Currency conversion fees

Mostly the fees charged by the credit card issuers for currency conversion and for foreign purchases. The fees charged with transactions made with credit cards, debit and check cards and ATM cash withdrawals.

This can add a significant increase in the cost of traveling across. You can save money by using the appropriate right credit card.

A survey is conducted recently to check the bank rate for currency conversion applied by the top credit card issuers to find out what they charge for these transactions. The banks involved for currency conversion were Bank of America, BB&T, Capital One, Royal Bank of Sotland, Chase, Citibank, Discover, Fifth Third Bank, Sun Trust, National City, PNC, US Bancorp, American, Express, Regions, TD Bank, USA, Wachovia, Washington, Wells Fargo, Zions and Simmons. Each credit card issuer take percentage of total of the the amount charged by the issuer, plus the charge by Visa or MasterCard for a foreign purchase. The foreign currency purchases converted to U.S. dollars with that one percent fee.

Although some banks may not pass that fee to customers except few Visa or MasterCard cards that carry one percent charge. The credit card issuer or bank often charges an additional fee, usually two percent, which adds up to a three percent total charge on foreign purchases.

The general definition of currency is medium of exchange. The currency constitutes coins and banknotes which differ country to country.

The currency has predominated in human civilizations in the form of Money from about 10,000 BCE. Government declares the fiat currency and modern currency has value only by government order (fiat).

In early stages the basis of trade is metal and symbols. This was the first stage of currency where stored values are represented by metal and commodities by symbols. The trading system collapses when system pointed to a flaw due to which there was no place safe for store value, the value of a circulating medium as sound as the forces defended that store. Due to these factors the store of value shifted to metal in consecutives stages first silver, then both silver and gold. The trends came to mine metal and stamped into coins. Coins could be counterfeited.

It is difficult to carry coins as the thousands of coins weighted a lot to carry from one place to another place. So there is a need emerges for less weight currency and Paper Notes comes into picture. This led to the introduction of paper money.

There were numerous advantages of paper currency as it reduced the transport of gold and silver, and thus lowered the risks. In joint stock companies it enabled the sale of stock and the redemption of those shares in paper.

In spite of advantages there are also disadvantages as note has no intrinsic value. There was no method to stop printing by issuing authorities. Second, because it increased inflationary pressures due to increased money supply.

The percentage set under debit and card purchases is the charge assessed by credit card issuer or bank and Visa or MasterCard. For ATM cash withdrawals and by each card issuer a fee is also assessed which vary fro each card. The lowest Currency converter fees are from Capital One at zero percent. Posted by Forex Growth Bot .