Avoiding currency exchange fees if renting dvc points.

[peter quill]

Iam sure this has been asked before but can't find any answers on the dis, iam looking to rent approx 100 ponts from a dvc owner for July 2022 but i can see nearly all are us owners and quote in us dollars per point. I assume they will take payment by PayPal, but even if I link a zero fee credit card to my PayPal account will i still incur exchange rate fees or is it even possible to link a zero fee card and pay this way. Any advice would be great.

 

[Constant]

In a similar boat to yourself, my plan is to use a method proposed in the past, I'm going to buy some disney egift cards from target paid with paypal dollar balance and then save until our dues come up later in the year and use the gift cards. That way I'm not having to convert back to sterling to convert back again later. I've not tried this so have been looking at threads where people use reward points to get gift cards

 

[heathere3]

Unfortunately, currency exchanges cost money. Usually ridiculous amounts of money for what's actually happening. I've never found a way to totally avoid it.

 

[Ronaldo17]

We have rented our DVC points many times on Disboards in the last two years and Yes, we advertised them in US $ as all of my renter's were Americans due to the ban on UK flights at the time.

So, I had to açcept payment by PayPal in US $ and then pay the currency conversion fee to convert to £ sterling.

However, if someone from the UK had wanted to rent any points from me I would be happy to agree a price in £ sterling and just ask for an electronic bank transfer.
That way there is are no fees for renter or seller.

So,, it's worth checking all the rental listings on Disboards as quite often the seller will indicate they are from the UK, that way you can agree a £ sterling transaction.

 

[Ruttangel]

Which resort are you looking to rent?

 

[chrish2]

I'm not 100% sure on the exact scenario (we rented out points). But I did find this page

https://www.paypal.com/uk/smarthelp/article/how-do-i-send-a-payment-in-another-currency-faq1555

The primary currency of your PayPal account is the default payment currency unless you choose to use another currency. You can convert an existing currency balance to another currency before sending an amount.

Before going into how to send convert or send money in a different currency.

It also goes into this "When you use your credit card"

When you use your credit card as the payment method, we ask you to choose who performs the currency conversion:
* If you choose PayPal, we can show you the conversion rate at the time of the transaction
* If you choose the credit card association currency conversion, your card issuer will determine the foreign exchange rate to apply to the transaction. You will not be informed of the foreign exchange rate or any additional foreign exchange fees applied until you are billed by your card issuer
* American Express payments are always charged in US Dollars.

Sounds like you will be wanting that second option. If I remember correctly the option might be hidden somewhere, you need to look out and make sure you have selected it before confirming the payment.

One thing to keep in mind. Paypal is effectively a different product in different markets. I've posted this in the past to explain

After a bit of research my understanding is PayPal is different product in every market. A UK, Hungarian, and US PayPal account (note that is countries not currency) all have their own set of features.

Most common of these features shared almost universally is the ability to hold different currencies, the ability to spend PayPal balance online and the ability to send a PayPal user an amount.

Beyond that it gets far more nuance. Some countries allow you to "Pay Out" over Visa/MasterCard (this appears as a card refund on your bank statement). US PayPal accounts have a special process to withdraw cash over the counter at WalMart stores. The list goes on.

The above makes it quite hard to work out what you can and can't do. From what I've seen researching this is most (included myself when I started looking at this) think "a paypal account is a PayPal account. if I [in x country] can do y then you should be able too" but in reality its much more complex.

 

[peter quill]

Which resort are you looking to rent?

Not fussed really, just not okw as we have tried that before and fancied somewere different, just looking for 2 nights in july.