10 Travel Money Mistakes to Avoid

When budgeting for a trip, we often list the big-ticket items—airfare, hotel, lodging, car rental, attraction tickets—add them all together, and call it the final price. But the trickle of funds to other costs starts almost as soon as we start moving: Gas to and from the airport, tolls, airport parking, overpriced bottles of water in the airport, and more.

That trickle doesn’t stop when you arrive at your destination; think cell phone charges, bank fees, hotel Wi-Fi, and housekeeping tips, to name a few. To avoid spending more than you have to, check out these 10 travel money mistakes to avoid.

Forgetting to call your bank before traveling abroad is a common error that even frequent international travelers make; it slips your mind until the plane touches down, and by then it’s often too late. These days banks have almost zero lag time in noticing a debit or credit card being used abroad, so you will get shut down on pretty much your first swipe in a foreign country.

As banks have gotten more sophisticated about tracking card use locations, this can even be important for domestic travel, and most banks recommend that you let them know about those closer-to-home trips as well. Fraud detectors can be tripped if you’re suddenly using your card across the country, making more or different purchases than you usually do, or charging unexpectedly large amounts (such as a weeklong hotel stay).

Note that this applies to debit cards as well as credit cards, and you sometimes need to talk to more than one department even inside the same bank to get them all approved for travel.

While traveling internationally, each time you go get cash you will likely incur a fee of some kind. These can vary a lot depending on whether the ATM is run by a large bank or not, if the bank is on your card’s network, and more. Keep in mind that fees can change from year to year, so it’s worth checking before every trip.

That first taxi ride from the airport may be your most financially vulnerable moment of any trip—the time when you have no idea how far it is, what a fair price is for the ride, whether you have lower-cost alternatives such as a train or bus, or even whether your hotel has a free shuttle. It’s best to figure all of this out before your trip; when you arrive you are tired, often without much cash and carrying a ton of luggage. You don’t want to be fumbling around trying to figure all this out on the airport curb.

How much could a few texts, a bit of mapping, a few email checks and a batch of social media updates cost per day? Plenty, it turns out—so be sure to purchase an international roaming plan that will cover you while you’re away. For more information, see The Best International Phone Plans for Travelers.

Especially in the first several hours at your destination, having done a little research on the local exchange rate against your home currency can make a huge difference. Often it takes a couple of days really to get a handle on how much things cost, but this can take even longer if you are traveling in an area where prices may not be so fixed as they are at home. Knowing the exchange rate cold so you can do the math quickly in your head will help considerably. See How to Get the Best Exchange Rate for more info.

Barely anyone accepts them anymore, they’re not cheap, you have to invest a fair amount of time in obtaining and purchasing them, and credit cards give you a far better rate of exchange in most parts of the world. Skip ’em.

Tipping customs vary immensely from place to place, and not having knowledge of these can be both awkward and expensive.

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Tipping practices can also vary from industry to industry as well; in Brazil, for example, a 10 percent tip is customary in a restaurant, but it might already be included, so you will want to check the bill. On a taxi ride you just round up to the nearest one (or five if you are feeling generous) for most rides (so for a 13 reais taxi ride, you give 14 or 15 reais).

One note on U.S. travel: As the movement to pay restaurant workers higher wages gains steam, some restaurants are telling customers that they no longer need to tip. I saw this at two restaurants in Seattle last month (where a new $15 minimum wage law went into effect recently); check your bill to make sure.

Many travelers will leave it until the end of a trip to tip the housekeepers (usually by leaving some cash on top of the bed); this can backfire. On any given stay, you might have a different housekeeper from one day to the next, and to be the fairest and to get the best treatment, it’s best to leave something each day. Many housekeepers live on subsistence wages, and this is both the right thing to do and also arguably a bit of blood money—most of our readers have seen the hidden camera videos of crossed housekeepers, and a small tip each day can keep you on their good side. To learn more, see How Much to Tip Hotel Housekeeping.

Shoving your wallet in your back pocket or your purse over your shoulder is such a natural and almost automatic action that almost all of us will do this at some point in our travels. It’s also the easiest way to get pickpocketed or ripped off, as these spots are both obvious to thieves and difficult to protect.

This doesn’t apply only to your wallet; you will want to secure anything that someone could grab quickly. On a recent trip to Rio, we got on a train to the legendary Maracana stadium for a game featuring the local futbol favorite Flamengo. It was rush hour, and the train was insanely packed; despite living for more than a decade in New York City and having taken countless trips around the world, I have never experienced anything like it. If there was ever an environment ripe for pickpocketing and unseen thefts, this was it. I had a backpack with sweatshirts and a camera inside,  so I looked around at how the locals were dealing with it and noticed that everyone had their backpacks and bags in front of them.

A button on your back pocket or an across-the-body bag instead of an over-the-shoulder purse can also help here; adding just a little bit of difficulty is often enough to inspire thieves to look for other victims.

You’ll want to avoid checking bank balances, making online payments or entering financially sensitive passwords of any kind while using public internet or Wi-Fi networks. Occasionally it’s unavoidable, and the number of hotel Wi-Fi systems with keystroke loggers installed by sophisticated hackers is extremely low—but it’s always a risk.

Note also that a hack doesn’t have to be an inside job—that is, a hotel employee or system installer—but can also be a fellow lodger who has hacked into the minimally protected (if at all) hotel Wi-Fi network.

Hopefully, by keeping your money on your mind just a little, these tips will help you keep your money in your bank account as well.

You Tell Us: Which travel money mistakes have you made?

More from SmarterTravel:

• Buying Foreign Currency: 9 Ways to Get More Bang for Your Buck
• The 12 Most-Hated Travel Fees and How to Avoid Them
• 10 Clever Car Rental Hacks That Will Save You Money

Editor’s note: This story was originally published in 2017. It has been updated to reflect the most current information.

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