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Old December 6th, 2015, 09:46 PM posted to rec.travel.europe
W. Wesley Groleau
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Posts: 36
Default large cash hotel payment

On 03-26-2015 05:25, Athel Cornish-Bowden wrote:
However, apart from agreeing with all that has been said I would like to
add that changing cash in Italy can be complicated, though it may be
better today than it was 25 years ago when my wife and I wanted to
change a not particularly large amount of dollars (about 50, probably)
into lire. We went to a bank in Cremona thinking it would be a matter of
five minutes, but it took about three hours. The cashier couldn't
understand why people who weren't American and didn't live in the US
would want to change dollars into lire.


Today, they use Euro instead of lire and there are ATMs everywhere. For
anything related to finance or technology, 25 years is a good as a century.

I know of at least two U.S. banks that refund all ATM fees and mine uses
very close to the interbank exchange rate at the time of a withdrawal.
In 2013 in Italy, I only carried enough cash for a couple of days of the
few places that wouldn't accept plastic.

--
Wes Groleau