Hello and welcome to today's independent travel podcast with me, Simon Calder, and many people,

of course, looking forward to their Easter getaway, how lovely that will be. But with the

pound still pretty pathetic, how are you going to make the most of your holiday money? Well,

I am in the very fortunate position of being in the company of Jasmine

Bertels, who is the founder and leader of Money Magpie. And Jasmine, you are also a great

traveller. So how do you manage your travel money? Well, it's a good point because it does rather depend where you're going.

For example, if I go to America, I actually happen to have a dollar account

because I have one or two clients that occasionally pay me in dollars.

So I sort of put that aside for my American spending. But I'm also a

big fan of cash. And again, America, they're pretty friendly with cash as well. So before I go,

and I do make sure I do this a few days before I leave, I will go online and see where I can get the best, you know,

um, transfer quite often, as I live in central London, quite often, actually, I find that some of

those, those little kiosks on the high streets, in some high streets, they're often, you know,

as good as some of the, the better ones online. Um, so I make sure that I have, um, you know, as good as some of the better ones online. So I make sure that

I have, you know, a wad of cash. Apart from anything else, the thing about cash is it makes it a lot

easier to budget because you actually physically see the money going out of your hand. And that's

very much the case when you're abroad, if you're on a budget, as well as, you know, when you're at home. And in the past, I have, when I've been on a

strict budget, I have had just cash with a credit card for just in case. You know, the only downside,

of course, of that is that if you lose the cash, that's it, it's gone absolutely out of the water.

So sometimes it can be better to, well, either instead of or as well, to get a prepaid card.

People aren't doing those so much now because of the online banks like Monzo, Revolut, Starling.

I actually don't have an account with those, but people who do swear by them for going abroad

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