Euros.........

[Charlie123]

Really daft question.. We go away in just over two weeks so have to order some Euros.

Is it easy to get coins as well as notes ? Would like a pile in the designated container ready for toll roads.. Wife seems to think we may have a problem getting coins. Me I haven't a clue .

Cheers .

 

[hilldweller]

Would like a pile in the designated container ready for toll roads.
Cheers .

If it's French tolls you need a big stash of notes not coins ! Or a CC.

 

[chaser]

Tesco CC Exchange rate loading 2.75%
Nationwide CC Exchange rate loading 0%

If you draw out cash on a Tesco CC, 2.75% exchange rate loading, plus 3% charge or £3 minimum plus interest charge of between 24.9%-29.9% APR.

I know all that, and wasn't suggesting using it all the time, just that it is not as bad as you think because they use the bank to bank rate on the day so it still doesn't cost a lot more than the tourist rate,
I drew out 70 euros which cost me £49.84 plus £1.37 exchange fee £3 handling and 95 p interest so that is about £55 for 70 euros don't know how that works out someone might work it out but when I loaded my euro card I only got 1.29, so how does it compare?

 

[MikeandCarolyn]

We're lazy-can't be doing with all this hunting out pre-paid cards etc.
Cash from International Currency Exchange-delivered next day and our usual debit and credit cards do us.
We usually take 1,000 Euros each for each month we are away.

 

[Baldeagle7470]

To be honest we have noticed more and more unmanned toll booths appearing particularly when they are being updated or the road is being widened and coinciding with the reserved booths for adherents,or dongle holders to go throught at 30 kph.
Being one of the above it took a few attempts to not brake approaching the barrier,got the hang of it now though and does save a few seconds or more in summer months,not essential when you are retired though!!

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[Lenny HB]

I would never even consider carrying that much cash, 3 weeks in France we usually spend less than €200 in cash, everything else on Nationwide CC, Visa bank exhange rate & no charges.

 

[Lenny HB]

To be honest we have noticed more and more unmanned toll booths appearing particularly when they are being updated or the road is being widened and coinciding with the reserved booths for adherents,or dongle holders to go throught at 30 kph.
Being one of the above it took a few attempts to not brake approaching the barrier,got the hang of it now though and does save a few seconds or more in summer months,not essential when you are retired though!!

Never had that problem, but then in 7 years of Motorhoming only payed €0.70 in Autoroute tolls and that was due to a navigation error.

 

[Carol]

Errrr Dont have a credit card... Will debit do ?

I would not use our main Debit Card for motorway tolls, they can and have been cloned as quite a few threads on here over the last couple of years will testify when used on toll roads. We always have a credit card that we use for motorways with a cap on it. Also don't let it slip your mind letting your bank know where you are travelling roughly because they will stop it they think it is been used in a way different than normal.

 

[denisejoe]

I would never even consider carrying that much cash, 3 weeks in France we usually spend less than €200 in cash, everything else on Nationwide CC, Visa bank exhange rate & no charges.

Same here except I use mainly Metrobank Credit and Debit cards both of which have no charges in Europe, although do outside of Europe. Occasionally use our Nationwide CC when the Metrobank one doesn't work (something to do with being Mastercard, maybe?).

Denise

 

[MikeandCarolyn]

I would never even consider carrying that much cash, 3 weeks in France we usually spend less than €200 in cash, everything else on Nationwide CC, Visa bank exhange rate & no charges.

I've been thinking about the amount of cash I carry around.
I think it stems from a life spent working in Television during the 'Golden Era' .I rarely touched my salary and lived on expenses and floats which were paid in cash-I often had over £1,000 Pounds in my pocket,and never less than £200.Old habits die hard I guess.

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[Eve]

It's worth having a debit card that does not charge for goods.

Lots of air de services now have barriers ,card to get in,pay when you leave. Fuel at supermarkets are often now just card specially on Sunday's
Another thing you should think about if anything does go wrong, is make a list phone numbers to ring to cancel any cards,plus photostat your passport and keep in a safe place. The reason I am saying this,at some petrol stations I have been asked for my passport,also in case of loss,you do have a photostat .

 

[peter marshall]

We use the Co-oP Cash Card, only charge is at an ATM, other than that all free , it goes on in Euros so no messing about, and you pick it up at the local travel agency with proof of id (Passport) on the day you take it up, you can also keep track of your balance on line. Pete

 

[PhilandMena]

Agree with the Caxton card. saves you carrying a load of money.
Plan your route in advance to save on Toll roads. This link will save you a lot of money and get you to your destination using non Toll motorways and dual carriageways.
http://about-france.com/travel.htm

 

[chaser]

Yeah all good stuff, but we don't take any debit cards or anything to do with the main bank, if you lose them or get them nicked , think of all the hassle getting everything stopped before your account is empty, even if you notice. We usually have less than £500 on a prepaid euro card and fill it up as and when so only stand to lose that ,they can't get any more out of it and a tesco credit card, as I said before for emergency as they wouldn't get a lot out of that either, and also about fifty euros in cash , that's it we have never had any problems with that lot, don't need anything else

 

[big map]

Another thing you could consider... Probably too late now ..is getting a toll tag .. That way you just pay by direct debit a month later.
As some have said it can be nice not to use tolls. But lots of us do for various reasons.. For us .. We have limited time and know where we're going in advance.
Have a great trip

I have just looked into getting a toll tag and according to this large motorhomes are not eligible currently.

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[sdc77]

If you're under 3m tall then you're fine.
We're a smidgen over and it works fine for us. We look like a 3.5ton van too

 

[JockandRita]

If you're under 3m tall then you're fine.
We're a smidgen over and it works fine for us. We look like a 3.5ton van too

But if you are over 3.5 Tonnes, ie, 3.85 Tonnes or above (as many are these days), you're not fine according to the info.
That's when we use the pager box, to inform them (in French) that we are a "Camping Car". It usually provides the desired result, ie, a reduction to Category 2.......................but not done it for some time now. We try to steer clear of tolls, where possible.

Cheers,

Jock.

 

[mitzimad]

we use a weswop currency card weswop.com always get a good rate and we got our card in about 7 days can do everything online Broken Link Removed

 

[DBK]

The Euro rate has dropped about 5 cents in the last week, now around 1.37 at which price I've bought a few to add to my Brittany Ferries Euro Card but if I had done it last week it would have been at around 1.42. Ho hum.

Looking on-line the pundits think the rate will probably go back up again and the current dip is a combination of apparently good news from Greece and the latest figures from the Bank of England and the rise in unemployment. But forecasting this is not an exact science and it could of course continue in the other direction - which is why have bought a few at today's price.

 

[Charlie123]

We managed to pick up a Post Office money travel card application today. Haven't filled it in yet.

It can be made "live" within a couple of days we are told. Is this card OK ?

These cards are alien to us and neither of us have had or needed a credit card for over 15 years. We like the idea of putting money onto the card rather than running up a tab..

Thanks to all for the advice !

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[Charlie123]

It's worth having a debit card that does not charge for goods.

Lots of air de services now have barriers ,card to get in,pay when you leave. Fuel at supermarkets are often now just card specially on Sunday's
Another thing you should think about if anything does go wrong, is make a list phone numbers to ring to cancel any cards,plus photostat your passport and keep in a safe place. The reason I am saying this,at some petrol stations I have been asked for my passport,also in case of loss,you do have a photostat .

Safe place ? I spent quite some time installing a really decent quality strongbox hidden quite well in our van last weekend. It really is out of the way and extremely well fixed and bolted down. It isn't easy to get at though but that's a minor irritation !

 

[Lenny HB]

Sweden now a lot of retailers won't take cash even small corner shops the norm is to pay by card even f

The Euro rate has dropped about 5 cents in the last week, now around 1.37 at which price I've bought a few to add to my Brittany Ferries Euro Card but if I had done it last week it would have been at around 1.42. Ho hum.

That's a poor exchange rate it's 1.3991 at the moment.

 

[DBK]

We managed to pick up a Post Office money travel card application today. Haven't filled it in yet.

It can be made "live" within a couple of days we are told. Is this card OK ?

These cards are alien to us and neither of us have had or needed a credit card for over 15 years. We like the idea of putting money onto the card rather than running up a tab..

Thanks to all for the advice !

The Post Office card is fine, it was the first of these pre-pay cards we had. The exchange rate wasn't very good but perhaps they are better now, although the rates this year are so much better than 12 months ago it seem peevish to quibble over a few percent.

 

[DBK]

Sweden now a lot of retailers won't take cash even small corner shops the norm is to pay by card even f

That's a poor exchange rate it's 1.3991 at the moment.

On what card?

 

[DBK]

It's worth having a debit card that does not charge for goods.

Lots of air de services now have barriers ,card to get in,pay when you leave. Fuel at supermarkets are often now just card specially on Sunday's
Another thing you should think about if anything does go wrong, is make a list phone numbers to ring to cancel any cards,plus photostat your passport and keep in a safe place. The reason I am saying this,at some petrol stations I have been asked for my passport,also in case of loss,you do have a photostat .

My list of useful numbers includes now things like the house insurance because if someone got in touch to say the place was burning nicely or flooded I suspect I might struggle to remember who we were even insured with. Policy numbers and the international phone numbers very useful to have to hand. I also carry the numbers for our embassies in case we need serious help.

I'm not a worrier, honestly!

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[Cobweb]

Hi. We use Fair FX preloaded card as well as Nationwide debit card . For some reason we have not been able to pay for fuel or tolls with our Fair FX card but the Nationwide debit card is accepted instead . We can pay for things in supermarkets etc with the Fair FX card for no extra charge.
Many tollbooths are automatic so a card will be needed as well as for payment in some aires. We do usually carry a bag of 1 and 2 euro coins as well as some 50 cents sometimes needed for picking up water or payment for aires which have meters taking only coins ....the good thing is in some you can use even smaller coins which helps to get rid of the accumulated schrapnel . In the end of your trip some larger supermarkets like Intermarche have machines to exchange your small change
into notes . As for cash we generally do not carry anymore than 300 euro on us .

 

[Lenny HB]

On what card?

That was the commercial bank, rate Nationwide CC usually within fractions of a decimal of it, e.g. current bank rate 1.3989, Nationwide CC rate 1.3983

 

[DBK]

My list of useful numbers includes now things like the house insurance because if someone got in touch to say the place was burning nicely or flooded I suspect I might struggle to remember who we were even insured with. Policy numbers and the international phone numbers very useful to have to hand. I also carry the numbers for our embassies in case we need serious help.

I'm not a worrier, honestly!

I was just digging this information out ready for our trip to France next month so this might be useful for others, but obviously you need to add the details for your own bank or whatever if they are different.

British Embassy Madrid: +34 902 109 356

British Consulate Bordeaux +33 (0)5 57 22 21 10
British Consulate Marseille +33 (0) 4 91 15 72 10
British Embassy Paris: +33 (0) 1 44 51 31 00

And for lost cards:

Halifax Clarity Card: +44 1733 57 31 89
Halifax Current Account: +44 113 242 2229
Barclaycard: +44 1604 230 230
Barclays Visa Card (Current account): +44 1928 584 421
Post Office Travel Money Card: +44 20 7600 7797

On the bit of paper I carry I also have the number (the 16 digit one) of each card recorded and we have a few copies of this, one carried and at least one other in the safe of the MH. Hopefully, I will never need this!

 

[DBK]

That was the commercial bank, rate Nationwide CC usually within fractions of a decimal of it, e.g. current bank rate 1.3989, Nationwide CC rate 1.3983

Nationwide say they use the Visa exchange rate so I guess all Visa cards should be the same - except some banks add fees of course. I've also just checked and Mastercard are using virtually the same rate. Not sure how Brittany Ferries manage to "lose" 2% but I can live with that. I have a wallet full of cards already.

 

[Lenny HB]

I always upload such info to Google drive or Dropbox, then if phone & wallet were to get nicked I can access it from any PC.

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[Lenny HB]

Nationwide say they use the Visa exchange rate so I guess all Visa cards should be the same - except some banks add fees of course. I've also just checked and Mastercard are using virtually the same rate. Not sure how Brittany Ferries manage to "lose" 2% but I can live with that. I have a wallet full of cards already.

That's the difference, NW & Halifax Clary don't apply charges, Tesco it's 3.75%, which is typical of most cards.
Mastercard rate is slightly better but not enough to worry about.