Paying by card

Yes. At the airport you should be able to buy tickets in machines with your card. Most recently in Paris we had no trouble with a US chip/sig card charging our Navigo Ds on the machines. They ask for a pin but you just hit continue and it will work. The machines have an English option and you can buy tickets to town (10 Euro) and also a carnet of Paris tickets (14.50) at the machines. If for some reason your card didn't work at the machine, the clerk at the staffed window could sell you tickets and use the card; this often means a long line, so use the machines if possible.

I don't know if the tourist office selling Museum Passes takes cards, but would expect them to. Maybe someone with direct experience of that will add their 2 cents here.

Dear Mary,

of course you can do both thins with credit card! In Last years plastic became a magnificent thing, and today you can pay for everything with your card almost in every country. Just be aware if you have card issued by Discover bank - they don't participate in Visa and MasterCard infrastructure, thus, their acceptance might be limited.

I'm pretty sure I used my card to buy my museum pass - I'm sure I didn't have enough cash and I'm sure I didn't use a check.

I had some issues with buying things with cards in France but my theory is the transaction times out before they get an approval code from my overseas bank. It wasn't an issue with a particular card or account. I probably had 25-30 declines on my first attempt at metro, toll booths and restaurants, but almost always had the transaction go through on the second attempt. In some cases, I tried different cards (credit and debit) until something worked.