Re: [ga] Proof of Identification -- BANKS

[John C Klensin <klensin@mci.net>]

--On Tuesday, December 07, 1999 20:02 +0100 Elisabeth Porteneuve
<Elisabeth.Porteneuve@cetp.ipsl.fr> wrote:

> Banks are the strongest remparts protecting countries economy,
> and a currency is sovereignty attribute.

Absolutely.

> Your Bank story is missing a paragraphe about trying to cash
> travel checks emitted in FF (probably every European currency)
> in the US -- this side is fun too.
> Please note I said "trying", I did not said "cashing" :-)

Back before credit cards were popular, especially outside the
US, I learned some things about traveller's checks:

(i) Despite what they would like to you to believe when they
sell it to you, if you get them from "Joe's (or Hans's or
Pierre's) Traveller's Cheque Company", and the person/facility
you are asking to cash it has never heard of Joe/ Hans/ Pierre,
prospects are poor, independent of the currency.

(ii) In countries where places besides banks (and sometimes
hotels and currency changers) are permitted to cash or accept
traveller's checks, they had better be in the local currency.
Otherwise, one will get a horrible exchange rate if they can be
used at all, which is not often.

(iii) If traveller's checks are carried into a real bank which
has provisions for currency exchanges as part of the same
facilities as the check-cashing ones, and the check is
recognized, then almost any currency can be accepted, although
"local" is often less of a hassle.     If the two departments
are separate, a foreign-currency check will make them crazy,
since the currency conversion department can deal only with
currency conversions (e.g., from FF)  and the check-cashing
department can only cash dollar checks.  If, for example, the
check-cashing department could cash the FF travellers check and
give you Francs, you could carry them to the currency-conversion
department and get dollars.  But...   (The US is _not_ the only
place I've encountered approximately that problem)

But...

One of the nice features of most European (and most other
country's) banking systems is that things that look like banks
are almost always banks (or Post Offices, which seem much the
same from a currency conversation standpoint).   In the US, we
have all sorts of things that look like banks, but aren't.   And
many of them can't handle foreign currencies in any form much
less checks in such currencies.   The staff of many of them
won't know why, either, and will waste a huge amount of time
(theirs and yours) trying to figure that out.  If you want to
handle "foreign" currency, or, worse, other types of
instruments, you need to find a _bank_ and one that deals in
such things.   And, especially in smaller communities, there may
not be one.  This is called being "tourist friendly", and ranks
right up there with English-only signs in airports.

More about the real issue in the next note...

     john