Money... Hi Im visiting the beautiful Cancun for the third time this August, and am coming from the UK, I get a rate of: £1 to 20.3753 Pesos or £1 to 1.9063 Dollars Is it best for me to get Dollars or Peso's I really appreciate any help.... Also what is the Dollar Peso equivilent in Cancun, i.e if something was 200 Pesos, how much would it be in Dollars...hope that makes sense...
You can get about 10.75 pesos for $1US. You are better off selling GBP and buying MXN without exchanging for dollars. That way you only pay one commission and not two. But no matter what, you will find the prices less than half of what you pay in GB for food and drink. But you have to tip here. In Cancun you are either rich or poor and the rich are not usually serving you, so be generous. No Stellas here either. LOL
Confused Im not really understanding the conversion. Can someone explain what exactly it means and what is the best deal. I heard you get different rates when you use cash or credit card.
Bottom line - Don't exchange from one country's currency to another's and then to Pesos. Each transaction basically has a commission in it. So if you are from Canada or UK, just exchange your currency directly to Pesos. In other words, don't buy US dollars first. Pesos are typically the best thing to use here but not always. Before you come find out from your credit card company what exchange rate they use and what fees they charge you for foreign transactions. By exchange rate I mean what index, not necessarily how many pesos you get per dollar or whatever. If they will tell you the rate on the day you call, post it on this board and someone will tell you what the local bank rate is. Citicards for example uses a rate that is right at the local bank rate, but they also charge a 3% foreign tranaaction fee. Also, call your bank and ask them what ALL fees are if you withdraw pesos from a Mexico ATM. It's pretty much a math thing when the smoke all clears. To make it even more confusing, if you are on all inclusive you may not need much local currency. But no matter what, don't spend your cash. If you don't exchange for pesos, then use your credit card and or ATM. Hope this helps. Don't be confused.
Personally, if you are not going to get your money out of the ATM then I'd say bring pesos. And if you aren't from the states thenm there's no reason at all to bring dollars. As for credit, depending where you hang out not every place will take a credit card. Most places in the hotel will as far as bars and restaurants but if you're going to be downtown a lot many of the bars and restaurants there will not.
Cun 101 - Klaw is right except she forgets that there are dollars in Canada, at least there were the last time I checked. The bank rate I saw yesterday was $10.58, terrible for US$ sellers. Suggest you check your largest local bank for a rate, which may be about 2% more than here, with commissions and all. But post a question a few days before you leave, maybe with your bank rate already known and we can tell you the local rate. Bring some US$, CDN$ or GBP for cash emergencies and plastic up for when it is more convenient. But again, if your hotel, food and booze are paid, there is not much left besides gifts and you may not be able to save enough on exchanging to make it worth your time. But you will need some pesos for purchases outside your hotel and you rarely want to buy anything with other currency. If you are paying for your hotel by credit card, they usually charge you in pesos at a different rate daily that equates to the reservation rate in dollars. I sometimes found that I was better to pay part of all of my bill in pesos when checking out, IF THE HOTEL CHARGES A LOWER EXCHANGE RATE THAN YOU CAN GET IN THE STREET. Rental car companies do this too but some (Executive for one) will not let you pay any way but credit cards and they wack you for another 5% which you really don't realize till you get your bill a month after you get back home.
I'm still not sure that changing from Canadian $$ to US $$ and then to pesos makes sense and I don't know of anywhere in Cancun that acepts Canadian $$ so you'd have to convert to spend your money. It would make more sense to me to just convert to pesos.
Cun 101 and Klaw. Yes, most places in the hotel zone accept credit cards. The malls do for sure. Smaller markets like Coral Negro and the place outside TGI Friday's are a toss up. 95% of restaurants and bars take plastic. Klaw, silly girl. What you said was "And if you aren't from the states thenm there's no reason at all to bring dollars. " My smart ass comment had to do with the "states" not being the only ones who have dollars. Canadian currency is also called dollars. But you are very correct in saying there is no point in converting from Canadian to US to Mexican. There is no need to convert your currency to anything but Mexican pesos.
