namante

I was with WaMu for my banking and credit card up until the recent buyout by Chase... now Chase is raising the International Transaction fee from 1% to 3% and cutting the 1% cash back on my credit card so I think it's time to jump ship. Does anyone have any recommendations for a good card with a low international transaction fee and rewards?
My credit is excelent and I always pay off my bill in full each month, I'm mostly looking for something with a 1% or less fee for international use, good conversion rates, maybe some insurance protection, and 1%+ of rewards. Airline miles would also be acceptable if they are useful/easy to redeem.

joe7f

Good topic, I thought I would throw out that when airline miles become difficult to redeem you may consider using them as upgrades since it is at times easier to turn that coach seat into Business class than it is to get a coach seat free (well, plus taxes).

I think Marc873 posted a thread a while back on a Paypal Visa card (I think it was a bank card though) with very low transaction fees.

--Joey

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simply_angelic

Anything you do VISA is the best...it is SO ridiculously frustrating when you need to take money out and find that there is only one type of bank in a country that takes Mastercard (if any at all)

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mbo108

Capital One is the best credit card for international travel IMO.

There are NO international transaction fees and Capital One even pays fees that the vendor may assess.

I have mine linked to "No Hassle Rewards miles" which are great because you can book travel on any airline. I recently bought 1 NYC-JNB (Johannesburg, South Africa) ticket and two city-to-city tix in South Africa with my miles). Right now they are also offereing triple rewards if you meet certain requirements.

I HIGHLY recommend Capital One.

namante

Thanks for the advice guys!

After lots of searching, I was about to get a Capitol One card, despite the loads of negative reviews I kept coming across online about their customer service; I think I found an even better deal from Schwab though.

Schwab Invest First Visa - 2% cash back visa card with no annual or foreign transaction fees (). Forgive me if I sound like an ad here, but it's too good a deal to not be a little excited, heh. The only slight catch is that instead of statement credits they deposit the money directly into a brokerage account. It's really no big deal for me because you can sign up for both at once and there's no requirement to use the brokerage account (or penalty for non-use); I just plan to take the money from the brokerage account and transfer it to my checking account each month.

On a side note, they also have a pretty good checking account I'm might signing up for as well (High Yield Investor Checking)... it's 1% APY checking with no ATM fees/Unlimited ATM fee rebates (including foreign ATM fees) and free checks. The only thing I haven't figured out yet is if the Visa debit card charges foreign transaction fees. I'll let you guys know when I find out.

Overall, I think they beat my WaMu accounts, even before Chase got their hands on them. The only thing they're lacking is a decent savings account, but seeing as how their checking gives the same APY as my WaMu/Chase savings account does now (1%), I might as well switch until I sign up for ING or something like that.