Holidaymakers could benefit from credit cards

Many holidaymakers in the UK that head off on holiday each year use credit cards to make payments for purchases, and one recent report has suggested that this could prove to be an ideal solution for holidaymakers.

There is a choice available to those travelling abroad when it comes to how they make purchases, and this includes cash, traveller’s cheques, debit cards, and credit cards. For many credit cards offer the ideal solution, as they provide flexibility, ease, and convenience.

Research that was carried out by the Spanish banking group Santander recently showed that around 20 percent of holidaymakers took credit cards with them when they went abroad. However, 52 percent of holidaymakers still took cash as a means of making purchases.

Debit cards were taken by 15 percent of holidaymakers that went abroad, and traveller’s cheques were only used by around 5 percent of those that went on holiday abroad.

With many people spending a lot of money when they go abroad it could make a lot of sense for consumers to take a credit card as their main means of making transactions when they go on holiday according to Santander officials.

The bank said that consumers need to be careful to choose the right method of payment when going abroad, and credit cards were often the best choice because they offered ease, convenience, and increased protection when making purchases.

An official from Santander stated: “The reliance on cash does raise some concerns: one, is it safe to carry large sums of money; and two, is cash the cheapest way to pay for items whilst out of the UK? Britons do believe that credit and debit cards do not get great rates of exchange, but this is simply not the case – the exchange rate on cards tends to be very close to the daily wholesale rates.”

Tags: rate, sums of money, britons, Credit card, recent report, consumers