Ripped off at a bureau de change in central London

[Deleted User]

Maybe you needed to check the exchange rate checker on this site first. This is just buyers remorse - you have no legal rights to refund on money exchanges

arcon5

halibut2209 wrote: »

Which one tasted better?

The second one - the onions was crispier so it won hands down

paddyrg

Bureaux de Change...you often see areas packed with them, even areas not so big with tourists - there is not enough tourist income (especially in these days of credit cards and cashpoints everywhere) to sustain them all. Many have been linked to money laundering and fronts for other criminal enterprises - you may not want to go in too heavy, let's say.

vikingaero

Many BdC's in tourist areas employ sharp practices.

One common ploy is to take your Sterling and convert it to Euros before converting to US Dollars.

geo555

Was you buying £s or another currency, €s or $s for example?
If you was buying £s from €s, you would not get the same as the selling rate.
For example, the € selling rate would be 1.20 and the buying rate would be, say 1.35. This means that if you exchanged £500 you would get €600. If you was to change the €600 into sterling, you would get £445

melbell

Cool story bro!

You should totally complain on here. Oh wai....


No seriously its your fault you never shopped around

MothballsWallet

I don't use BdC any more - I have a Nationwide account, so I use that to withdraw money when on holiday, the rate's pretty close to the rates given on the likes of xe.com and oanda.com. I'm sure there are other accounts like this.

When we were in Cyprus earlier this year, some of the shops had a sign saying that they used a card payment processor who converted the Euro price to your home currency before applying it to your card account, so you wouldn't (they claimed) lose out on the difference between authorising the payment and it reaching the account, which can be a few days.

wealdroam

MothballsWallet wrote: »

When we were in Cyprus earlier this year, some of the shops had a sign saying that they used a card payment processor who converted the Euro price to your home currency before applying it to your card account, so you wouldn't (they claimed) lose out on the difference between authorising the payment and it reaching the account, which can be a few days.

This is often not the best way of doing it.

From MSE's Cheap Travel Money article...

If I spend abroad & they let me pay in pounds, is it worth it?

This is called dynamic currency exchange, and usually should be avoided. Often the rate you get will be appalling and someone will be making big money out of it. If you’ve got one of the specialist overseas cards, you’ll get a much better rate paying in the foreign currency rather than pounds. Even if you’re using a normal card, as you’ve no idea of the relative exchange rates they could be playing you for a fool; so it's usually best to stick with paying in the foreign currency.

Omar_Little

PlutoinCapricorn wrote: »

I always used Marks & Spencers and the Post Office.

You aren't getting the best deal from either of those places. Despite the OP complaining about a central London Bureau d'Exchange, I have personally found them the cheapest by far and use one of them, next to Victoria Station, 3-4 times a year.

There are quite a few in that area, all with no commission and competitive rates. Thomas Exchange Global, at the time of writing, give 1.2410 Euro's to the pound whilst the Post Office is 1.21 and Marks & Spencer just 1.1954.

http://www.thomasexchangeglobal.co.uk/