Hi all,
I was in France last year for the first time since the pandemic and was annoyed to be charged at an ATM for withdrawals on my Santander Zero card. Does anyone know if Intermarche offer cashback with your shopping now?
Also, LCL have upped thir fees for accounts from 48 to 120 EUR pa, so I just opened a Starling Euro a/c for EDF, Water etc. D/Ds. I’m hoping I can switch - is there a facility to do that in France or is it all manual?
Many thanks!
M
I’ve never seen cashback in any supermarket here. Or anywhere else to be honest.
I’m surprised you were charged for an ATM transaction.
somewhere else on the forum, we’ve discussed how/why some ATM’s charge for their use… and others are free…
Generally, the ATM does show to which bank it is affiliated (or they used to…) I know that Leclerc had several and one had to choose carefully which one to use, depending on one’s Card…
Ah, OK thanks. Yes, Credit Agricole ATM, and when I Googled it seemed to be a thing last year with all banks on foreign cards,
Again, Google tells me that Casino started offering cashback a few years ago…but you say it’s not caught on?
M
Certainly locally… Credit Agricole ATM is for their own customers… 
OK, I couldn’t find a bank that didn’t charge but then I didn’t really need that much cash…just annoyed to be charged when I did!
M
Why not contact Santander and ask with whom they’ve made Agreements for free ATM transactions… ???
OK will do…I think I may have discussed it with them last year and not got anywhere, though.
M
If they’ve got no agreements… then it’s fair enough that ATM withdrawals are charged for…
“We will not apply any exchange rate or charge any fee for withdrawing Euro outside the UK. You may be charged a fee by the local ATM provider.”
!
You’ll have to do the switching of mandates. If you transfer an account to another French bank they will do it automatically but I very much doubt Starling can/will
Indeed
Yes, fair enough. I’ll look into it…
The LCL account is in my 90 Yr old mum’s name and she doesn’t go to France anymore, so I will need to act on her behalf.
Not sure what authorisation docs I need but hopefully EDF and Suez will be OK updating SEPA details as long as they get their money. Then my mum can write to close the account.
M
Round us (Lot et Garonne countryside) the small local supermarkets in the villages do offer cashback.
Yes, when Mus mentioned Casino I wondered that. We only use Carrefour or Hyper U or rarely Intermarché. There’s a Casino in one village we aperitif in but it’s small and more geared to tourists in both price and choice. We get all our fruit and veg in Fresh or Grand Frais. I’ve never seen any of them do cashback. We use a carte Pass in Carrefour anyway, I must see if it has the facility.
Some of the little supermarkets here are also ‘cash dispensers’ (without the ATM) as they are affiliated to a bank for their card transactions. They will ask if you would like some cash, or you can ask for cash, and at that point it just comes out of the till as if you had withdrawn it from an ATM. It is rare but there are some. Still, worth checking the charges if used as we never had to do so.
I managed to get online with Suez for the water rates and they will only accept a French Iban with an invite to contact Customer Services for anything else.
Have people managed to set up Sepa D/Ds with Starling and do you also have to manually request cancelling the existing D/D?
Thanks!
M
They have a carte de fidélité which gives you (very) few discounts.