Santander ATM abroad rates

Fi_83

Hi,

sorry if this is in the wrong place

I am going to barcelona next week. I have my holiday savingsin my Santander “Premium” bank account which they have told me doesn’t incur withdrawalcharges from a Santander ATM in Barcelona. I am thinking of mainly withdrawingwhen abroad and taking little cash with me due to safety reasons. I don’t havea vast amount of money so don’t know if the small difference in exchange rateswill make much difference . But when I rang Santander today but they couldn’ttell me the exchange rate from atm is for today (so i could compare). They saidthe only way i could get this is when I get my receipt from withdrawing inBarcelona.

Does anyone know if it’s a really bad rate from an ATMabroad

daveyjp

Often better than exchange offices as you get commercial rates. We got 9.1 in Denmark, it was 8.3 at the exchanges.

fifeken

Santander don't set the exchange rate. It's set by either Mastercard or Visa (I think Santander issue cards from both of these dependant on the type of account). You can find either of them on line and both will be much more favourable than the tourist rate.

callum9999

Not strictly on topic, but has anyone here ever seen a Santander branded ATM in Spain? Maybe I'm just being blind, but I can't remember ever coming across one! Even at the Santander branches I came across the ATM was branded "Telebanco" and not Santander - do these count as Santander ATMs?

EDIT: It seems they do count. No idea why I couldn't find that out last time I searched for it!

daveyjp

Barcelona has plenty of Santander branches.

Telebanco is an ATM system not a bank, much like Link in the UK. Another is Servired, I can't remember which system Santander Spain use, but for free withdrawals with a UK Santander account which offers free withdrawals you are best using a Spanish Santander machine.

callum9999

daveyjp wrote: »

Barcelona has plenty of Santander branches.

Telebanco is an ATM system not a bank, much like Link in the UK. Another is Servired, I can't remember which system Santander Spain use, but for free withdrawals with a UK Santander account which offers free withdrawals you are best using a Spanish Santander machine.

I assumed it was, but the point I was making was they are purely branded Telebanco with no mention of Santander anywhere (all the ones I saw anyway). While it is a safe bet those attached to Santander branches were Santander and therefore free to use, I couldn't be sure (and as I have other fee-free cards anyway, I didn't need to worry about trying it out).

Though I did come across a surprising number of ATMs that offered to charge your UK bank account with pounds instead of euros seemingly completely free of charge (i.e. 0% rate mark up, 0% commission). I tried it once and it did seem to be completely free but I haven't analysed the rate or anything.

fifeken

callum9999 wrote: »

Though I did come across a surprising number of ATMs that offered to charge your UK bank account with pounds instead of euros seemingly completely free of charge (i.e. 0% rate mark up, 0% commission). I tried it once and it did seem to be completely free but I haven't analysed the rate or anything.

Please do the analysis and let us know how much you've been stung for.

It's a well publicised method of separating you from your money.

callum9999

fifeken wrote: »

Please do the analysis and let us know how much you've been stung for.

It's a well publicised method of separating you from your money.

It's too late now but I don't see how that could possibly be the case. The machine specifically said that there would be no mark up or fees on the Visa rate. I don't see how a national banking group could possibly get away with lying?

The "well publicised" method of separately you from your money in this method is by putting a % fee on the markup. If the % in this case is zero, please explain how I've been "stung"?