Money Money Money!
Credit Cards
Get a credit card that gives you points. How’d I pay for my first plane ticket to India? I didn’t. I had accumulated $1500 worth of money on my TD First Class Travel Infinite Visa card. If you have an unlimited account with TD, it won’t cost you $120 a year but if you don’t then it’s still worth it to pay $120. You can use that money you accumulate for anything and you don’t need to go through TD’s recommended travel agent Expedia to make the bookings. You can go on a weekend getaway, submit the receipts online, and TD Rewards will reimburse you, no questions asked. I still have $600 left over from my points I’ll use on my next trip. Don’t get an Aeroplan points card, they are a pain in the butt. You need to accumulate a minimum of 25,000 points to fly somewhere and it’s on Aeroplan’s rules, meaning a simple normal direct flight might be broken into awkward connections or black out dates. I’ve experienced this using my Aeroplan points to go to my gf’s wedding one year.
Credit Card Expiry Dates
Make sure before you travel you look at the expiry date of all your cards. Mine expired during my travelling months so I called up all my credit card companies a few weeks before my departure and asked them to send me new ones with new expiry dates. Now you can only do this if your card expires within 6 months, so beware. Most credit card companies will send you a card anywhere you are in the world, but who wants that hassle? Especially with mail getting “lost” in a lot of countries too.
Keep your old credit cards
I mean maybe I’m just being a little pessimistic but I’m keeping my old credit cards which are expired on my person. Why? Well if I get robbed and they want my credit cards, I’ll give them the ones that are expiring. It’s really not a big thing if you give them the real ones but at least it might save you some grief.
Bank Accounts
I did a ton of research on Canadian bank accounts and which ones will give me the best bang for my buck while travelling in terms of transaction fees. I contacted most major Canadian banks and honestly, they all kind of suck. You can’t get away from not paying any fees. Here’s a breakdown of the 2 best:
TD Bank-These guys are my main bank and they couldn’t throw me a bone. I wanted to open a fresh new chequing account that isn’t linked to any of my regular transactions. TD told me I had to open another account holding a minimum of $3000 and then I’d get unlimited transactions BUT when I take money out of ATM’s oversees I’ll be charged a $5 transaction fee always. Why would I want to keep even more money with TD to have to pay transaction fees oversees anyways? If I didn’t keep $3000 in the account, I’d pay $10.95 per month and only get 25 transactions per month free. I’d still have to pay a $3.00 ATM fee if I used an ATM in USA or Mexico and a $5.00 ATM fee any other country.
Check out their plans below:
Scotia bank- The better option out of all the banks, but they still suck in terms of minimum account balances. I decided to go with them, keep a $2500 minimum or $9.95 per month if you don’t have the minimum. You get 25 free transactions. I don’t’ see myself taking money out more than 25 times per month or transferring money into that account. Scotia is also part of the Global ATM Alliance, meaning if you can’t find a Scotia bank to take your funds out of you can use one of their alliance partners around the world and won’t get charged a transaction fee. I mean, it’s not 100% great since there aren’t too many banks located in Asian countries but it’s better than nothing. If you take money out of a none Global Alliance partner you get dinged $5.
Check out their plans:
http://www.scotiabank.com/ca/en/0,,8093,00.html
The rest of the banks-I really couldn’t see anything these banks were offering that were better than TD and Scotia so that’s why I haven’t written about them. Let me know if you find a better bank for world travelling 🙂
