ATM Travel Solutions

Monday March 17, 2008

About's travel writers for Europe and Italy, respectively James Martin and Martha Bakerjian, have done some extensive and sometimes painful research on using debit cards in Europe over the last year, and Martha's latest post on her Capital One ATM card woes in Italy, where she is at this moment, is worth reading.

A great recommendation for avoiding coming away cashless from ATM machines abroad, which Martha goes into in some detail, is traveling with two ATM cards, each from a different bank. I've always recommended bringing two from the same bank in anticipation of that inevitable moment when the magnetic stripe on the most-used goes kaput from its travel in and out of my cargo pants pocket, and that's still a great idea (if I do say so myself), but Martha's post brings up another thought: no quantity of ATM cards from one bank will help when the account's gone wrong.

As for which cards to bring: well, James and Martha made some observations on different debit cards in Europe last year, and I usually bring along my fave Juniper Bank credit card (great customer service and I'm almost at two free trips to Costa Rica with the Frontier frequent flyer miles it gives) but my main mojo are two ATM cards from my beloved little bank in Western Colorado, Alpine Bank (though only for one account -- and I think I'll change that). Alpine charges me no foreign transaction fees (very unusual -- most banks charge at least two percent) and once overnighted (overnighted!) a new ATM card to me in Germany (Germany!) at their expense when they erred in failing to get a new card to me before a European trip. Ask your local bank what they'll charge for transactions abroad -- you may be pleasantly surprised.

What I don't like? Well, in a fit of paranoid precognition, I brought a Wells Fargo credit card as a backup to Australia last year in case all my usual magnetic stripes went awol -- which they did happen to do, and I had to rely on the backup. Ugh! Useless. I don't even want to think about how much I spent on overseas calls trying to get them to unlock my card, which they locked repeatedly while I was there becaue it was being used in Australia, although I'd alerted them before I left that I would, yes, be using it in Australia for a month. (And reiterated that fact with each spendy subsequent call.)

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