American Express Credit Card Question

We use debit cards all the time to get money and to pay for things. None of my debit cards have a chip in them and they work perfectly fine. Just be sure to let your own banks know that you are traveling so they don't put a fraud hold on the cards when you try to use them in Europe.

Donna

My debt card has always worked fine in the ATM's. However, AMEX is one of the least accepted cards in Europe. Way better off with MC/Visa

Thank you for the responses. I will make sure to bring one of our debit visas :)

Actually, I advise that you bring at least two debit cards on two different accounts, in case one doesn't work or gets lost, stolen, etc. Occasionally a card won't work. That's usually a temporary condition, rooted in your bank or theirs. I even had the experience of a card not working at an atm machine inside but not outside a bank. Since we had just entered Sweden, we had an urgent need to get local currency, so I went in to ask the person inside to check. She was able to get it to work on her machine, but hadn't a clue as to why one was good and not the other. As she said, it was the same system.
BTW, don't use a cc to get cash. That's called a cash advance, and they starting charging interest from the day you take it. There's a lot of information that you can access on this site about getting cash. Do a search.

I always ask the question, "Where did you heard that??" You need to be listening to better sources. The cards that don't work are non-chip credit cards in SOME stand alone ticket machines, toll booths, gas pumps. Mag strip debit cards have always worked at bank owned ATMs. And mag strip credit cards will work where there is an attendant to run the card. Mag strip credit card are slowly becoming less convenient but still work in most places that want to take your money. BUT -- this is one time -- you can leave home without it. Except for a few high end restaurants, hotels, the Am Express card is worthless. Stick to VISA or MasterCard branded credit cards for everything. Better yet, just use cash. Italians and most of Europe love cash.

Edit: Always an exception to a broad statement. The AE is good for car rentals IF you are using the AE supplemental car rental insurance.

I use my American Express in Europe and Italy but mostly for deposits on rental cars and hotels. I prefer to pay cash to avoid high transaction rates and fees. Getting cash from ATM's with a zero transaction fee debit card is the way to go, ask your bank. I have used the Amex recently (May) in Italy and it worked just fine.

Notify Amex and your bank that you will be traveling.

Look to the left of this screen. Go to Travel Tips, then to Money for lots of good money related information on what to do and how to do it.

Personally, we use our debit cards only to get cash, pay with cash as much as we can, and use credit cards only for large purchases and in situations where using them makes more sense. We followed that pattern most recently in Italy last fall.

We only have Visa and MasterCard credit and debit cards. None of them is chip and pin. They continue to work in all the applications already mentioned, but I am looking forward to the time our credit unions replace them with chip and pin ones. In fact I was surprised to see this week that our little local neighborhood Walmart is already set up to take them.