Travelex Currency Services

Go to your local bank for foreign currency. Harris Bank has foreign money available immediately at their location on N. Washington by the train tracks. Satellite banks can get you currency in two days. (You must have an account at the bank.) Oh, did I mention that the Travelex’s transaction cost was about 5 times HIGHER than the bank’s price? Outrageous! Save your money for that cold Pina Colada on the beach! ;-)

I have been dealing with Sam at Travelex for many years, every vacation I go see him and pick up my money. Travelex as a company kind of sucks, the exchange rates are high, many stupid policies, their cash passport program is a joke and I’ve had super huge problems trying to place orders online, at one point they held 3 grand of my money for an entire week had I not had extra funds would have sabataged my vacation.
As far as the staff and how I’m treated at this location though awesome. LIke I said their rates are a ripoff but I’m willing to be bent over for the convenience and because often times when arriving in other countries it’s late in the evening and I don’t want to chance it, it’s worth the safety and convenience for me. THat said they have gone above and beyond trying to get money for me on short notice and are always super friendly and helpful.
My positives are that they have a good selection of currencies on hand and anything else they can get pretty quickly, much quicker than my bank. To the lady complaining about Guatemala Quetzels on one or two day notice that’s an exotic currency it’s not Euros or Pounds. I’m sure they tried to get it for you but with off the wall currencies it may take them longer than a day or two, next time I’d suggest if your going to Vietnam, Peru, Oman, etc give them a week to get your money.
My review mainly is of the staff, Sam is awesome I enjoy chatting with him when I go to visit the store and he’s always more than happy to accomdoate any special requests I have for small bills or anything else like that. I’d suggest calling the store and not placing orders online as I’ve had problems on numerous occasions with them taking my money and then telling me there’s a problem and they can’t process my order after they’ve already taken my funds. They then take a week to give my money back even though they never fulfilled my order. Their phone support is abismal as well on the 800 numbers.

My daughter was going on a mission trip
to Guatemala. She needed local currency.
I placed the order on a Saturday and was
told we would have the money on Wednesday morning. You guessed it!
Not there. «Maybe tomorrow» he says.
Seriously?
Isn’t exchanging money what they do?
Seinfeld in a class episode says «taking the reservation is easy, delivering on the reservation is not.