Euros

[dethleffs640]

When touring in France & Spain Can any one please tell me, is it best to take Euros, Prepaid Travel Cards, Travelers Cheques or Sterling and change for Euros in a Bank. As the exchange rate now is only about £1. = 1.078 euros, which do you think will give me the most for my Pound.

 

[Clive-Cardiff]

We find that the easiest way is to use the usual hole in the wall ATM. The only problem is that most banks charge a fee for doing this.

The way round this is to open a Nationwide Flex Account and load it with whatever amount you think you will need.

Nationwide do not charge any fee or commission for this and you will find ATM's just about everywhere, just like the UK

 

[BigTim]

Hi Grenville.

In France and Italy, not sure about Spain, as we haven't been for a while.

When travelling from the UK we take just enough Euros to keep us going until we can get to an ATM in France.

Like Clive we use our Nationwide flex account debit card in ATMs which can be found at most banks and supermarkets too. Nowadays most French ATMs accept UK Chip and pin cards without any problems. That has been our main current account for over 20 years anyway. We keep any spare cash in a N/Wide online Esavings account and transfer it to our Flex account when necessary. The Flex account online service means that I can check my account and move cash around, as above,online whilst abroad. There is, also, a N/wide Phone banking service which I have used from France when there has been no internet link readily available.

We, also, use Nationwide and Post Office credit cards as these do not charge any weighting when converting from Euros to sterling - most other card providers do. Again these cards are freely accepted at most supermarches and petrol stations. Many auto pumps at petrol stations now accept UK C&Pin cards without any bother.

My wife and I now have our own seperate N/W credit card accounts, as well as being cardholdes on the others account, as a theft a couple of years ago left us cardless in Italy. We now, also, keep one of the cards hidden in the 'van as an emergency back up.

I hope this helps.

Tim

 

[EvansofSprot]

Fortunately I have >

 

[smiley]

We've just come back from France. I checked the rate today with the bank (nationwide flex) 1.118 euros to the pound.

 

[RayS]

If you are running Windows Vista you can get a small software "gadget" which shows you the current pound to Euro (or, easier to understand, euro to pound). This has moved from 88p to 95p in the last day or so and looks as if it will go to parity or worse very shortly.

Nationwide credit and debit cards seem to work quite well in Spain. If you are considereing a transfer from e-saver to flex accoount you made need to take the little hand-held number generator gizmo which they sent out to flex account holders around April earlier this year.

By complete chance I too came home in april with a reasonable amount of euro's but I expect they will soon go.

 

[vernon]

Using Travelex exchange rates. Not only are we doing bad against the Euro, but over the past 10 days of this 'Global Credit Crunch' the Pound has done worse against the Bulgarian Lev, Croatian Kuna and the Czech Koruna, they are hardly major economies, and I bet they didn't give several hundred million to Pakistan to help with their security.

 

[BigTim]

Hi

In response to Ray S's comment regarding needing the Nationwide card reader (gizmo!) to transfer funds between N/W Esavings and Flex accounts. I believe that it is only necessary to have the reader if transferring between accounts in DIFFERENT names, eg, we forgot our reader and weren't able to transfer funds to our son's N/W account. (Our son did post one of our readers to my sister's home in the Pyrenees which we were visiting - it missed us by a day and is still in the Pyrenees!!!)

Obviously one does need to take one's log-on details for using internet banking, easily forgotten if the saved on home computer! I take a file of important computer passwords, in coded form.

Tim

 

[RayS]

Hi

In response to Ray S's comment regarding needing the Nationwide card reader (gizmo!) to transfer funds between N/W Esavings and Flex accounts. I believe that it is only necessary to have the reader if transferring between accounts in DIFFERENT names, eg, we forgot our reader and weren't able to transfer funds to our son's N/W account. (Our son did post one of our readers to my sister's home in the Pyrenees which we were visiting - it missed us by a day and is still in the Pyrenees!!!)

Obviously one does need to take one's log-on details for using internet banking, easily forgotten if the saved on home computer! I take a file of important computer passwords, in coded form.

Tim

Hi Tim, the reason I posted about the card reader was that a friend had had to use it to transfer between her e-saver account and her flex account for a fairly modest sum - about

 

[Paul_5064559]

Using Travelex exchange rates. Not only are we doing bad against the Euro, but over the past 10 days of this 'Global Credit Crunch' the Pound has done worse against the Bulgarian Lev, Croatian Kuna and the Czech Koruna, they are hardly major economies, and I bet they didn't give several hundred million to Pakistan to help with their security.

Vernon, Don't suppose they need to since they are not waging bloody wars in Iraq and Afganistan....

Its only us Brits (and Yanks) that have to keep watch over our shoulders thanks to our past and present Government's policies!

 

[jaiymes]

American Express Travellers cheques are also not a bad idea if you cannot organise yourself with Nationwide account. You can exchange them without commission/charges at a post office in France and other outlets also. Check online with American Express website and you can even print out a map of the locations of compatible exchanges in the places you are visiting. If you hand over a 100 euro cheque, you get 100 euros.

I hope this is of some help to you in your decision.

Kind regards

James