A couple things I've learned about travelling in Europe, so far

[xiphias]

1) Cash
I didn't even think about this until I glanced at a travel guide in London -- one of those humor books which actually has good points in it. Naturally, I looked up the US in it, and and they had a bit about money. Everyone in the world who comes to the United States is annoyed that all of our paper money is the same size, shape, color, and design, with the only differences being a few numbers in the corners -- written smaller than the numbers in any other currency -- and which basially-similar-looking white guy has his basically-similar-looking portrait on it.

They pointed out that Americans aren't bothered by this (or, for that matter, that we have a $1 bill rather than coin -- I think that other countries believe that, if your average vending machine sells stuff more expensive than your smallest bill and your largest coin, you're doing it wrong) because we almost never use cash.

I'd never thought about it, but it's true. Even McDonald's takes debit and credit cards. I normally don't carry more than $20, back home, because I don't need to.

But I have not seen, in London, Florence, Rome, Paris, Venice, or Trieste, any of those self-service credit-card/debit card readers -- the ones where you swipe your card yourself, sign the little box with a light-pen, or punch in your PIN, and handle the transaction with minimal input by the clerk.

However, ATMs are everywhere and usually fee-free. In the United States, ATMs are a little less common, and almost always charge you for the privlege of getting your own money. If they only charge you $1, you count yourself lucky. If I want cash, I go to a supermarket, buy something small, and pay with a debit card, asking for "cash back".

But I almost never want cash.

In London and in Italy, we can use our Visa card at some restaurants (mainly the ones which cater to tourists), and to buy more expensive, big-ticket items (in general, if it's expensive enough that you're going to fill out a VAT exemption form for it, you can use a credit card), but, mainly, it's cash.

The advice we'd gotten had been to keep your cash in a moneybelt under your shirt, and only have what you need for the day out in your wallet, in case you meet a pickpocket. But we've found that a better place to keep your money is in a bank, and just go to the Bancomat every day to get your cash for the day. The Italian sentence I've used most is "Dovè ille Bancomat, per favorè?" And I've always gotten a helpful answer.

We have a credit union, which doesn't charge us for ATM transactions on their side, so we can do this. (Yes, in the United States, your own back can, and usually will, charge you to get your own money, and then the bank which owns the ATM will charge you again). So, for us, just getting money as we go makes more sense than getting extra.

Comments

[estherchaya.livejournal.com]

I've always found this a peculiar difference between the US and Europe.

Though when I was in Scotland last, there WAS a debit card reader thingy in the grocery store (but no where else that I recall... I was there for a funeral, not for real shopping).

[navrins]

Um, not to contradict your main point, but I've *never* kept a bank account that charges me to use its own ATMs, and for the past many years if have an account with any bank on the SUM network (which is almost any bank except Bank of America) and you use any ATM on the SUM network, you don't get charged anything. So if you're getting charged for ATM use, you're either choosing to pay for the convenience of using *this* ATM rather than looking for one a block away, or you could get a better account.

[undauntra.livejournal.com]

ATMs are a lot less common here than they are around Boston. I pay for the convenience of using *this* ATM, rather than looking for one across the interstate and down the road a mile or two.

[navrins]

Fair enough. But I think my points should pretty much hold for xiphias, even if they don't for you.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

We don't have a bank: we have a credit union. So we don't have ANY native ATMs. Nonetheless, our credit union does have agreements with a bunch of the local banks, so, if we plan ahead, we can usually avoid fees.

[florafloraflora.livejournal.com]

You're probably right about most Americans and differences in the average American vs. the average European, but I personally try to use cash as much as possible. But then I'm a bit of a Luddite and privacy freak. I keep my money in a bank that has a lot of ATMs in my city and I rarely pay a fee to withdraw cash. It's not unusual for me to carry $100 in cash.

[felis-sidus.livejournal.com]

Ah! A kindred spirit! I use checks for monthly bills and cash for everything else. I check out the free-ATM policy on any bank before even considering doing business there. My bank even refunds up to $10 of other banks' ATM charges if their depositors are hit with them. I also avoid using "courtesy cards"; it's nobody's business what groceries I buy!

[redbird]

I use cash quite a bit, but I've also made a specific point of not having a debit card, because if your debit card is lost or stolen, the only legal limit on your liability is how much you have in that bank account. (Yes, in practice, the person I know who had that happen did eventually get his money back, but it took several weeks.)

I still feel odd about charging groceries and other small purchases, even though I'm paying the credit cards off in full every month. So, cash for groceries, and for many clothing and most book purchases. I use plastic mostly for travel expenses (train, airplane, and bus fares, and hotel bills) and clothing. And I'm still making a number of transactions that have to be cash--the street vendor selling me a roll or a pint of blueberries, my morning newspaper, and my usual Chinese restaurant don't take cash.

There were signs at the farmer's market yesterday, saying that starting next week vendors at that location would be taking credit cards and EBI (welfare/food stamps) cards; I've been paying cash there, for fruit and bread and fish and vegetables, for the last few years. My drugstore and supermarkets would, but I usually give them cash.

[ckd]

I have a debit card. What I don't have is a debit card that can be processed through the credit card payment system.

I have to lose the card and the PIN, or at the very least the card number and the PIN to someone with a card writer. It's a calculated risk, since I only use it at the grocery store to get cash back, or as an ATM card. Every other time (including grocery store trips without doing cash back), it's the credit card instead.

[msmidge.livejournal.com]

It took me a long time to figure out when I was in Germany a couple summers ago that almost none of the businesses would take credit cards. I kept going around to different stores thinking I just hadn't found the right ones yet, rather than these freak businesses that were cash-only. But no, they were all freak businesses. :P

[wildcard9.livejournal.com]

I always try to have at least $50 cash on me since tow trucks will only accept cash. Something I found out the hard way when I had a breakdown, and only had $20 in my wallet. When I use cash, I can see how fast I am spending it; not so with my credit cards (that is how I spent $1000 more than I intended to during a trip a few years ago, I used my credit card for everything except lunches and bought lots of stuff that added up very quickly).

[nitoda]

In London it's certainly possible to use credit cards in most stores and most restaurants though it would be considered very unusual to do so at a bar unless either buying a large round or staying for the evening and running a tab. Most supermarkets do the "cash back" thing, though my son informs me that our local Sainsbury's has stopped offering this now that they have cash point machines right outside. Our cash point machines are mostly free at point of use; the ones to watch out for are ones inside pubs or small shops where they may charge but are obliged to tell you so before you get far enough to incur the charge so you can cancel the transaction and go elsewhere if that is an option. It's still not uncommon though to see people peeling off notes in bundles at a supermarket to pay for a week's shopping. What's a whole lot less common is seeing a couple with a full trolley of food that's just been rung through the checkout both look at each other expecting the other to have means of payment only to find out that neither of them picked up a purse before leaving home! D'oh! (That's what happened to M and me this afternoon and we felt like spectacular idiots. There was no chance of coming home for a card as we were within minutes of their closing down the tills, it's Sunday and our Sunday trading laws don't allow them to take payment after 16:30. So they offered to put the stuff in their chiller room for us overnight and one of us will have to drive the 4 miles or so to collect it in the morning when they re-open!)

[adrian-turtle.livejournal.com]

Most US transactions can happen without cash *now*. That has only been the case for the past few years. Do you remember when debit cards were new and hardly any places accepted them? And when credit cards were only used for large purchases? Even when lots of people didn't *have* credit cards at all, and it was not a major inconvenience? The laws about debt and bankruptcy have made it much easier for people to get credit cards when they don't have much money. Alongside of that, there's a lot of encouraging people to use their credit cards frequently. It's only in the last 10-15 years, and foreigners have been complaining about US currency for much longer than that.

[cellio]

I used to use cash more often than I do now, back when I could freely use any ATM and using cards was a bit of a hassle. I sometimes wonder which is cause and which is effect -- did the stores put in the card readers on their own, or because too many customers were handing cards to the clerks (which they were doing because cash was getting harder to use)? And would there have been more of an outcry against the latest bordering-on-illegible-to-some-people bills if more people were using them on a daily basis?

My bank does not charge me to use its machines, but it is not the dominant bank in town. I visit an ATM once every few months to get cash (or do the cashback thing in the grocery store if it's more pressing). I use either credit cards or store cards for most purchases, even small ones. (By "store card" I mean the so-called gift cards, not branded credit cards. For example, my synagogue sells cards for the local grocery store; they get a small profit and I pay face value, so when it's convenient I write them a check for store cards and then spend those down.)

When I was in Israel I was a little surprised by the number of places that would react to my plastic by asking if I could pay in cash, even USD, in preference. ATMs weren't quite plentiful enough IMO, but I managed.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

The chip-and-pin readers are more common over here than you might think, and we get cash back from supermarkets too. Many places that normally do smaller transactions don't offer the service for amounts under £5 or £10 because the charges to them are excessive, and because data lines are or were slow and also expensive.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Also, having all your paper money the same size, shape, colour and design can make it quite difficult for the blind to know how much money they've got, for example. There are practical reasons to design it differently, which is why it's different over here, and we can't figure out how the disabled manage over there.

[beckyzoole.livejournal.com]

The blind generally fold their bills in distinctive ways before putting them in their wallet.

Of course, they have to depend on the honesty of tellers and checkout clerks, because they can't check their change.

[xiphias.livejournal.com]

I might kick this question over to some of the blind American people on my friends list, but, first, a good number of the blind people I know CAN, with pain and difficulty, squint at the corner of a bill almost enough to get a vague idea of what kind of bill it might be.

And, other than that, blind Americans are taught to fold each of the denominations of bills in their billfold differently, to distinguish between them.

So, what's to stop someone from giving a blind person a $1 bill in change when they should get a $20? Um.

The fact that ripping off a blind person that way is SO low that even scuzzballs can sometimes feel bad about doing it?

Yeah. The system could be improved.

datapointing

[the-siobhan.livejournal.com]

Canadian banks won't charge to use their own ATM, but will charge you to use somebody else's. Most stores take debit cards, but the exceptions are always the small fast-food places or little convenience stores. None of the convenience stores or fast-food outlets will take credit cards, but large grocery chains or stores that sell bigger items will.

[ailbhe]

I rarely carry or use cash, and have used a debit card for most things over £5 and about half under since 1998. This includes cafes, sandwich bars, supermarkets, clothing stores, train stations. I use cash for independently-owned businesses which can't yet afford a link to the debit network, or for busfares, or for buying a single chocolate bar, etc.

My debit card is a Visa. I've used it in ATMs and stores in the UK, Ireland, Sweden, the Netherlands, Barcelona, Bruges, and likely other forgotten towns. No-one charges extra, normally.

[aquaeri.livejournal.com]

The thing is, your money has been boring and indistinguishable for a lot longer than you've been using plastic. And Australia is more plasticised than the US, or at least last time I was in the US. Our money changes colours and designs every so often, but the notes are always different sizes and different colours.