6 Tips to Save Money On Credit Card and ATM Fees When Traveling for Nomads
When you travel full-time as a nomad or even if you’re on vacation, it’s easy to avoid excess credit cards fees by making a few intentional decisions before you even leave on your trip. We give you six tips (two of which you’ve never seen anywhere else) to make sure you’re not going to get unexpected charges on your credit and debit cards when you travel. Especially if you travel full-time, these tips will save you at least several hundreds of dollars annually if you follow all of them.
Tip 1: Avoid Foreign Transaction Fees
Surprisingly, there are still credit cards that will charge you for using them outside of the USA. These fees, called foreign transaction fees, are a small percentage of each charge you make when you’re outside of the USA or if you use a website that is not in the US. Granted, just a few cents isn’t much, but it will add up. There’s no need to use a card that has foreign transaction fees, and there are many credit cards that not only don’t have foreign transaction fees, but they don’t have annual fees either. See below for recommendation.
Tip 2: Avoid ATM fees.
Just like foreign transaction fees, you shouldn’t be paying ATM withdrawal fees either. When you withdraw money from an ATM, which is the easiest way to get foreign cash when you travel, you will get asked at the ATM machine if it’s okay to charge you a transaction fee. Not only will the ATM’s bank charge you fees, but your own bank will charge you fees. You could rake up $10 per transaction! Avoid this by making sure you’ve got a debit card that not only doesn’t charge you a transaction fee, but also reimburses you for the other bank’s transaction fee too. We know of two cards that reimburse you for both sets of ATM fees. See below for our recommendation
Tip 3: Don’t Allow Conversion Fees
This fee is a sneaky fee that you often won’t even see. This is what happens. You run your credit card at a transaction terminal, often at restaurants. The terminal will ask you if you want to complete the transaction in the local currency or your home currency, which for us is US Dollars. If you get asked this, always decline the conversion. You want to pay in the local currency and let your credit card’s bank do the conversion. ATMs often ask if you want to accept the local conversion fee as well.
But sometimes, the waiter or cashier will answer the question for you. Often they assume that since you’re American, you’ll want to pay in US Dollars. If you see your total being displayed in USD rather than the local currency, decline the transaction and ask them to run it again in the local currency. You’ll get a much better conversion rate.
Tip 4: Compare the local website to the US website
When booking your travel, including airline, hotel, cars, cruises, ferries, and even bike rentals, often you find a website that ends in the .com that you’re probably familiar with. Usually, these .com websites are US companies selling something with US Dollars. But those same companies will have a website available at the local country, too.
As an example, let’s sau you’re cruising from LA to Sydney, or you’re flying from Santiago, Chile to Santiago de Compostela, Spain. Be sure to check the cruise website at both the .com and .au websites, and the airline websites for .cl and .es. You might find two things; the prices might be cheaper on one country’s website than the other, and your exchange rate to the USD might also be better. We saved $100 per ticket when booking our South American flights to the USA by going to LATAM’s Chilean website over the USA website.
Tip 4: Get Your Cash at the ATM
Don’t buy cash from your local bank before you leave nor buy cash from a cash trader. Both are very expensive ways to get cash, and chances are, you might not even need the amount of cash you think you need. A few exceptions to this rule would be countries where inflation is rampant and there are lucrative black markets for the US Dollar like in Argentina and Turkey. But in most cases, the best place to get cash is the ATM.
If you follow our tip 2, it doesn’t matter which ATM you use since your fees will be reimbursed. Having said that, you always want to be wise in picking your ATM. Don’t use any stand-alone ATMs, ATMs attached to an exchange box, or EURONET. Be sure they’re attached to a bank, and make sure there’s a camera recording your transaction. If you can tap your card rather than insert it, that’s even better. We love getting money from the airport ATM. It’s convenient, easy, and safe. We’ll grab cash then go right to the concessionaire and buy a bottle of water. We’ll get change for our large bills and have smaller coins for the bus we’re probably about to grab as we leave the airport.
Tip 5: Your Cards WILL Go Fraud
No matter how much attention you pay to your credit and debit card safety, they will go fraud. Or lost. Or stolen. So instead of hoping it doesn’t happen, plan for it so that you’re not caught in a problem. Make sure you use our triple wallet strategy (see our video) where you triplicate your wallet around your personal ecosystem. One wallet in your purse, one in your luggage, one in your backpack. Each wallet has a little bit different configuration so that they all act up as backups for each other. Make sure that the banks that own your cards will ship you replacement cards for free. See our recommendations below.
Tip 6: Avoid “No Commission, No Fees” Locations
If you do end up at some sort of money changer type of situation, don’t be scammed by the “no commission, no fees” game. There may be no fees, but your conversion rate will be awful. For example, rather than getting $1.25 for your dollar, your exchange rate will be worse, and your dollar will only be worth $1, or a 25% conversion charge. Paying a fee might be the better way to go.
>>Our Recommended Credit and Debit Cards<<
All of these cards below follow our relevant tips above. We routinely rotate these cards through our three wallets.
Credit Cards We Recommend
Chase Sapphire Preferred (annual fee of $95)
Bank of America Travel Rewards (no annual fee)
Delta SkyMiles Blue American Express
