I did, BofA was recommended to me by another person. But it says this: "To purchase foreign currency online, you must have a Bank of America checking or savings account" I'm a Wells customer, not BofA. The R$580 I bought from Travelex for $290 would have cost me $286.06 on BofA, so a $2 difference, essentially the same. However, here is a nice thing with BofA: "You can choose to receive your order in small, large or mixed denominations. Denominations are always subject to availability." If I was a BofA customer I would have gone with them, if Wells offered a rate reasonably close to Travelex I would have gone with them, but as neither were true I went with Travelex.
Makes sense. I'm a Wells customer as well. I didn't see the fact that you need an account with them. That's lame in my opinion. :/.
Yeah. So, the ideal way is to get BRL from an ATM in Brazil using a card that charges 0% Foreign Transaction Fee?
by "ideal" if you mean is it the absolute best exchange rate, I'm not sure. But generally ATMs give a good rate and you're absolutely right, having a no fee account on your side is best although the Brazilian bank will take its fee I think.
Yes, that's what I meant by ideal. I will hunt around a bit more before I bow down to Travelex. There is a currency exchange office in my nearest airport. I will talk to them soon. However they are open only when the last light of Durin's Day falls on their door.
Why would the ATM apply its own rate? At an ATM you should always choose to be charged in the local currency as opposed to your home currency if the ATM gives you the choice. This is to avoid getting the ATM rate. Invariably if you have a decent card for travelling, the rate applied by your bank should be better than the ATM rate.
from my considerable experience (I fly internationally about 8-10x a year), the currency exchanges in US airports are the absolute worst....and the ones I've seen here on the west coast (LAX, SFO) are run by Travelex! But good luck, I have no idea how they are where you are.
Not sure what you mean. I have never been to Brazil so I don't know how the banks work there. But from my experience, it's the local bank who owns the ATM is the one charging you the fee and there's no choice in the matter. I usually see a prompt come up after I've put in the amount that says something like: "we're going to charge you a fee of XXX, press "Enter" to proceed or "Cancel" to end this transaction" or something like that. My US bank's ATM card doesn't charge me an extra fees, so when I get my statement the only thing it shows is a single transaction amount that includes the foreign bank's fee for using their ATM. I have never seen an option for choosing anyone's rate, the rate is whatever the rate is set by the bank who owns the ATM, and it's usually a fair enough rate. I don't recall ever being offered a choice between the ATM Bank's rate and my home bank's rate. But I have never been to Brazil and certainly haven't been to every country on earth. is this how it works in Brazil, you get to choose?
These are not Travelex guys. Some weird name. "Airport Business Center". They are run by airport authorities? I talked to my bank and they said they would charge me according to the VISA exchange rate for the day (as shown on VISA's website) + fee(s) when withdrawing money from ATM. I have a VISA card, of course.
No worries. Certainly in Europe, fairly often an ATM will recognise an English card and give you an option to pay for your withdrawal in £ right there. eg. "Would you like us to charge your card £15 for these 20EUR, or shall we charge your card 20EUR?" The latter is always preferable, because although you are subject to your bank's fees/rate, that rate should be cheaper than the crap rate the ATM is charging for conversion at that moment. As for ATM's charging a fee for the withdrawal itself, it should be possible to find enough fee free ATMs. Banks such as HSBC, Santander etc don't charge in my experience.
that makes sense to me. I never thought about where the rate came from, just in my experience it's always been good/fair enough. My point was I don't recall ever being given a choice of whose rate to use when I used an ATM in a foreign country. OK, that's cool, I believe you. I have no experience with that being a Yank. certainly I am all ears about any tips for how to do this in Brazil. But I'm guessing it's not going to give a choice of currency, just Reais, and you're stuck with "the rate", which hopefully is a fair one.
The VISA exchange rate that they publish on their website is pretty close to, if not same as, the result that you get when you search "1 USD in BRL" in your favorite search engine. And if the bank has a modest fee (read 1%) the final rate that we get will be cool. Yes, getting such a choice in the ATM is new to me as well. To be fair, I have used ATMs only in 2 countries.
Yep, all you can is maximise your rate, and minimise your fees by your choice of bank/card at home. It is in your hands to avoid ATM charges once out there though, stick to big bank ATMs, as opposed to ones in convenience stores!
I avoid the convenience store ATMs like the plague. Too bad they don't have the facility to accept arms and legs. They badly need it.
right, same here in the US. Still a few no-fee ATMs (some credit unions), lots in the $2-$3 range, $5 for the no-name ones in convenience stores, and like $10 and up in a casino where people are desperate. if it's true that HSBC and Santander don't charge a fee, that's great info to have.
No fee ATMs are standard here, and having visited Brazil a few years ago, I don't remember feeling annoyed at being charged to use ATMs. The HSBC and Santander comment is more a best guess as opposed to actual knowledge.
For those of you in the US, you can check the Charles Schwab's checking account. It is the BEST ATM card (visa) with 0 fees. They reimburse you ALL ATM fees anywhere in the world. So you do get the plain visa exchange fee. I have used it in some countries with no problems at all and that is what I will use in Brazil. There might still be time for you to open an account (with no minimum) and to receive the ATM card. *They do run a credit check but it is well worth it for me.
i asked the Banco do Brasil branch in NYC and they said they only charge 1% of the total transaction.. and I think they were offering over 2 reais to the dollar yesterday (May 13th).. i just dont remember exact amount.
I called them this morning and they said that the $1.50 charge was included on the list of fees as a result of "an error" and that they have "negotiated" to have the fee waived. Seems a bit fishy to be honest. I am inclined to believe the terms and conditions over someone on the phone or in the store.
This issue aside, it seems like a pretty good deal but you have to wonder what else they have got wrong.
They hate to break it because that means less change to give back to other people when necessary. Specially considering lots of them don't sell more than a couple hundred worth of products each day.