Perhaps you were lucky this holiday season and got a whole bunch of cash in your stocking. More than likely, you were not. Still, I bet one of your new year’s resolutions will be to start saving more money. Whether you cut back on your bar tabs or not, one brainless way to save money is to stop paying exorbitant ATM fees.
This holds true for travelers especially, who are often hit with dual fees – one from their home bank and one from the bank whose ATM they’re using. That SUCKS. While traveling, I, too, used to withdraw more cash than I should so that I wouldn’t have to go back for a while and thus avoid the $6 in fees. (When traveling in developing countries, that equates to a night at a hostel, or six servings of mango sticky rice!)

Why Charles Schwab Checking Accounts Rock
- They don’t charge any ATM fees whatsoever.
- They REFUND you for any fees charged by other banks. (Just go ahead and read that again. Uhh, yeah.)
- Since you don’t have to worry about fees, this also has the added advantage that you can go to the ATM each day while traveling, withdrawing small amounts of money. Take that, pickpockets!
- There is no minimum account balance and no monthly service fees.
- It is easy to connect to a real person when you call, and their reps are helpful and nice. (There’s no way I’m the only person that just says “agent” over and over again when calling other financial institutions.)
- It is “high yield.” I thought that term only applied to crops or Duggers, but apparently it applies to checking accounts, as well. If you have a pitifully small amount in there like me, .15% isn’t gonna do much, but it’s better than other checking accounts out there.
Do you agree? Disagree? Please share your favorite travel debit cards in the comments. I’d love to learn about them!
I absolutely love the schwab debit card. I had it before I started traveling internationally significantly and loved it even before I knew it had all these great international benefits. Because of this card, I laugh at my friends who have to exchange money at the ridiculous rates in the airport or who are charged out the ass when pulling cash out of the ATM. While I’ll always have and love my schwab card, I did recently add a new card to my portfolio – the Chase Sapphire. Basically, it’s a points earning credit card with no international transactions fees. It’s a great compliment to the Schwab.
I completely agree, John! Thanks for your comment and suggestion. I actually recently got the Chase Sapphire, as well. I definitely should write about it as the perfect travel credit card, or maybe both as the perfect travel card duo!
Don’t you just love the heft of the Saphire card? I get comments everywhere I go with it.
Haha, yes! I call it my “Blue Card” because it’s nice and heavy like the Black Card.
Wow – this was an excellent post, something that I’d not thought about before. It would be great to be able to travel without all those fees attaching to each and every expense and carrying around cash is not always smart. There is still the old “travelers cheque” but no one really seems to know what those are anymore. Thanks for the tip – this is something I’m defiantly going to have to investigate.
Thanks, Bea! I know this card definitely changed my travel finance habits for the better. Hope it works for you, too!
I have been googling the best debit card for international travel and have been quite disappointed until I found your blog. Why is this not well known?! I opened a TD debit card a few years ago because they used to offer 0 fees and full reimbursement all over the world but it seems like as soon as I got the card the stopped that. I can’t wait to get my new Charles Schwab card and close the TD account!
Hi Marie! I don’t know why it isn’t more well known, but I agree that the Schwab card is the essential debit card for international travelers. Enjoy!
Do I have to put $1000 to open up a brokerage account? It looks like they’re connected
Do I have to open a Schwab One brokerage account with my High Yield Investor Checking account?
Yes. Schwab Bank High Yield Investor Checking is only available when linked to a Schwab One brokerage account.
They are linked but neither account has a minimum balance.
What are the fees and commissions?
Service fees: $0
Minimum required to open an account: $1,000
http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/investing/accounts_products/accounts/brokerage_account
Discuss.
http://www.schwab.com/public/schwab/banking_lending/checking_account/checking_account_faqs
Are there any account services fees for my High Yield Investor Checking or my linked Schwab One® brokerage account?
No, there are no monthly or low balance fees for either account when you open a High Yield Investor Checking account linked to a Schwab One brokerage account.
Nice!
Thanks for all the info, Marie!
Bleeda, I definitely don’t think I had $1,000 when I opened the account, and I don’t think I’ve had that much in there since. Ha! I’d just call Schwab; they’re super helpful and can help you sort out all that stuff.
Bottom line: get the card! You won’t regret it. Also, not sure about Boulder, but I’m almost positive they have a real live branch in Denver.
I’m definitely going to look into this!
Wondering if I can get them though. Being from little Belgium and all…
I’m not sure if you can as a non-US citizen. Hopefully, because it’s a great card!
Thanks a ton Susan. I’ve been having trouble figuring out what bank account to open that will help me out no matter where I am
You’re welcome, Nate! I hope this one works out well for you.
My wife and I returned from a 2-week tour of Europe yesterday. Our experience recommends that you not rely on an ATM card, or at least not on a Charles Schwab debit ATM card..
My wife got a Charles Schwab debit ATM card just for the purpose of this trip. She moved monies into the debit card account and gave Schwab notice of the dates and countries we would visit. On the trip, her card worked 6 times and thereafter was rejected. She could no longer withdraw funds despite there being plenty of money in the account..
The Schwab Debit card instructs you to call collect to the USA if you have any problems. Unfortunately the number on the card connected us to an automated system that would not allow us to speak to a person and that caused an automatic hang-up after roughly two seconds of Schwab’s message. We tried calling directly to Schwab’s USA internal telephone help line – the same thing happened. We tried both numbers from our hotel room, from the hotel front desk, from cell phones, and from an independent phone company in Paris – in all cases Schwab’s help lines automatically disconnected. We asked the hotel front desk to help but they could do no better. We asked the independent phone company to assist us but they could do no better. Charles Schwab’s phone help lines were utterly, absolutely useless.
If we had relied solely on Schwab’s ATM card the trip would have been a disaster. Luckily I had insisted that we take significant US currency (although honestly my first choice was travelers’ checks). We exchanged the dollars for Euros (and paid the high exchange rate), re-evaluated our situation and budgeted for the remainder of the trip. We arrive home with $60 cash in our pockets.
My wife called Schwab when we got home – they were clueless, couldn’t give a reason for the card not working despite a large balance and the fact that there were no fraudulent transactions. I consider this completely unacceptable.
Everybody talks about how great the Schwab debit ATM card is for travel but for us it was a POS. I am glad that I had the good sense to mistrust it – my conservative behavior saved our trip.
Wow, Michael — so sorry to hear about your poor experience with Schwab! It sounds awful. I have relied on my Schwab card during trips to more than 25 countries on almost every continent, and I’ve had nothing but good experiences. You’re right, though: you should never trust just *one* thing. It was smart of you to bring some extra currency with you!