I think you will find that the goa banks who are warning of charges at their machines are refering to local customer transactions, you need to find out what your own bank is charging, two examples I have looked at for debit cards are:

Nationwide: cash withdrawal 2% plus £1 per transaction. Card payment 2% no transaction charge

Halifax: cash withdrawal 2.5% plus £1.50 per transaction. Card payment same as for cash

The exchange rate is the visa rate at http://www.visaeurope.com/en/cardholders/exchange_rates.aspx on the date it is debited to your account.

I used a bank ATM in Calangute last week with my Nationwide Flexi Account Debit Card The charge for 7000. Rps was a reasonable £99.64 which worked out at about70.25 rps to the £ which was about the going rate that day. However on return, my statement also shows the standard charge of £1.00 plus a charge of £1.98 which is linked to the ammount drawn. This , when taken into account gives you the rate of 68.41 Rps to the £ for the transaction, which is'nt so good. Most other cards would actually work out worse. It's not a great ammount, but if you used the debit card to buy jewellry, it might make a bigger difference to the final price.
Alan

We used our Nationwide debit card to withdraw R10,000 on the 23/11. The exchange rate was 71.968, about the same for cash on that day. The added charges were £2.77 commission and £1.00 fee. As there is a maximum withdrawal in one go we had to pay the fee twice !

We used our Nationwide credit card the day before and there are no charges or commissions and the exchange rate was R71.466, about the same for cash that day too.

The best advice is take as much cash as you feel safe to carry to exchange for rupees and pay as much by credit card where it's viable such as hotel bills and expensive retail items.

DaveWales

Was it you who said in a earlier post that you used a Caxtonfx card

DaveWales

Was it you who said in a earlier post that you used a Caxtonfx card

No we only used a Nationwide card Preacher.

I have always just used my Cashpoint Card (Barclays Connect), however :

If you use your debit card abroad, you'll be charged a 2.99% foreign exchange charge. On top of this, if you're getting cash over the counter at a bank (including Barclays), or using an ATM other than a Barclays ATM or those within the Global Alliance, you'll also be charged 2% of the transaction (minimum charge £1.50, maximum £4.50) and there may be other charges. See which banks are in our Global Alliance . The 2.99% foreign exchange charge is included in the exchange rate used by the card scheme to convert the currency amount into sterling on the day it processes the transaction.


PS - India is not a Global Alliance Country

Can anyone confirm if any banks in Candolim still do not charge a withdrawal fee. I do not mean the fee charged by English banks. Ta!

Was it you who said in a earlier post that you used a Caxtonfx card

Preacher I mentioned that I use a CaxtonFX Card http://www.caxtonfxcard.com/

No ATM charges when overseas and no fees, commission, or extra charges, load the card at a competative rate and use as normal wherever you are.

We used a pre-paid travel card in Turkey and found it to be brilliant!
loaded it with £500 before we went then used ATMs over there no charges and got the bank exchange rate of the day, we even loaded the card free of charge in Turkey with an extra £200 by logging on to the internet with the hotel's free wi-fi.
Inititially the card should cost £9.95 but we got it free with our travel insurance company -special offer at the time, currently loading some cash each month for our Goa holiday in March.
http://www.fairfx.com
https://www.fairfx.com/about