Just suppose you are travelling to Taiwan, HK and China.

Is it better to change Taiwanese Dollars in Taiwan, Hong Kong Dollars in HK and Chinese Yuan in China?

Or should I change all of those in my home country?

Which option offers better returns?

There are a lot of seasoned travellers in here so I will be thankful for your guidance.

Thank you!

it really depends on where your home country is. if you are from the UK or someone within
the EU, then it would be much better to get your forex when you actually get to your
destinations with the exception of China.

change your NTD in Taiwan and your HKD and RMB in Hong Kong. to secure a better rate, i
think it is common knowledge not to change the whole bulk of your cash at the airports...wait
till you get to the city...many of them in downtown Taipei and HK.

the reason for getting your RMB in HK is that it is a real pain to get any forex done on the
mainland due to tight currency control laws. they don't have private money changers on the
mainland and only the Bank of China is authorised to change currency (which incidentally,
requires paperwork and your passport) regardless of the transaction amount.

depending on your specific location, a Bank of China branch may not be convienent for you
to get to and you can be sure that any chap that offers to change money for you will be more
than ready to offload his bulk of counterfeit RMBs.

get it changed in HK at any money changer and they will run the RMB notes through a
counterfeit/sorting machine in your presence.

This is something I know about!

Re Taiwan. If you have US dollars, change them at Taoyuan airport in Taiwan - recently, I got 32.55 NT per US$.  If you have HK dollars, go to Chungking Mansions in TST and change the HK$ to US$; and then, if you're going on to Taiwan, change the US to Taiwan NT at Taoyuan airport.

Exchange rates at Taoyuan airport are as good as anything you'll get from a Taipei city bank, and there is no commission at the airport.

For major currencies, Chungking Mansions money exchangers give amazingly good rates - for the US to HK conversion, you only lose 0.3% over the interbank rate! -  but with lesser currencies, you can lose as much as 10-15%. (For smaller economies, it's always best to do the conversion in that country.) But be careful not to choose the exchanges right at the entrance to Chungking Mansions, go a bit further in and check the rates on the sign boards. Also, go during banking hours when the money exchanges offer slightly better rates to compete with the banks. HK banks always charge non account holders a fixed fee for any currency exchange, btw, which is another reason to avoid them.

Don't exchange money in your home country, the buy-sell spreads are MUCH larger in the West - 3~5% for US$ to HK$, as opposed to only 0.3% in HK. Currency exchange is a  much more common and competitive business in Asia, whereas western banks will always screw you.

Buy you RMB in HK, altho you will have to do two conversions - US/Euro to HK to RMB - you'll still get a much better deal than if you change directly from US/Euro to RMB thru a western bank.

Be careful when you exchange money anywhere else - ignore all the "No Commission" notices; the important thing is to pay attn to the buy-sell spread. The interbank rate will lie at a point between the bid-offer quotes. If there is a huge gap between those quotes that means the exchange is making all it's money on the spread.

Don't exchange money at the HK airport. All the currency exchange has been taken over by one company (Travelex?) that gives shit rates. Also, never exchange money at any of the street-side booths encountered in the touristy areas of HK - these 'No Commission' places will take 10-20% of your money by offering ruinous rates.

[ Last edited by  Marsupial at 12-9-2009 21:07 ]

Mars .... you seem to know a lot about most things!

I would add that it can be very useful to change some money before you leave home so you can hit the ground running, nothing worse than being ready for action and having to go looking to exchange some cash. It also pays to watch the rate movements as if your home currency is going through a downward cycle it may be a good idea to hedge some travel money in advance .... Bro Mandingo did this on one of his Macau trips and I got really burnt by waiting, lost some 15%.

just out of curiousity, do people still buy MOP for purposes of punting in macau?
the only advantage i can see is if you are changing large amounts of your home currency
and considering that the MOP is weaker than the HKD, you get a little more to spend.

it's only usefull if you really spend more than 10K every month, mean 120K in 1 year so can save hkd3600 otherwise I think it's useless cos you don't save a lot and lost a bit with the change commission.

and myself I prefer use credit card averseas cos you got the best daily change rate and your bank commission is definetly lower than any money change agency.
don't trust the no commission agency, it's bullshit they took the commission on the change rate, so you pay a kind of very high "invisible commission"

and if you are from a country with strong currency like us$ or €, it's better to change in the country you are going especially if you are going to a poor country that need € or us$ for their importation

actually, people seem to be shunning the MOP. i saw a guy once at the ferry terminal back to
HK who paid for a soft drink with a 100MOP note and got his change all in MOP. he requested
that they give him the change in HKD but they said something like "if you pay in MOP, the
change will be given in MOP".

i understand that the MOP is practically worthless outside of macau and that is one
disadvantage as to it lack of popularity.

i don't think i will be spending the kind of amount you mentioned (although i wish i could)


sticking to the HKD then.

of course he will never give back the change in hkd if the guy pay in mop, the vendor will lose money. even sometime in some little shop if you pay with hkd, they give back the change in mop cos not enough hkd.

I don't know why many hongkongers mind about giving the 3% difference to the vendors especially the little vendors for their lunch or shopping while every month they give millions hkd commission for betting banker at the baccarat to the casinos

I went to Hong Kong last July 24 - 26, 2009.

It was a fast pace city visit. We were constantly walking all over the place.
Unfortunately, we don't have enough time to explore kowloon Island.

Anyways, I spent around 10 hours inside Causeway Bay's Shopping district.
I found a small money exchange booth that gave good rates compared to others.
In Causeway Bay shopping strip, there are alot of Money exchange booths.

That small booth offered 7.68 HKD per 1 USD  during my visit there (July 25 - 26) with no commission.

In my hotel (Bishop Lei International Hotel, Mid-levels, Richmond Road) the rate was 7.20 HKD to 1 USD (almost the same in one Money Exchanged at the Airport)


DON'T EXCHANGE your Currency through the booths with big neon lights.
They mislead people by listing the SELLING rates on the left column of their rates board. (7.81 HKD to 1 USD)
Their REAL Buying / Exchanger rate (at that time) was 7.086 HKD per 1 USD. (written on the right side of the board)

I don't know about Money Exchange in other areas but the 7.68 HKD to 1 USD was a very good rate to me (comparing it to the rate that my local bank sold me the USD).

For convenience sake, it is sometimes good to have a bank account at Citibank or HSBC as these are global banks.  I can use my atm bank cards to take money out in the local currency in China, Taiwan, Macau, and HK from these banks' own network atm machines. By using their network, there is not network handling charge, just the interbank rate.

The other point is that currency is so fast-moving that any rates you check before getting on the plane will be out of date by the time you get off it.Currency moves very quickly in the space of minutes - in each direction - so ultimately you can only get the best rate you can find in the time and place you do the exchange.  

Yes if there's a long-term trend it is definitely worth deciding whether to change cash immediately (if your home currency is weakening) or to use credit cards (if your home currency is strengthening) - but you have to watch the trend for a while to make that decision correctly and you can still be caught out.  

Mars' advice is sound, follow it and exchange large quantities in a place where the competition between changers is hot, making sure the notes are genuine.  That's the best you can do.

Sorry to Hijack but does anywhere change Russian roubles? , I've been holding onto several thousand and no money changers will touch it banks are no good as I have no account either ....

I also have a ton of mongolian , a ton of Kazah and a BRICK of Uzbek (they weigh the money in uzbekistan rather than count it)

In addition, if you have account with Bank of America, you can use your ATM cards at China Construction Bank which has many locations in Macau.

HSBC has many locations in Macau including Lisboa Hotel, but not many locations in the US.

I think Citibank has many locations in the US, but only 1 location in Macau.

How many roubles do you have?  I know someone who does business in Russia.

HSBC has a big presence in New York only ... there may be one or two branches in other states but they are few and far between ...

i have a HSBC account opened in the UK and on one of my trips to HK, i was under the
same impression as you bro as far as the charges were concerned. i sought out a HSBC
ATM and the one closest to my hotel also happened to be a proper bank. i got out
my UK HSBC debit card and just to ensure that my logic was correct, i approached
a member of the staff.

he told me that there would be no difference in the charges, based on the fact that
i was using a HSBC UK card to get money from a HSBC HK ATM machine. i needed the
money anyway so i went on to draw 500HKD and got the transaction receipt etc.

back in the UK, when i got my bank statement, sure enough there was a
conversion rate (the interbank rate you refered to) and a foreign transaction charge
which was 3 pounds sterling. no big deal there but it is worth mentioning that
as long as your HSBC card is not issued in HK, don't bother running around looking
for a HSBC ATM to get a better deal. any ATM with the cirrus/maestro logo will do.

this is just for HSBC but i suspect it should be the same with the other banks as well
(e.g. Citibank) although i cannot guarantee they all operate in the same way.

If you want to maximize convenience, use some form of bank/credit card, but bear in mind that there are always hidden charges, and a record is made of each transaction.

If you want to get the absolute best exchange rate, nothing beats cash. When I was last in HK, and the interbank rate was 7.77, the Chungking Mansions money exchangers were selling HK$ for 7.72 to a US dollar.

And Kennichi, if anyone in HK will take roubles, it will be the Chungking guys.

Be careful when changing money at chungking though. Heard that they slip a few fake notes in with real ones.

30 years of changing money at Chungking Mansions, and neither I nor anyone I've sent their way has ever been given a fake note. This is what these guys do for a living; if it got out that they were handing out fake bills, they'd quickly find themselves without any customers.

for bros from the US, you may find the following article quite useful

http://www.credit.com/credit_inf ... Conversion-Fees.jsp

for bros not based in the states, it may be worth the effort to check with your bank on the
formula they will use for forex conversion and whatever charge that will be levied. could be
quite a substantial amount in fees at the end.