German Amazon Purchase - Pay in GBP or Euros?

shortcrust

I want to buy something via the german amazon site. When I get to payment it asks me what my card's currency is, I think essentially giving the option to pay in pounds or euros. Is there any benefit in using pounds? I can use my Nationwide Select CC so no fees for euros. My gut tells me euros will be cheaper as amazon will cream a bit off in the conversion. Anyone know?

foxtrotoscar_2

If you pay in £'s you know exactly what it costs. If you pay in euros you don't as you have no idea what exchange rate will be applied. You pay your money you take your chances I guess!

Krash420

I would agree with not knowing how much it will be, but if you pay in Euros it WILL be cheaper. As for knowing how much, assuming you're paying with mastercard, you can check what the days master card rate is for gbp to eur conversions. Thats roughly what you'll have to pay. You can find it by googling Mastercard Exchange rates.

Youll find that paying in a foreign currency in cases like these always works to your advantage.

I would go with EUROs.

chattychappy

Is Amazon giving you the price in both Euros and GBP? Then you can see whether the rate is reasonable or not.

Else I would always want to be billed in Euros, even if I DIDN'T have a card like Select.

SnowTiger

foxtrotoscar wrote: »

If you pay in £'s you know exactly what it costs. If you pay in euros you don't as you have no idea what exchange rate will be applied. You pay your money you take your chances I guess!

Nationwide Select can be used commission-free for foreign purchases. It's unlikely Amazon would beat that, so I'd choose to pay in Euros.

pstuart

I made this mistake with a Dutch purchase recently (80euros), had the easy option of paypal, which I took.
When I looked at the purchase later, discovered that I would have been some £4 better off if I had used my Nationwide card and payed in euros.

Its a blatant rip off by many of these outfits and not very MSE of me !

shortcrust

Euros it is then! Thanks everyone.

Scarpacci

The only time I think it would make sense to charge in £s at a rate that's very much likely to be less advantageous than that of the card, is where your bank also charges a fixed fee for foreign transactions (e.g. £1) which would make the effective exchange rate much worse in practice.

c-m

This one is simple. Pay in Euros with a card like that offers near perfect exchange rates like the Supercard, Clarity et al.

Krash420

I'll be honest, even if a card charges a fee (say 2%) it's generally cheaper to pay by card, than it is to pay with it converted into your local currency, or for that matter to get cash converted at a currency exchange and pay by cash.

As an example, the Mastercard GBP to EUR rate for purchases settled on thursday is: 1.359512
Todays travelex rate is 1.3380. Post office is 1.3230.

Course you should use a debit card when taking money out of cashpoints, but it can be cheaper and worth more

Always consider all of your options...