?? Cash -v- Travellers Cheques -v- Credit Cards ??

We will be travelling to Hong Kong soon and have read somewhere that travellers cheques seem to be ';old fashioned'; these days and that the ';savy traveller'; has abandoned the use of travellers cheques now.

Opinion seems to lean towards putting everything on a credit card as the way to go, but has anybody had any bad experiences with credit card skimming in Hong Kong? Are there particular places or areas where a credit card should not be used? I guess you would need to avoid credit card transactions around the markets ....

Also, it is just not practical to use credit cards when buying lunch or just a drink from a small vendor or even somewhere like say Ocean Park or Disneyland - its hard to put a few dollar drink on credit I would think.

I can however see the sense of putting any charges we incur in the hotel we are staying at on the room bill and then settling the account on checkout with a credit card transaction.

The alternative is to use ATM%26#39;s to withdraw cash from your home bank account (Cirrus network) but I believe that Australian banks impose substantial feees on overseas transactions - has anybody been stung really bad by a bank here (in Australia) for doing this? Anybody know of an Australian bank that is less brutal with its charges for overseas ATM transactions?

Have travellers cheques really had their day or do people still feel that the security they provide (and relatively low fees) mean that the good old traveller cheque still has a place in modern travelling.

Many thanks to everybody who replies :-))

?? Cash -v- Travellers Cheques -v- Credit Cards ??

We went to Bali last year and got a lot less to exchange our travellers chqs than cash - we are off to HK soon and will just withdraw from the ATM%26#39;s as the charges from our bank (Bendigo) didn%26#39;t seem much.AMEX card also goes well OS and rates always seem good.

We had trouble in the USA a few years ago and just walked into a AMEX office and withdrew $ no questions asked

So I would just take your cards are feel safe knowing that you can just withdraw little amounts as you need it. Ring your bank/credit card and ask - our Visa card charges always seem a little high but Diners and Amex have never let us down (good freq.Flyer points also)

Have a safe trip

?? Cash -v- Travellers Cheques -v- Credit Cards ??

Yep Amex / visa / mastercard no problem, but recommend folding for anything that looks remotely dodgy, having said that, been to HKG 4 times to the markets, seedy looking basement shoping arcades (and heading there again this April) never had any bother before.

AND only fraw out cash from an A/c that has money in it, or else if drawing down from a C/c then interest starts the day you take, it is a cash advance %26amp; having done it once in desparation (while in Cairns) we got stung big time from ANZ, the A$200 ended up costing around NZ$340..........ouch.

As for traverlers chqs I think it doesn%26#39;t hurt to keep some funds in that form for emergencies. (or that must have bargain)

As a rule of thumb, greater HKG....no problem, but start heading in to China proper, %26amp; you will need to keep your wits about you, its worse than Kuta Beach.

cheers.