Which card to choose, is a credit card really required for a car rental, and should you bring cash? These kinds of questions pop up daily in travel groups. So, let’s go through everything step by step!

1. Research How and in What Currency You Will Pay at Your Destination

First, when traveling abroad, it is important to look into the payment card (or other payment system) situation in the specific country. When traveling to Eurozone countries, everything is usually simple—payments in shops can be made with your standard Latvian card, and the cash withdrawal limit applies to these countries as well. For these payments, I use my regular “salary” debit card (SEB) or a loyalty points credit card (Citadele C airBaltic), and there is typically no big difference.

It gets more complicated if you plan to withdraw cash or pay in a country that does not use the euro—here it is worth reviewing your bank’s transaction tariffs in advance. For such payments abroad, I have chosen to use a Revolut card, but other alternatives are available too. With this card, I can get better exchange rates when withdrawing cash at ATMs as well as when paying in stores.

Important: It is usually more cost-effective to choose to pay in the local currency when the card terminal offers to convert the amount to euros immediately or process the authorization in the local currency.

Things get really interesting when traveling to China, as you must familiarize yourself with this country’s specific payment system in advance. In many places in China, you won’t be able to pay with standard bank cards or cash, but only using local apps (AliPay, WeChatPay), to which you must link your card beforehand. Naturally, you will need an internet connection, which is usually easiest to set up using an eSIM if your phone supports it.

2. Take at Least Two Different Cards

It’s good to have at least two payment cards with you on a trip in case one is swallowed by an ATM, stops working for some reason, or gets stolen (which is why you shouldn’t keep them all in one wallet!). Of course, having the card available on your phone is convenient, but a physical card is definitely necessary, as you won’t be able to pay with your phone everywhere. It is better if the cards are issued by different banks and one is a Mastercard while the other is a Visa.

Experience shows that there are situations where one type of card or a specific bank’s cards won’t work, and it’s good to have a backup.

• I had an experience like this in South Korea, where I spent a long time looking for an ATM that would accept my card—in the end, I even had to check the Mastercard website to find which ATMs in Seoul would accept my card.
• Similarly, several ATMs in the Seychelles didn’t want to work with my card, and for my friends, the ATM swallowed theirs completely!
• In Singapore, there were payment issues in small shops; luckily, my husband and I had cards from different banks at the time, so we could use the other’s card.
• In the US recently, I couldn’t buy a metro ticket even after trying payment cards issued by three different countries, and I had to use cash.

3. Prepare Cash in Advance

When traveling to more exotic countries, it’s worth exchanging at least a small amount of money while still in Latvia so you have enough for initial payments if there happens to be an issue with an ATM or card acceptance. The reason cash can come in handy can be as simple as a power outage in a café preventing card payments! If the country is so exotic that its currency isn’t available at local exchange booths in Latvia, research where an ATM is located in the airport so you can withdraw cash right after arrival.

4. Warn Your Bank

I have been in situations several times where the bank sends warnings about suspicious transactions abroad and the need to contact them immediately to prevent accounts from being blocked. Therefore, if you travel very rarely, it is worth asking your bank if you can notify them of your destination in advance. This happened to me in Canada and the US when using small ATMs at gas stations; fortunately, I noticed the SMS messages sent by the bank in time, and my cards were not blocked!

5. Get to Know the Local Payment Culture

Keep in mind that payment culture can vary from country to country. Aside from the famous tipping etiquette in the US, you have to get used to the fact that when paying by card at a restaurant, it is often taken away, and you then have to sign a receipt confirming the transaction—on which you can handwrite how much tip you want to leave, after which the purchase data is updated with the total amount. Unfortunately, after one such trip, fraudulent transactions were attempted on one of my cards. That’s why I prefer using Revolut for these payments, transferring only a specific amount that I can top up as needed during the trip.

6. Set Up a Digital Wallet

While taking a physical card is essential, it is definitely worth using digital wallets like Google Pay or Apple Pay as well. This can also be a good option for payments, especially in the US where taking cards away is common practice. It can also be a helpful fallback if an ATM suddenly eats your card or if you’re out of the hotel and your preferred card was left in the room.

7. Check Your Payment Limits

You should definitely double-check your daily and single-transaction limits on your cards—it can happen that a hotel, for example, wants to charge the full stay amount at once, and it might exceed the card’s limit. If it’s a per-transaction limit, you can pay in two goes, but in the case of a daily limit, you will need to change the settings in your internet bank. I have also stayed at hotels that collect a separate security deposit for each night stayed, pre-authorizing the entire available credit limit on the card. Therefore, it’s worth clarifying beforehand: if a deposit is held, how much is it, is it calculated per night or for the total stay, and how long will it take to be released? It is also advisable to use a credit card at gas stations where a maximum amount is pre-authorized first—in my case, the unused balance from a gas top-up in the US was never returned to my debit card. In dispute cases, make sure to use your bank’s chargeback option.

8. Do Not Pay via External Links

Don’t forget that currently, a common scam in many hotel booking systems involves hotel accounts being hacked. Messages are then sent to everyone who made a reservation (via WhatsApp as well as within the booking platform itself, which adds credibility), urgently demanding payment for the hotel under threat of cancellation and providing links to third-party payment platforms. You should never enter your card details on such links, and if you receive a message like this, contact the hotel directly by phone!

9. Take Care of a Credit Card for Car Rentals

If you plan to rent a car, many rental companies strictly require a credit card (not a debit or prepaid credit card!). Without one, the car simply might not be handed over, or they will demand a huge cash deposit. It is important that the card is in the driver’s name. Afterward, make sure to track whether the deposit is returned and that no unjustified charges are made for claimed damages. The rental company will also use this card for parking fines, driving into restricted resident-only zones, toll roads, or speeding violations—typically, an administrative processing fee is charged from the card to forward the driver’s info to the relevant authority, which will then contact you for payment. In some cases, the rental company might charge the fine directly from the card.

10. Check Out Additional Credit Card Perks

Many banks offer various perks when choosing their credit card, such as access to airport lounges if a flight is delayed, or fast-track security clearance (which my SEB Premium card has). If you have a credit card, many banks include travel insurance for the cardholder or even the whole family. It is worth reviewing the full policy terms—what it covers—to make sure the coverage matches your planned travel risks (and duration), and whether there are any additional requirements (such as needing an EHIC card). Although almost all banks offer insurance policies, I choose the Swedbank Gold card, which I feel offers not only the strongest travel insurance in Latvia, but calculating the monthly fee on an annual basis, using the attached card insurance turns out to be cheaper for me than buying it separately.

As mentioned earlier, collecting loyalty points can also be an important factor when choosing a card. I have now started using the Citadele C airBaltic card to earn one point for every euro spent. Previously, I had a similar card issued by Luminor with which I collected quite a few points; by combining birthday and special monthly promotions, over several years I gathered enough points to cover flights to Athens, Dubai, Amsterdam, and other destinations.

11. Prepare an Action Plan in Case Everything Goes Wrong

Save information in advance on what to do if your card is lost or stolen—who to call? How to block access? Just as it is worth keeping copies of your documents in an otherwise unused cloud storage account (without phone two-factor authentication, so you can access it even without your phone), it is worth saving essential phone numbers there, one of which should definitely be your bank’s number so you can block the card.