The Man Got Me In The End
Well, phooey. In trying to outsmart the man , he got his money anyway.
Here's how:
Before my trip I discovered my credit cards charged 3% international transaction fees and my debit card charged 1% +$5 per international ATM withdrawal.
I decided to outmaneuver the man by taking cash and using only a partner bank for ATM withdrawals, PNB Paribas. Using PNB Paribas would save me $5 on each ATM withdrawal, but I'd still pay %1 fee.
Turns out the conversion rates were significantly better using the ATM, even factoring in the 1% transaction fee.
My conversion rate for changing dollars to Euros was 1.36.
But when I used the ATM at PNB Paribas, my conversion rate was 1.30 - ! -
Sigh.
Then, we have over 100 Euros at the end of our trip that we converted to dollars.
We only got 1.20 for it - ! -
So, in the end, they got their money alright.
I think I will revert back to my old strategy of just using credit cards on an as-needs basis when traveling overseas.
Even though they would have charged a 3% transaction fee, that would have been a real conversion rate of 1.33 (1.30 + .03) instead of the 1.36 I paid for currency conversion.
That and I likely would not have had so much cash on hand that I had to convert to dollars, which was especially painful because there was a cut both ways in getting the money and then converting the money.
posted by finance girl @ 2:04 PM
2 Comments:
There are really a lot of variables to try to optimize this. You can try, but as you found, the man usually has the last laugh. I have to say, I'm surprised you were able to get a 1.30 conversion at the ATM. That is a GREAT rate!
I have no idea how I got such a good rate at PNB Paribas. I never saw the retail conversion rate get that low accorgding to WSJ for the time I was there...odd..
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