Euros / BP needed?

[pink845]

Between our Cruise and pre and post stays totalling 25 days, we used our cash everywhere. Never turned down ever. We arrived home with no credit card bills. No foreign transaction fees. Nothing. Yes, we see Europe is pretty well all cashless and were queried several times about why north americans are credit card averse or tap and go averse. But no retailer denied  our cash right down to the tiny little grocer.

[CruiserBruce]

28 minutes ago, pink845 said:

Between our Cruise and pre and post stays totalling 25 days, we used our cash everywhere. Never turned down ever. We arrived home with no credit card bills. No foreign transaction fees. Nothing. Yes, we see Europe is pretty well all cashless and were queried several times about why north americans are credit card averse or tap and go averse. But no retailer denied  our cash right down to the tiny little grocer.

Never heard anyone deny cash. But, are your ATM withdrawals fee free, or your exchanges into euros back home, fee free, and at the bank to bank rate, like a fair number of credit cards now?

 

Spent two weeks on a land tour in Europe in June. Spent 80 euros in cash, thousands of euros on credit cards with no fees, at the bank to bank exchange rate, which is the lowest available. 

 

Yes, we might be quibbling over a few dollars, but there are definitely benefits to be cash free.

[Globaliser]

19 minutes ago, CruiserBruce said:

Never heard anyone deny cash.

 

Just in the last two days I've been to several mainstream shops and restaurants in London that don't take cash. They're still in the minority, but there are far more of them than places that don't take cards.

 

If you don't want to use cards, you'll find plenty of places where you can spend your money. But please don't let individual anecdotes fool anyone into thinking that every merchant will take cash. It's simply not true.

[Meander Ingwa]

and conversely, in my state, it was reported this morning that about 250,000 people do not have a bank account and no access to electronic type payments.  There are efforts to block vendors from refusing cash.  

 

there is also a well established anti-bank / mistrust, among our immigrant population.  

 

prohibiting the use of cash is one way to marginalize and weed out people

[ontheweb]

1 hour ago, pink845 said:

Between our Cruise and pre and post stays totalling 25 days, we used our cash everywhere. Never turned down ever. We arrived home with no credit card bills. No foreign transaction fees. Nothing. Yes, we see Europe is pretty well all cashless and were queried several times about why north americans are credit card averse or tap and go averse. But no retailer denied  our cash right down to the tiny little grocer.

Were you in Amsterdam? That is where we had trouble using Euros, basically at museums.

[Harters]

9 hours ago, pink845 said:

But no retailer denied  our cash right down to the tiny little grocer.

Apart from the early stages of Covid, I have not come across any retailer here that refuses cash. That is not to say that there aren't any, just that they must be few and far between. 

[Cotswold Eagle]

Some actual data here from the Netherlands central bank.  Interesting regional and sector variations, and I’m sure there would be similar in the U.K.  

The extent to which retailers still accept cash as a means of payment varies widely by retail sector. While on average 4% of retailers put up PIN-only notices to indicate they do not accept cash, this is significantly higher in a number of specific retail sectors, such as cinemas (22%), car parks (16%) and pharmacies (12%), our survey shows. This means the cash acceptance rate in these retail sectors is too low.

Edited September 12, 2023 by Cotswold Eagle

[Globaliser]

1 hour ago, Cotswold Eagle said:

Some actual data here from the Netherlands central bank.

 

That reminded me of the recent FT article about a consequence of the decline in the use of cash in countries like the Netherlands. Less cash, fewer ATMs (plus the Netherlands has good protection for the contents of ATMs). But Germany remains addicted to cash. So with plenty of German ATMs stuffed full of cash, Dutch gangs have therefore taken to blowing them up: almost 500 of them last year, taking an average of €100,000 per raid: Bombs, car chases and ‘free money’: Dutch gangs blow up German cash machines.

 

1 hour ago, Harters said:

Apart from the early stages of Covid, I have not come across any retailer here that refuses cash. That is not to say that there aren't any, just that they must be few and far between. 

 

Maybe I should keep a diary! As Cotswold Eagle says, it wouldn't be surprising if there the UK has similar regional differences, including a higher proportion of "no cash" merchants in big cities.

[Globaliser]

11 hours ago, pink845 said:

No foreign transaction fees. Nothing.

 

Unless you bought your cash from family or friends, this is practically impossible. If you bought cash from a bank or a money exchange place, you will typically have paid more in fees at the point of purchase than if you used a card for your purchases. Even if you use a card that charges forex fees (which is, frankly, optional these days), these are typically only 3% on top of a near-zero-margin interbank exchange rate. Between the bid-offer spread and the commission typically charged by a bank when selling you foreign exchange, you can pay a lot more than that.

[Harters]

32 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

including a higher proportion of "no cash" merchants in big cities.

Not that I've noticed as yet round Greater Manchester. But I suspect it's going to be a coming thing. By the end of this year, the constituency where I live will not have a single bank in it. That's meant that the number of ATMs has reduced alongside with the closures, so an issue for customers. But the growing problem now is for small traders in that  they don't have a convenient bank at which they can pay in cash takings. It's bound to lead to more looking to "card only" business. 

 

I don't usually find that a problem although, by co-incidence, I've been out for breakfast this morning to the nearby Turkish cafe. Card machine wasn't working but, fortunately and unusually, I had enough cash with me to pay. 

 

[ontheweb]

4 hours ago, Cotswold Eagle said:

Some actual data here from the Netherlands central bank.  Interesting regional and sector variations, and I’m sure there would be similar in the U.K.  

The extent to which retailers still accept cash as a means of payment varies widely by retail sector. While on average 4% of retailers put up PIN-only notices to indicate they do not accept cash, this is significantly higher in a number of specific retail sectors, such as cinemas (22%), car parks (16%) and pharmacies (12%), our survey shows. This means the cash acceptance rate in these retail sectors is too low.

Interesting data, but it did not mention museums. That is where we basically found that we could not use our Euros.

[John Bull]

Machines which don't accept cash are becoming more & more common.

But there's worse - in my local town there are now some car-parks where the machines don't even accept cards - a smart-phone is essential, much the same as the increasing trend for booking dining times, excursions & such on cruise ships.

I'm a dinosaur who is still trying to get to grips with the last century. My mobile phone is good for phone calls & texts and even has a camera, a torch and a snake game, but I don't have - and don't want - a smartphone. My girlfriend does, so I am now committed to her from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part 😏

 

But I never found a manned outlet which doesn't accept bread-and-honey until we went to Norway.

We'd taken a few kroner as a back-up, never even tried to use it until our last port-of-call. Spent it all in one bar which did accept cash.

 

JB 🙂

[Globaliser]

12 minutes ago, John Bull said:

But there's worse - in my local town there are now some car-parks where the machines don't even accept cards - a smart-phone is essential, much the same as the increasing trend for booking dining times, excursions & such on cruise ships.

 

Can you not even phone the payment contractor in these situations? Maybe I'm lucky that I've only encountered RingGo parking so far: I make a voice call, and the automated machine immediately says "Do you want to park your bright red Fiat Cinquecento?"* and walks through the remaining steps to take a card payment.

 

* Well, it isn't actually a bright red Fiat Cinquecento, but you know what I mean.

[John Bull]

45 minutes ago, Globaliser said:

 

Can you not even phone the payment contractor in these situations? Maybe I'm lucky that I've only encountered RingGo parking so far: I make a voice call, and the automated machine immediately says "Do you want to park your bright red Fiat Cinquecento?"* and walks through the remaining steps to take a card payment.

 

* Well, it isn't actually a bright red Fiat Cinquecento, but you know what I mean.

 

I've never even tried, G., I just move on to somewhere more customer-orientated.

 

JB 🙁

 

[Harters]

3 hours ago, John Bull said:

in my local town there are now some car-parks where the machines don't even accept cards

Same here, JB. And I don't carry a mobile phone of any sort,  so am now pretty much excluded from visiting the town centre. 

[ontheweb]

4 hours ago, John Bull said:

Machines which don't accept cash are becoming more & more common.

But there's worse - in my local town there are now some car-parks where the machines don't even accept cards - a smart-phone is essential, much the same as the increasing trend for booking dining times, excursions & such on cruise ships.

I'm a dinosaur who is still trying to get to grips with the last century. My mobile phone is good for phone calls & texts and even has a camera, a torch and a snake game, but I don't have - and don't want - a smartphone. My girlfriend does, so I am now committed to her from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, till death us do part 😏

 

But I never found a manned outlet which doesn't accept bread-and-honey until we went to Norway.

We'd taken a few kroner as a back-up, never even tried to use it until our last port-of-call. Spent it all in one bar which did accept cash.

 

JB 🙂

I wish I could give you both a like and a thank you, so here is the thank you. It's nice to know I am not alone in not wanting a smartphone. Those who cannot do without them seem to have no tolerance for anyone not addicted to a smartphone.

[Travelntrike]

I have some British coins left from a 1999 trip.  Two are dated 1982, and 1 is1992

Can anyone tell me if they need to be newer than a specific date in order to spend them? I'm getting some notes from my bank in the US but thought I'd throw the coins in my bag if they are still spendable.

Thanks

[Globaliser]

2 hours ago, Travelntrike said:

I have some British coins left from a 1999 trip.  Two are dated 1982, and 1 is1992

Can anyone tell me if they need to be newer than a specific date in order to spend them?

 

What denominations are the coins?

[eileeshb]

On 9/12/2023 at 5:03 PM, ontheweb said:

I wish I could give you both a like and a thank you, so here is the thank you. It's nice to know I am not alone in not wanting a smartphone. Those who cannot do without them seem to have no tolerance for anyone not addicted to a smartphone.

I work in retail and we still have customers who ring to check what stock we have and want to pay over the phone but I can’t trust those sorts of transactions unless it’s someone we know . 
just this week there were over a thousand failed/blocked/refused transactions on our website by someone who obviously got a collection of cards. Stripe process our web payments and all but 3 of the fraudulent ones were halted by them, the 3 that stripe missed we knew were dodgy, each one was trying to buy a tidetable for our local beach in Ireland but had buyers whose address was 5th avenue New York, California! 
card fraud is rampant, I get a couple of phishing/smishing attempts every few weeks on my phone so taking someone’s details over the phone is not going to be possible for very much longer. 
btw as a small retailer taking card or cash payments costs us money, the banks charge a fortune to accept cash lodgements but they also charge for processing card payments! 
there was one day in June this year when the power was knocked out all over the village for a half hour or so, everyone working in the shops just sat outside eating ice creams as none of us had working tills or card machines until the power came back. The main annoyance for us was our security alarm went nuts while the power was off and wouldn’t even accept the shutdown code. 
 

The tax authorities do not like cash businesses and would far prefer if everyone did cashless, but the pensioner voting base here is strong and forced the government to slap the banks for threatening to convert to mostly cashless branches. Oddly this was shortly after the government had smacked the taxi drivers for refusing to take card payments. 

[tobyt]

I will never again travel without at least a few hundred of the local currency. Last year in Ireland our credit card worked great but our ATMs from several different institutions did not. We struggled with parking costs, water or snacks, and smaller retailers who did not want credit cards. Thankfully a kind owner of a cafe took pity on me and allowed me to bump my dinner up my 100 euros for what he called pocket money and thankfully we had several hundred in US dollars which several tour operators took after hearing my tale of woe. If I bring funds home from the upcoming trip…more reason to go to Europe again!

[CruiserBruce]

49 minutes ago, tobyt said:

I will never again travel without at least a few hundred of the local currency. Last year in Ireland our credit card worked great but our ATMs from several different institutions did not. We struggled with parking costs, water or snacks, and smaller retailers who did not want credit cards. Thankfully a kind owner of a cafe took pity on me and allowed me to bump my dinner up my 100 euros for what he called pocket money and thankfully we had several hundred in US dollars which several tour operators took after hearing my tale of woe. If I bring funds home from the upcoming trip…more reason to go to Europe again!

Did you notify your banks you were going to be out of the country? Did your card have the appropriate PIN numbers?

[tobyt]

Yes to both and several hours of my vacation calling our US banks from my vacation I can’t get back!

Edited September 24, 2023 by tobyt

[Globaliser]

9 hours ago, tobyt said:

Last year in Ireland our credit card worked great but our ATMs from several different institutions did not. We struggled with parking costs, water or snacks, and smaller retailers who did not want credit cards.

 

Are your ATM cards debit cards? If so, you could simply have used them as debit cards rather than trying to draw cash.

 

There is always the ultimate backup of drawing cash on the credit card. Indeed, 30 years ago that was probably the best way of getting cash overseas, but changes to typical fee structures have seen to that.

[CruiserBruce]

10 hours ago, tobyt said:

Yes to both and several hours of my vacation calling our US banks from my vacation I can’t get back!

And your bank couldn't fix the problem? I think you need a new bank and new ATM cards. I forgot to notify my bank once...took a 10 minute phone call, and I had the cash in less than 10 minutes after that. In fact, I am writing this from outside the US, where we used our ATM cards with notification and no problems. Additionally, our bank got bought by another bank. The transaction was completed 8 days prior to this trip, and I stumbled across our new bank on this trip. I wasn't looking for them at all.

[tobyt]

After having our ATM and bank account skimmed for 3k we are super careful to have it be a single access only as an ATM.

I know we could have taken a cash advance on the credit card but frankly my stomach hurt just thinking about the fees.

We do have a new bank…..