Topic: How Fiat Ruined my Traveling Experience (Read 1525 times)

Last August.
Also last year, I've bought a car, and I paid it cash. The dealer wasn't accepting credit cards nor checks.
Different countries have different practices.

One day Bitcoin will be the most efficient and fast means of transferring value between people that ever existed. Until then learn and use the others for the historical value. History provides a useful frame of reference for everything and is a valuable course of study for any field. Also, patience is a virtue.

Bitcoin is super-efficient, though. If we all used Bitcoin, I could cross any border I want without ever having to use an ATM or talk to an exchange agent. The same effect will be a blessing for international business; currency fluctuations become a non-issue.

It's also vastly cheaper, the fastest means if sending money I've ever used. I'm a very impatient man, so that's really the sticking point. There are arguments we could make against that, but most of them are solvable by modifications to the blockchain and protocol.

I probably don't want to go through that again, though--you're right. But I'm so very disinterested in learning about cheques and stuff.  

It's nice that you live in a place where Bitcoin is so entrenched. I wish everywhere in the world was the same way because I would profit. I think you're the first person I've ever seen call Bitcoin "efficient". That's not really the first word I would choose to describe Bitcoin. You may want to spend a few minutes learning about "stone aged" financial technology if you intend to keep traveling around the world. For the next 30-40 years that knowledge might come in handy. That knowledge may even feed you someday when you're hungry.

Well, honestly, what the fuck are your banks doing in other countries? Here in Canada, I can send money via e-transfer as easily as sending an email, but those Nigerians demand to pay me by wire transfer. If they weren't fancy and important, I would have complained to them directly, but alas.

Pardon me for living in a city where I can get literally everything I need in Bitcoin (and even the banks are usually somewhat competent), but I don't feel like learning about stone-age financial technology. It would be more efficient for society if people learned crypto, instead, and because I am pathologically obsessed with efficiency, I intend to complain until they do.

BULLSHIT

It depends on bank/cc type.

I have a 2500 euro limit on one and just 300 euros on a cc i use mostly online

ROFL
Are you sure you're old enough to be traveling without adult supervision?

https://www.americanexpress.com/us/content/prepaid/travelers-cheques.html

Well, You did ask for feedback, didn't you.

All I was saying as a feedback that a story is better if the first sentence is written such that it does not cause the reader to seriously doubt the whole story. Just honest feedback that you asked for. Next time I know not to say anything.

I also have not used travelles cheques for decades. They are some steam engine era shit.
However I have always some cash in with me so I am not left out in the cold if my cards suddenly stop working. Some amount of euros to last for a week or two in various size notes are pretty much accepted anywhere even if local currency is something else. USD also works as universal currency.

Granted that "dough" eyes was an unfortunate typo, but your theory that this story is false is a lunatic conspiracy. Allow me to present a picture of me with my Nigerian students in Dubai:



My boss runs http://datapronigeria.com/; he's the short one in-between the two white guys. I'm the white guy on his right.

You see, presumptuous reader, Dubai has little-to-no visa restrictions. Nigeria does not. Further, Nigeria is a very impoverished and dangerous country, while Dubai is a playground for rich people. Nigerian officials therefore hold their annual compliance course in Dubai, where I was summoned to teach them because they'd read my Bitcoin Magazine articles.

That aside, I'm not sure how tackle the other points made. Yes, there are more fiat ATMs in convenient places than Bitcoin ATMs. That's because more fiat ATMs exist. It is stunning, therefore, that they do not place them effectively given their available numbers--the logical conclusion is that it is often intentional, to serve a middle-man profit motive.

And why would I ever need to withdraw bitcoins separately from an ATM in each country I visit? In the future, everybody will accept cryptocurrency. I will not need to withdraw fiat, and I won't.

I don't possess a credit card, to answer one of the later questions. I don't use our even understand cheques, because I grew up in the post-Internet era, and what the fuck is a cheque? Honestly. Just take my bitcoins, guys.

I have credit/debit cards from 3 different european banks and on all of them I have personally decided at the time of ordering the card what is the limit I want to have on withdrawals or paying bills from the accounts and on some of the cards I can change the limits myself easily by logging on to the banking website. I know because I have done on this a couple of times when I have something bigger to buy I rise the limit and after completing the purchase I lower the limits back down for my own safety.

On couple of times I have got a call out from a blue from the bank security department when they have tripped some safety check on my cards that they see suspiciuos. They have called me on my phone to check whether I have made those suspicious withdrawals and when I answer the call and say all I recognize those withdrawals they have been satisfied with that and dropped the issue. I am actually quite pleased with the service I have got from them on this security issue.

When ... ?

when a friend of mine want buy a apple tablet with cash ...   it can't and is bank account is full of money (it can view is account on the ATM) !
it have standard credit card with no option (50 euros per year for the cost of this "standard" card).

I've already made €1,000 cash withdrawals.
It depends of your bank. Rich people have much higher limits, with ATMs where you can't withdraw less than €50.

The person relating his poor experience is obviously totally inexperienced with banking outside of his own country. I've been traveling the past 3 months without using a credit card nor BTC. Well I made a few BTC transactions, but I didn't need to do them.

I'm living fine with cash and bank wires, BTC could help, but with so few people using it right now, it doesn't help much.

I was thinking that too. Pretty unbelievable story. I guess he never heard of travelers cheques. You can exchange travelers cheques for local currency from Mogadishu, Somalia to Daejeon, South Korea. In fact, it would probably be all but impossible for any one person to be able to get a visa to enter all of the countries that travelers cheques are accepted. I suggest that until Bitcoin spreads worldwide carry a few cheques with you. And, for christs sake, stop trying to use ATM cards in a foreign country. That's where credit cards become handy. I recommend American Express.

I know I cannot invent a more unbelievable scenario even if I try than being flown to Dubai from other side of the world to deal with Nigerian officials with some shoestring arrangements. Even if that would somehow miraculously be true, I know I would replace that with something remotely believable just for the sake of story.

Why did he feel sensible to first write a long rant of basically of how bad it is needing to use 5 different ATMs to get 5 different local currencies and then come to the conclusion that he would really like to use 5 different ATMs to get 5 different local currencies?

Why does he feel it makes sense to write a praise about how conveniently easy it is to find bitcoin ATMs if it is backed by a story where he did not actually find any of them forcing him face all the troubles with fiat?

Come on. On what kind of level does this story make any sense at all?

Hey, compare this to my rather smooth experience with BTC in South America:

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/personal-btc-success-story-travelling-south-america-902745

true.

ask the restriction per day, per week and per month of a "simple" credit card ... and you cry even if you have many money on your bank account.


EDIT: win ...  




in europe, restriction is 300 euros par ATM or 600 euros in a day (all ATM in 3 countries in the same day) .
deal with it ?

NO ! (bitcoin)

You are required to notify your banks and credit card companies of when, where, and for how long you will travel out of country. Bitcoin users not affected.