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English Pounds and St. Petersburg


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We were in London last month and have a lot of English pounds leftover. DH was distracted our little DD as he was getting money from the ATM and accidentally put in too many zeros. :eek::eek:We typically take out little spending cash when we visit a country and then use our CC for most things.

 

With that said, we have (2) options:

 

1. Exchange the pounds at our local bank. With the exchange, we would get 10% less.

 

2. Use the pounds on our trip in May 2019. We will visit Italy, Israel and on a Baltic Sea cruise. I searched CC and the Internet and am confused about the use of Sterling pounds in St. Petersburg. I read that £ is accepted in STB. I do not know if this means the currency is accepted, but I would be hit with a not so desirable exchange rate. Or is the pounds truly an accepted currency?

 

I am not looking for debate or advice about using the home currency when visiting a country. That I get. However, with the amount of pounds we have leftover, I am trying to see if it can be used on my next trip. If not, then I will go with option #1 above.

 

TIA!

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We were in London last month and have a lot of English pounds leftover. DH was distracted our little DD as he was getting money from the ATM and accidentally put in too many zeros. :eek::eek:We typically take out little spending cash when we visit a country and then use our CC for most things.

 

With that said, we have (2) options:

 

1. Exchange the pounds at our local bank. With the exchange, we would get 10% less.

 

2. Use the pounds on our trip in May 2019. We will visit Italy, Israel and on a Baltic Sea cruise. I searched CC and the Internet and am confused about the use of Sterling pounds in St. Petersburg. I read that £ is accepted in STB. I do not know if this means the currency is accepted, but I would be hit with a not so desirable exchange rate. Or is the pounds truly an accepted currency?

 

I am not looking for debate or advice about using the home currency when visiting a country. That I get. However, with the amount of pounds we have leftover, I am trying to see if it can be used on my next trip. If not, then I will go with option #1 above.

 

TIA!

 

 

the only currency supposed to be accepted in Russia is local currency ie rubles

tour operators will accept tips in any currency!

 

Does your May 2019 cruise involve a stay in the UK?

If not you may as well exchange them at your bank

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The currency in Russia is the rouble - if booking tours through an independent tour company, you must pay in roubles. However, many shops and souvenir kiosks will accept foreign currency including the £.

I purchased Shekels at a bank in Jerusalem as foreign currency was not accepted anywhere I went.

Italy is on the Euro - I have not attempted to use a currency other than the euro in Italy so have no information on whether or not some vendors will accept £.

I had the same experience with entering too many zeros - happened in Krakow. Fortunately, I was able to use them all in Poland before leaving. I hate losing $ on both ends of a currency conversion.

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This was 3 years ago, but our SPB tour (TJ) requested to be paid in fresh US dollar bills.

 

Perhaps ask your tour provider?

 

If not, and you have any volume of pounds, it will probably be better to convert them to dollars, take the hit, and chalk it up to lesson learned.

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As others have mentioned, Rubles are the only legal tender for commerce but it is perfectly legal to have and trade in currencies. The best exchange rates are not going to be banks outside the US, 10% is middle to low in the loss in conversion. There are specialty exchange banks in St Petersburg where all they do is exchange and are very competitive, usually 1% or less. No coins just bills, are accepted for exchange. The two best ones I know of are within a block of each other across the street from Moscow Station on Ligovsky street and Ligovsky lane. The latter is named Avangard Bank and does a lot of volume so rates are low and updated hourly. The other one is only 50 meters away on the larger street of Ligovsky Street next to Crowne Plaza Hotel. Other small exchange offices are not such a good deal, and some on Nevsky Prospect targeting visitors not familiar with foreign exchange are almost as bad as retail banks outside the country from which the currency comes. The worst place to exchange is at the airports where 25-50% loss is encountered. For small purchases or a meal, allowing your own credit card issuing bank make the bad exchange is tolerable but for larger purchases, go to the high volume exchange banks. Buying a fur, for example, can easily save you $200 in exchange on a modest fur or $1000 on a quality let-out fashion fur.

UK Pounds are not traded easily otherwise in Russia, unlike euros and US dollars. Canadian dollars are not easy to trade either unless at the high volume exchange banks. For larger tips such as multi-day tours to guides and drivers, US dollars or euros are gladly accepted. Euros are often saved for the next trip to Europe or Finland, if not exchanges in Russia. The general rule is if your exchange bank branch is not exchanging $100,000 or more a day in your currency, it is not going to be competitive in rate.

Another point that needs to be mentioned, only clean unmarked, unworn notes are going to be accepted. A US $100 bill if in circulation is not going to be accepted because of a strange habit of writing on bills as done in other countries. Banks in Russia only receive uncirculated new bills from the Central Banks, which is what you get when taking US currency from ATMs in Russia. You an still exchange marked or worn bills at the Central Bank but depending on the condition you will only get 30-60% of face value. Far more $100 bills are in circulation outside the US than inside the US.

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Here's a suggestion.

Post on your roll call for your upcoming cruise that you have X amount of pound sterling that you would like to sell.

Perhaps someone on your cruise would buy them from you at a rate that benefits both you and the other cruiser. They may be able to use them at another time, and it may save them a little bit.

Otherwise, save them yourself and take another trip to England.

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Another suggestion:

Ask friends and colleagues if anyone has a trip to the UK planned. Maybe someone will buy them from you.

I bought some Euros last year from an acquaintance after they returned from Europe. I paid less then the bank would have charged me, but more than the bank would have paid the acquaintance. Win/win situation for us.

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Some good ideas in posts 8 & 9.

 

Also what about tips in SPB. A lot of people say they give dollars for tips, so £'s would be just as useful to someone who has to change them to their own currency anyway. Likewise for tips on the ship if you can give those in cash. Anything you buy in Russia with a foreign currency would be overpriced anyway and the same in any other country, so likely to loose as much as you would on exchanging them back.

 

My husband mistakenly added an extra zero for an ATM in Cape Verde, but was able to change back to £'s through taxi drivers who had taken £'s as fare that day from other passengers from our ship, (that was late in the day of course). Again they would have needed to loose on the exchange, so I think we managed to negotiate a rate between the bank selling/buying prices.

Edited by tring
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