CIMB Enrich World Mastercard
Transaction date: 4 February 2012
Posted date: 7 February 2012
Amount charged in foreign currency: 855 Euros
Amount billed in MYR: 3,442.74

American Express Platinum Charge Card
Transaction date: 4 February 2012
Posted date: 5 February 2012:
Amount charged in foreign currency: 3,100 Euros
Amount billed in MYR: 12,674.13

Maybank Visa Infinite
Transaction date: 4 February 2012
Posted date: 6 February 2012
Amount charged in foreign currency: 8,205 Euros
Amount billed in MYR: 33,026.02

Oh yeah. Sorry, I calculated wrongly.

Hmmm, the rate is kinda high.

This post has been edited by tifosi: Feb 13 2012, 09:44 PM

yeah ... your transaction skewed my datapoints hahaha

for those expecting the analysis, my apologies for the delay. Swamped with work and personal errands lately. Hopefully will get to post it up soon.

maybank2Amex

08-Feb-2012 06-Feb-2012 CLEVERBRIDGE AG KOELN 27 US$18.47 RM57.09

HSBC Visa
Transaction Date: 18 February 2012
Posted Date: 19 February 2012
Amount Charged in Foreign Currency: USD 424.80
Amount Billed in MYR: RM 1,319.58
Final Exchange Rate: 3.1064

Visa Rate on both transaction and posted date: 3.038

Charges: 2.25%

Does anyone know why this high?
This is a paypal transaction, but I made sure that I select to use the bank's conversion.

This post has been edited by tskhang: Feb 22 2012, 10:44 AM

For e.g, a transaction in EUR means it will need to convert twice from EUR to USD and then USD to MYR? If that is the case, 0.5% + 2.5% charges will be doubled?

just want to share the findings of my long overdue analysis.

Executive Summary:
MBB Visa - 1.25% admin charge based on Visa forex rates on posting date
MBB Mastercard - 1% admin charge based on Mastercard global forex rates on transaction date
MBB Amex - Close to 2% higher than Visa and Mastercard

Detailed analysis available on my blog. Do comment and highlight errors if any.

This post has been edited by zenquix: Mar 5 2012, 03:17 AM

Interesting, visa is slightly higher than mastercard. thanks for the effort zenquiz!

Is the VISA a MBB2 VISA, regular VISA or MBB VISA Infinite ?

By the way, i recently discovered that the exchange rate for TWD is very good. It is even lower than the local money changer and if one were to buy their TWD with USD in Taiwan, the rate provided by Maybank credit card is still unbeatable.

For example, local money changer was selling TWD100 for RM10.55 in mid-February. Banks in Taiwan (Bank of Taiwan, Sinopec, Chinatrust etc.) on the other hand, were selling TWD100 for about RM10.40 (bought using USD and i bought my USD in Malaysia at USD1=RM3.03). I bought something with my MBB2 VISA and the final exchange rate was about TWD100=RM10.36, and i get Treatpoints for that! Will post some of my recent foreign transactions here later on.

Mixed. Have samples for all 3.

Reason for this is due to the fact that TWD is poorly traded in MY. So the money changers have higher margins, to make up for the lower volume.
This is documented in the Taiwan Travel thread (I did the MYR -> USD -> TWD comparison as well)

Yes. I already read that thread, which is the reason i bought USD here in Malaysia and only bought TWD in Taiwan. However, the exchange rate is not very competitive anymore. Those bank counters in Taoyuan Airport charge TWD30 commission while banks in downtown charge TWD100 and with a not so competitive exchange rate (USD to TWD), the final exchange rate is more or less the same as the rate offered by local money changers. In that Taiwan travel thread, it is said that for each RM1000 exchanged, one can save about RM50. However, this is no longer the case now. Maybank VISA/MasterCard give an even lower exchange rate.

Thanks for the effort.

Your work reconfirm what jchong reported.

Thanks for posting. I read it already on your blog.

Good to know that Visa is consistent across the different types of Visa card. For a moment I was concerned if VI had a worse exchange rate (in order to compensate for the 5x TP).

---

Added on March 6, 2012, 10:51 amOne comment, I notice that the forex rates quoted by Visa are generally a bit higher than MC. So the real diff between Visa and Master is a little bit higher than 0.25%.

This post has been edited by jchong: Mar 6 2012, 10:51 AM

Maybank Visa Infinite has higher exchange rate compare to normal m2u visa?

Hmm like that i use normal Visa will do.


So Maybank mastercard is the best rate to use oversea?

Maybank 2 cards are ready to use in oversea? Or I need to call bank to activate it?

No need to activate to use MBB 2 Cards. BUT many reported at MBB 2 Thread that they need to call up CS for online transactions with their AMEX card. Try and you'll know, if fail then call CS. And it is a good practice to inform CS when you are going overseas, for any credit card.

aiya, now I at overseas already. but I did used online transaction several times in Malaysia without calling CS. I was just wondering if the cards are ready to use in merchant shops

HSBC Premier
Transaction Date: 30 March 2012
Posted Date: 02 April 2012
Amount Charged in Foreign Currency: TWD 2800
Amount Billed in MYR: RM 297.10

Transaction Date: 31 March 2012
Posted Date: 02 April 2012
Amount Charged in Foreign Currency: TWD 13200
Amount Billed in MYR: RM 1400.54

not sure what the conversion rate has been charges to me

About RM10.611 for every NTD100, not bad at all! Local money changers have been selling NTD100 for about RM10.60 - RM10.80 in the past 1 - 2 weeks.

I get from local money changer RM10.75.

Regret didnt buy more ahhhhh