In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
@Athletico Charlton I’ve been to Vietnam 5 times since May and it’s SO frustrating, especially coming from China where I literally don’t have to touch cash, ever and it’s an absolute pain in the arse finding an ATM that takes my card.
I’m going again in February straight after I’m back from England, is it possible to exchange beforehand in London?
Good question, does anyone know where we can get Vietnamese Dong in London?
Most bureau de change have them.
FTR you only need cash in Tokyo for the subway, unless there was another way of putting money on the card that i missed. Also tipping in Japan is considered as bad manners! 😃
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
@Athletico Charlton I’ve been to Vietnam 5 times since May and it’s SO frustrating, especially coming from China where I literally don’t have to touch cash, ever and it’s an absolute pain in the arse finding an ATM that takes my card.
I’m going again in February straight after I’m back from England, is it possible to exchange beforehand in London?
Good question, does anyone know where we can get Vietnamese Dong in London?
Pretty certain you can order via John Lewis, don’t know if they keep it in stock.
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
Nothing worse than getting your dong out when there's loads of people watching.
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
@Athletico Charlton I’ve been to Vietnam 5 times since May and it’s SO frustrating, especially coming from China where I literally don’t have to touch cash, ever and it’s an absolute pain in the arse finding an ATM that takes my card.
I’m going again in February straight after I’m back from England, is it possible to exchange beforehand in London?
Good question, does anyone know where we can get Vietnamese Dong in London?
Most bureau de change have them.
FTR you only need cash in Tokyo for the subway, unless there was another way of putting money on the card that i missed. Also tipping in Japan is considered as bad manners! 😃
Your better bet in Tokyo is to get a Pasmo card, ideally if your on iPhone you add it in you wallet app and top it up there via Apple Pay(probably similar on Android) and you never have to worry about cash. You’ll also just be able to use your phone to pay as you go in and out of the network
pasmo, is also accepted as a way to pay in loads of non transport places as well
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
@Athletico Charlton I’ve been to Vietnam 5 times since May and it’s SO frustrating, especially coming from China where I literally don’t have to touch cash, ever and it’s an absolute pain in the arse finding an ATM that takes my card.
I’m going again in February straight after I’m back from England, is it possible to exchange beforehand in London?
Good question, does anyone know where we can get Vietnamese Dong in London?
Like Chinese Yuan, it’s a closed non tradable currency, so I imagine it might be tricky, will look into it closer to the time.
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
@Athletico Charlton I’ve been to Vietnam 5 times since May and it’s SO frustrating, especially coming from China where I literally don’t have to touch cash, ever and it’s an absolute pain in the arse finding an ATM that takes my card.
I’m going again in February straight after I’m back from England, is it possible to exchange beforehand in London?
Good question, does anyone know where we can get Vietnamese Dong in London?
Most bureau de change have them.
FTR you only need cash in Tokyo for the subway, unless there was another way of putting money on the card that i missed. Also tipping in Japan is considered as bad manners! 😃
Revolut getting a terrible press here. I have never had any issues with them abroad. I just use my first direct debit card now they don’t charge fees when your abroad.
Revolut getting a terrible press here. I have never had any issues with them abroad. I just use my first direct debit card now they don’t charge fees when your abroad.
Revolut getting a terrible press here. I have never had any issues with them abroad. I just use my first direct debit card now they don’t charge fees when your abroad.
It’s a good product, abysmal organisation
Would you recommend that I stick with first direct debit card payments when abroad or load up on revolut, or something else?
Revolut getting a terrible press here. I have never had any issues with them abroad. I just use my first direct debit card now they don’t charge fees when your abroad.
It’s a good product, abysmal organisation
Would you recommend that I stick with first direct debit card payments when abroad or load up on revolut, or something else?
Cashless suits the rich and the middle classes. Cash suits the poor. Ergo ~ we are heading for a cashless society. Pray for the poor and those front line staff who have to be on the receiving end of the inevitable rage when the poor lose the last piece of control they had ~ what they spend their money on. Its going to be messy. Very messy.
My understanding is that Visa and Mastercard take about 1.5% of the transaction value. Then she has to pay something to the "acquirer" who provides her terminal. I think its usually a fixed monthly fee.
It's about 10 years since I last worked on this stuff, but back then I think Debit cards were a flat rate of 29p, while credit cards were on a % basis. 1.5% sounds about right, but I vaguely recall something about volume discounts, so a small local trader would pay a higher % than a big national chain.
My understanding is that Visa and Mastercard take about 1.5% of the transaction value. Then she has to pay something to the "acquirer" who provides her terminal. I think its usually a fixed monthly fee.
It's about 10 years since I last worked on this stuff, but back then I think Debit cards were a flat rate of 29p, while credit cards were on a % basis. 1.5% sounds about right, but I vaguely recall something about volume discounts, so a small local trader would pay a higher % than a big national chain.
Mine is 3.75% plus 20p on every transaction. Used to be closer to 5% plus 20p on my last machine.
Revolut getting a terrible press here. I have never had any issues with them abroad. I just use my first direct debit card now they don’t charge fees when your abroad.
It’s a good product, abysmal organisation
Would you recommend that I stick with first direct debit card payments when abroad or load up on revolut, or something else?
My understanding is that Visa and Mastercard take about 1.5% of the transaction value. Then she has to pay something to the "acquirer" who provides her terminal. I think its usually a fixed monthly fee.
It's about 10 years since I last worked on this stuff, but back then I think Debit cards were a flat rate of 29p, while credit cards were on a % basis. 1.5% sounds about right, but I vaguely recall something about volume discounts, so a small local trader would pay a higher % than a big national chain.
My understanding is that Visa and Mastercard take about 1.5% of the transaction value. Then she has to pay something to the "acquirer" who provides her terminal. I think its usually a fixed monthly fee.
It's about 10 years since I last worked on this stuff, but back then I think Debit cards were a flat rate of 29p, while credit cards were on a % basis. 1.5% sounds about right, but I vaguely recall something about volume discounts, so a small local trader would pay a higher % than a big national chain.
Mine is 3.75% plus 20p on every transaction. Used to be closer to 5% plus 20p on my last machine.
It's this bit that kills high volume low value businesses (like corner shops). I personally don't think 3.75% is a bad rate vs cash (we were charged 0.3% by HSBC to BANK cash at my last place).
The problem comes when you are putting 20p on a £2 card transaction.
Yeah, got a card for work to pay official fees in foreign countries, so got a personal account as well. Really easy to use, get good exchange rates, no charges when you use it. Think there's a limit to how much cash you can take out of the machine with it but never had a problem. Used it in France, Greece and Thailand
IT systems are prey for hackers. If HMRC has access to everybody's account at some point in the persons life then this would be a massive target for attempted fraud or even blackmail should they find payments going somewhere the account owner would not like to have revealed. If someone pays in cash for a bill or invoice, or even a cash tip for service, it it the sole responsibility for the receiver to declare it.
Also I know of a few challenged people who are given an allowance in cash for the week so they know what they are spending as opposed to having a card where they might just run riot.
In Vietnam this summer everyone wanted cash. The issue with that was I was travelling with a family of 4 and the machine would only let me withdraw £90 a time. As cheap as it is there that doesn't get you that far when paying for hotels in cash etc so I would have to stand there and make 4-5 withdrawals at a time (the £90 was per withdrawal but actual withdrawals were seemingly unlimited!). It made it very obvious to anyone around I was fully loaded with cash when I left the machine!
Nothing worse than getting your dong out when there's loads of people watching.
On a similar note, we went to Albania and they too wouldn’t take cash. Having to constantly get money from machines seemed to cost me a arm and a lek
See, I got cash out in Seoul and it felt like I had won
In Poland I had a zloty fun getting cash out.
Yeah, I remember .........when travelling in Poland 30 years ago I briefly became a millionaire!
Great, until I popped into a local shop and it cost me 30,000 zlotys for just one ice cream ..... I spent almost all of that million in about 10 days
Soon after, the Polish government revalued the zloty by disregarding the last 3 zeros or something like that.
Cash is what you use if you don’t have technology.
A lot of people like me find navigating the technological landscape problematic. Younger people will roll their eyes, say what we need to do is learn the technology and acquire the equipment, they declare it is no biggie and you ‘just’ do this or you ‘just’ do that. There was some hope with the simplicity of Oyster Cards, but even having a credit card can be a pain. Every time I enter my card details to pay £10 to Charlton TV for a stream Barclaycard oblige me to put the card in some god awful machine at home and do a dance with a series of numbers before approval. Even when out and using my card on a machine, some demand you put the card in and remember your numbers, or hold it over the screen, but oh no you have to hover it the other way round, or the magnet or whatever it is can be found at the end of the machine not the flat surface.
Or you have to have some kind of telephone with an appliance to wave around.
This is even before we get to systems not functioning for some reason. Leave cash alone, and let those of us who grew up with it continue to use it.
Having to go through the credit card authentication process in order to pay to watch a Charlton TV stream is far easier than trying to pay cash.
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FTR you only need cash in Tokyo for the subway, unless there was another way of putting money on the card that i missed. Also tipping in Japan is considered as bad manners! 😃
pasmo, is also accepted as a way to pay in loads of non transport places as well
The problem comes when you are putting 20p on a £2 card transaction.
Greggs hit by IT issue affecting card payments
Bakery chain Greggs has shut some of its stores due to an issue accepting payments.
Customers found branches of the bakery chain closed or cash only.
It follows card payment outages at Sainsbury's and Tesco on Saturday, and McDonald's last Friday.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-68614636
Great, until I popped into a local shop and it cost me 30,000 zlotys for just one ice cream .....
I spent almost all of that million in about 10 days
Soon after, the Polish government revalued the zloty by disregarding the last 3 zeros or something like that.
Sainsburys today(well at least my Sainsburys is cash only today)
Card payments going down all over the place
Nationwide payments to banks and building societies 'delayed'
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-68635180