The Best Bank For Traveling Abroad
Updated: October 12, 2018
Ah, the sweet art of trip preparation; flipping through guidebooks, reading online articles, daydreaming about the most epic vacation of your life. What must you see? What must you eat?! What will the ATM fees cost? Hmm, okay that last notion is not as thrilling. Unfortunately, depending on who you bank with, using a debit card abroad can seriously impact your vacation budget. Charles Schwab, a bank and brokerage firm based in the United States, is our top choice for preferred bank to use while traveling internationally. Check out the reasons below to see why we consider our Charles Schwab debit cards to be almost as essential as our passports!
No Foreign Transaction Fees
Okay, let’s start off with the big one: No Foreign Transaction Fees. Yep, that’s right. Even abroad, Charles Schwab does not charge you to withdraw money from an ATM or make transactions with your card. We try to minimize debit card use abroad, but do frequently need to withdraw money from an ATM. No foreign transaction fees for using ATMs abroad is great not only because it allows you to save money (some banks charge $5 per withdraw abroad, yikes!) but also because of, in our opinion, the increased security. As budget travelers, we like to cut costs wherever possible. Before opening up a Charles Schwab account, we liked to minimize the number of times we withdrew money to avoid fees. Therefore we would withdraw larger amounts of money less frequently. In the age of credit cards and payment apps, walking around with a bundle of cash is a somewhat frightening thing! We love not worrying about foreign transaction fees from Charles Schwab. We are able to withdraw smaller amounts from ATMs, more frequently, feeling much safer and less paranoid! We are alllll about taking those good vibes and the $5 we saved to the local passion fruit smoothie place for worry-free R & R.
No ATM Fees
Okay, so that’s pretty cool. Charles Schwab does not charge you foreign transaction fees. Well what about the fee the local ATMs charge? Take a seat, my friend and keep on reading. Charles Schwab will refund any ATM fee you are charged anywhere in the world. So that little message that pops up saying “do you accept the $$$ fee for this transaction”? Just hit ‘accept’ and flash a smile. You’re getting that money refunded back to you by your awesome bank! One reason Charles Schwab offers this service is because, as they are primarily a brokerage firm, their locations are somewhat limited. They want to make it as easy as possible for their clients to withdraw money wherever they may be.
Avoid Currency Exchange Centers
The absence of fees allows you to withdraw smaller increments of money on an as needed basis. This is beneficial in a variety of scenarios. It makes it easier to withdraw the exact amount of money you need as your departure date closes in and is helpful if you’re entering another country and need to obtain new local currency. For example, with just one day left in Thailand we withdrew enough Baht from the ATM in Chaing Mai to sustain our Khao Soi cravings for 24 hours. By the time we got to Laos, we didn’t have any leftover Baht to exchange and were able to withdraw Laos Kip at the current going rate through the local ATM. This helped us avoid a visit to a currency exchange center, which may sell currency at a higher price than the current foreign currency exchange rate. These higher prices can cause you to lose money or lead you into some funky exchanges.
Amazing Customer Service
The pinnacle of what makes Charles Schwab so wonderfully ahhhhmazing is their customer service. The feature we love the most is being able to chat 24/7 online. A lot of times when we travel we are unable to make international calls. Charles Schwab is able to make a lot of magic happen over their secure online chat. While abroad, we’ve also had to contact the other bank we use. Without access to a phone and no chat option available, we were forced to send an email to customer service. It took three days to get a response. Unfortunately a fair share of reasons to contact your bank require immediate attention. Being able to reach Charles Schwab in multiple ways around the clock, is essential for the time-zone-hopping adventurer!
Check out some of our Examples of great Charles Schwab Assistance
In 2014, Destiny’s debit card was cloned in Brazil. She had no access to a phone, but needed to speak with a member of the verification team to review the false purchases. A representative from Charles Schwab was able to provide a secure number to her that would work over Skype to help sort things out.
Before we left to Sri Lanka, we realized our debit card was due to expire while we were on the trip. Charles Schwab overnight delivered a debit card at no cost to us before we left for Asia. They even assured us that if we didn’t receive it in time, they would send one to us in Sri Lanka, no problem. All at no cost to us!
We’ve had issues withdrawing money both in Sri Lanka and Laos. On both occasions, it turned out the ATMs were malfunctioning. It was a painlessly easy process to chat with Charles Schwab representatives who were able to review the error messages received at each ATM and advise us on what exactly happened.
Charles Schwab has kept the banking stoke level high these past few years. We both opened up a no fee high yield checking account which is automatically linked with a brokerage account as well. There are no fees to open an account, however, please note there is a $1000 minimum deposit. Even though we love banking with Charles Schwab, it’s worth noting that it is not possible to make cash deposits. Charles Schwab branches are not always frequent and most of them do not deal with cash directly. If you require easy access to a banker who will deposit cash into your account, Charles Schwab may not be the best primary bank choice for you. It is very easy to set up transfers between banks, as well as deposit checks and money orders via the mobile app.
We’ve had great experiences with Charles Schwab as a bank, both abroad as well as back home in the United States. The amazing travel benefits, great perks like free checks and an easy to use mobile app make this bank our number one choice. It is ideal for our situation and lifestyle.
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Thank you for checking out our guide to the best bank to use while traveling abroad!
We felt compelled to write this due to our awesome experience with this great bank. Our only motivation for writing is to spread our opinions and experiences to other travelers. We have no direct affiliation with Charles Schwab and received no incentive to write this article. We hope it helps save you money and stress, it certainly has done so for us! Have fun exploring.
Please note we are not financial advisers and it is always best to speak with a professional to see what options will work for you.
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