelmoneymaximiser tells me there are high st buy back rates of 50 baht to the pound why didnt you use one of those

DCFC79

OP the experience for others is to do they're research before they get any exchanged.