Most UK travellers know that Nationwide is the best bank account for foreign withdrawals. I received a letter today to say NW are changing my cash card to a new 'cash card plus' card. Great new features - but you can't use it abroad! Nooooo! NW wouldn't let me upgrade to the visa debit card. Bummer!
I set off next month on a RTW trip. I need to find an alternative bank account that offers decent rates/low charges on foreign withdrawals. Any ideas?
Reply to this Hi There
Did you try to ask Nationwide to continue with a normal 'cash card'? We travelled with a Nationwide Cash card (Nationwide did not want to give us a visa debit card either at the time) and it worked well. We could pick up for free at all cash points that had the Cirrus sign. If we could not find one, I used my Halifax Debit Card, who charged £1.50 for picking up cash, which is average I think.
If you are planning to take a credit card, the Santander Zero Credit Card is good as it does not charge a fee for withdrawal. However, using a credit card to pick up cash is very expensive and would only use it as a back up.
Have a look here: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/travel/overseas-card-charges
Cheers Em
Reply to this We've already got the Santander credit card. The new NW card will cancel the old cash card. I suppose we just need to find out which of the other banks is the 'best of the rest'. I've seen that guide, cheers. It seems that everyone other than NW are pretty crappy. It's not just the withdrawal fee, it's the load % you lose also.
I'm really gutted as over a year this could cost us £100's - and I thought the crappy exchange rate was bad enough!
Reply to this We travel with at least four cards just in case. In the early days of cash machines it was often difficult to find a machine that would work with a particular card but things have improved greatly since then nevertheless we still like to have a backup.
I have not yet found an Australian card that will allow cash out with an Eftpos transaction in a retail store overseas. This would be so much easier and would avoid the machine charges.
Reply to this Hey Chris,
I actually just pulled my card out as this thread confused me... 'NW cash card'?. But then I saw that mine is a Visa Debit card, with a flex account.
Why would'nt they give you a Visa Debit? I actually almost didn't get this card in time as they messed up my application (didn't get the PIN, but got my mum to email it me). While I was panicking, I opened a Joint account with them as well, which went through without a hitch and gave us two cards, one for the wife and I. Great backup, and I'm sure you could apply and get it on a month if you do it in Branch with ID.
Sadly in these economic times, even NW isn't as good as it was... they now pass on the Visa fees for withdrawals abroad (outside EU), but this still only comes to 1%, so is still far superior to ANY other card.
Not sure if you're aware but when you click on your profile link, it takes you to the home page rather than your profile, might want to get that fixed before you leave.
Good luck with NW....
Mike.
Reply to this They wouldn't really give me a specific reason why they wouldn't give me the visa debit card. They guy at the branch reckoned it was because I didn't use the account as my main account (wages etc).
As all the other banks are awful, we've decided to go with the FairFX currency card (pre-load card) which seems to offer decent rates. Certainly much better than using my bank card. Only a 1.5% charge for using in foreign ATMs.
Um, not sure why my profile link is broken......
Cheers Mike.
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