Credit cards and overseas travel

[quest208]

I have no experience in this:
I plan to be overseas for about 5 months starting in june 2012. Do credit cards normally charge extra fees when used overseas? (China). If so is there a card i can get that i can use in china without having to pay extra charges?

[tntexans72]

---

@quest208 wrote:
I have no experience in this:
I plan to be overseas for about 5 months starting in june 2012. Do credit cards normally charge extra fees when used overseas? (China). If so is there a card i can get that i can use in china without having to pay extra charges?

---

I researched 6 months back on a card that I can use oversea without FTF. Comes down to 2 cards that are the best in terms of signup bonus/rewards etc.....IMHO.

Chase Sapphire Preferred

Capital One Venture

Look into those 2 cards....they both have no FTF. I am sure OP will have a couple they may want to recommend also. In the end, I went with the Chase Sapphire Preferred for their 50,000 signup bonus.

[dansparis]

If annual fees are not a problem I agree with tntexans72, Chase Sapphie Preferred might be your best travel card considering the initial sign up bonus and various other travel benefits including no foreign transaction fees.

If you're looking for something with no annual fees, you have a wide array of choices amongst the Capital One products (depending on your credit level) that all have no foreign transaction fees. I recently got the Capital One Newcomers card to use when travelling overseas as that also provides me 2% cashback on all travel-related services (hotel, flight, train, bus, car service, etc.) and I'm planning to apply for the Capital One Cash that provides 1.5% on all purchases so that I can use that for all the non-travel related purchases overseas.

Hope this helps!

[Guava]

If it's China then Discover will be pretty useful to you. They don't have foreign transaction fee anymore.

Cap1 cards also have 0 foreign transaction fee. Their Venture cards have good reward and come in 2 flavors (one with annual fee and higher reward rate, one without the annual fee but lower reward rate).

[Anonymous]

There are a ton of cards with no foreign transaction fees.

All Cap1 cards 

Chase Sapphire Preferred

Chase British Airways, Priority Club, Hyatt, Marriot Premier, Continental Presidential Plus, etc.

Citi Thank You Premier or Prestige

Amex Platinum

Discover cards (as of 11/6)- but not always widely accepted overseas.

Go for a VISA or MC.