Be aware that withdrawing cash using a credit card is possibly the most expensive way of getting cash. It will be treated as a cash advance and attract interest at a high rate until it is paid off.

Not always the case.

Sainsbury Gold credit card has absolutely NO fees whatsoever for cash transactions from an ATM. It also has worldwide travel insurance cover for up to 21 days for under 65 year olds.

It has a monthly £5 fee - I have an HBOS Reward Current account (needs £1000 paid in monthly) for my salary etc.which attracts a £5 monthly bonus and I use that by Direct Debit for the Sainsbury card fee.Of course, you need to settle up your card balance when due or normal charges become due , but that's standard procedure.

Then there is HBOS Clarity credit card which also incurs no charges at ATMs.

You can - and HBOS don't want you to know this - preload such a credit card with cash in the UK before travelling abroad and drawing up to the limit you've credited without fees kicking in.

I assume you can do this with other types of credit card as well - although transaction etc. fees may still be charged.

I use both the above since Nationwide did the dirty on its debit card holders.

You must check current card conditions and confirm with your bank of course as they may have revised since I opened these accounts.

Agreed. However the information was correct at the time of posting as the credit cards with no fees weren't widely available then. Now there are a few with perfect exchange rates, no cash advance fees and low interest rates.

luci

My boyfriend and I recently went to France on holiday and got a Thomas Cook Cash Passport. We researched it before we went and decided it sounded like a good plan to keep half cash, half on the card. However, when we tried to top the card up when we were in France (via the website or via the phone), we couldn't. The reason given was that we had only lived at our address for 3 months! This is true, but we were trying to pay with the SAME CARD that we originally loaded money on with. We were advised to do a bank transfer instead which our leaflet told us could take "up to 5 days", which isn't much use when you're only away for 1 week. We decided not to do the bank transfer and instead took the hit on our debit card. It might have been handy if we were made aware that this would be a potential problem when we first topped it up. In conclusion - nice idea, but wouldn't use again.

I have a Caxton fx card, and would not leave home without (have not had any problems anywhere we have been, touch wood!) can reload by phone, internet , rate does not fluctuate, what you load at is what you get, even if you loaded it 6 mths prior to travel. we use it in ATM's, shops, resturants etc. my husband is now planning on getting the dollar & global cards

I took a cash passport on the last two of my holidays and think they are fantastic! I had no problems using it and found it very easy to use. I'm not really sure why people say it is a con because you lose out on the buy back rate? Of course you lose out on the but back rate that's the same with cash or the passport it has always been like that! My advice would be to spend all of your holiday money if you feel that strongly about it!

I went in to their local shop to get a card and put £1000 on it only to be told that their system was down . I went back the next day and everything went well I give them half in cash and half on my mastercard. Then they told me that they would have to phone head office. Over 2 hours later I'm still there and they tell me the system is still down but they cannot refund the money. Then I find that they took £1000 out of my mastercard + £500 cash . it took another hour to convince them that I was not leaving with out a full refund. In the end they found a way to do the refund I think they just wanted me out of their store