european/international webmasters spending USD on credit cards
 

My tip of the day:

Visa and MasterCard charge you 2.75% comission everytime you buy in USD. This isn't set by your bank, this is a charge levied by Visa and MasterCard themselves.

Just spending $2000 a month on hosting/content/ppc traffic etc will cost you $660 a year if you pay using any type of Visa/MasterCard.

I always used to think... its cool... I am raking in the Air Miles but this is bullshit. I prefer the savings and have recently started consolidating many credit card transactions into monthly or bi monthly wire transfers and it is saving me a shit load...

Of course an alternative is to get a credit card that charges in USD. I know Citibank UK can do that.

a single wire transfer takes like $30, so whats the point in it?

wire 12 months upfront, easy and no ridiculous costs

exactly glad someone understands :thumbsup

i guess he overlooked this one..

I dont pay a shit in comission

Hmm, my Visa is in US so I guess I already "save" a ton.

Get the best bank deal, and you save the costs.
I'm paying an one year fee, about 40$, and there are no extra hidden costs, no matter how many or big the transactions are.

I understand a wire also costs money but for big transactions it is still worth it. My bank also does some cheap wires that take longer.

and of course it depends on how big the transaction is...

I was just pointing out anyone who spends USD on a non USD credit card gets charged 2.75% on the conversion and most of the time it won't even appear on your statement. It will give the USD amount and the 2.75% will just be added onto the amount charged in your local currency.

I have a USD account and all my USD transactions are charged from that account

so no comission

if i would have charged my local currency card that i would only pay a ridiculous exchange rate but still no comission

I pay 4% factoring fees on all earnings + wire fees
The convenience plus the ontime payments are well worth it. It does however hurt in the long run, when you add it all up. I could buy alot of nice things with what I pay in fees alone.

So you guys really arent that bad off :)

OR move to Amex