General Holiday Enquiries, Hints and Tips

General Holiday Enquiries? Got General Hints & Tips? Post Them Here.
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There are separate Bureaux de Change windows in the main Branches I use (Leyland & Preston)
Got to admit though, rarely get cash there, rate is lower than elsewhere. Sterling Travellers cheques
commision free to Royal Mail employees ;) otherwise would give the place a miss myself
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my local post office yesterday was quoting 1.1895 as the exchange rate.
i'll just keep on using the hole in the wall.
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I am off to Luxor this week, staying at the Iberotel .I prefer to take a small amount of currency with me then use ATM for topping up. Are there ATMs in Luxor? As Iberotel is in centre should be banks close by ,but will I need more than just my card? :cheers
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have you tried the ATM locators in the first post [on page 1] there is a link for visa and another for mastercard
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Just bought euros for my mum and dad today. 1.23 got £1000 euros for £813.01 from Thomas Cook.

Word of advice Haggle like a champion, dont take exchange rates at face value, started this morning at 1.185 got it up within an hour of going round places. It makes all the difference.

Next step Dollars for my holiday to Florida I will be looking for almost 2 to 1. Gonna change £2000 so hopefully with that amount they will increase the rate just to get the money

Any hints or tips for the Dollar welcome

Thanks
Allymc316 :sun2
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Thanks for the tip.
(Our local Thomas Cook was only advertising 1.21 yesterday)

I did notice that some travel agencies/bureau de changes weren't advertising their rates
for the Euro or American dollar at all, but had a sign up saying to ask inside.

Maybe they are the best ones to haggle in?
What do you think?
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I always go back and for with the banks and travel agencies , and if one is advertising
their rate i will go to another who is not advertising to see what they are giving

Lynne
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Thomas Cook in Metro Centre were advertising €1.215 if spending £600 - we were only spending £350 and she said we could have it for €1.21. Sterling TC's were 3% commission so said we'd go to M&S who we know do it for 1% and she told us we were 'daft' and we should use Euro TC's as the rate is only €1.15 in Spain!

Anyway M&S were offering €1.20 so got sterling TC's from there and went back to Thomas Cook for the euro's - DH went to walk away and realised she'd only given him the €1.19 not the €1.21 rate stated 10 minutes earlier! So he went back and she said "Oh I didn't recognise you!"

Have to say, on principle I don't think I'd use them again - they seem to be saying one thing and giving you something else and if you don't check..........!
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4 weeks ago [before we went to greece] i went out to get £100 of euro for our first couple of days several places were advertising 1.18/1.19 thomson was ask ..they offerd 1.195 , i found one place doing 1.21 went back to thomson got 1.215.. on holiday we started by getting 1.22 and by the end of the week it was up to 1.225. WE NEVER tack t/c's in europe just not worth it

thankfully the interbank rate is still rising and i have high hopes of a decent rate in october

[well we can alll dream]
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hi, might be a silly question but how do you haggle, do you just go into shops and say such and such offerd me whatever then they offer you more/better deal? i tried it for the first time for this years holiday and im not sure i did it right i went round a few different travle agents and checked hol prices but it was a last minuet decision to book one and i found most was booked. They were all the same cus they all had the same system with the same holidays but i found that some would offer half price insurance or even free insurance, however i found a price on the internet and i had herd that people have taken it into the shop and they gave them the internet price so i did this and they did give me the price, but i forgot to mention that the co-op were offering me free insurance so ended up paying £20 each for the thompson silver insurance which we have every year.
but i thought maybe they wouldnt have given it to me anyway as i already had a discount with the internet price, i was wondering could i have taken the internet price into any travel agent or would only thompsons meet it as it was there site?
im learning for the next hol we book! and for our hol money for this year, does everyone haggle?
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I always look and price up on the internet and then go to a travel shop and ask them to match the price, did that this year for a trip to Mexico. They beat the the price, gave us free insurance and gave us buy one get one free on premium seats. Plus if anything looks like it is going wrong (thanks to info on this site) you always have a 'real' person you can ask about things, rather than trying to sort it out on expensive premium telephone lines.
Most travel shops sell holidays with all the TO,s so no problem there.
Denny
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denny, how did you come about getting all that then, did they just offer it you or were you if'ing and ar'ing about the price or something so they offerd you that?
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Linzi I was going to ask the same! Great minds and all that....! ;)

And Denny, what currency exchange website do you use to quote to the travel agency please?
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It looks as though the rate is creeping up ever so slowly at last. One company on comparetravelmoney.com is offering 1.246 at the moment. Let's hope it keeps going up. I've got my eye on it to exchange money for end of July.
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oooooh thats good news shirley ive got till the end of August hope it rises some more
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Linzi,
Just took a print off of the holiday from Thomas Cook website and took it in to the local Thomas Cook shop. Showed it to the agent and asked if they could match it. They asked if I would book that day if they could better it, I said yes - if there price was right.It was, so I booked. Simple as that.
Denny
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does anyone know when you use a cashpointmachine abroad do i ask for my money in euros eg 100 euros or the equivalent in sterling
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depends where you are going.. most euro zone ony issue euro notes, the only country i can think of which gives a choice is Turkey :que
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