TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin us dollars or euros

we will be at club orient on july 14 to 23rd'''last time there was 2012 and used dollars ,,,are they still accepting us dollars or should we get euros

dollars are still the biggest currency on the island...and especially now...the exchange rate is pretty on par..

ty you edb

I am curious about the prices in Euro on the French side over the past 2 years.

We are from Canada and spend most of our time on the French side.

When we were there Dec/Jan 2013/14, it took 1.06 CAD to get 1 USD. At the same time it took 1.45 CAD to get a Euro.

Right now it takes about 1.27 CAD to get a dollar and only 1.39 to get a Euro.

So if prices in Euros have not increased significantly, we would probably be better off going with Euros rather than USD.

Does anyone have any sense of what prices have done in Euro?

Just googled and 1.10 euro equals 1.00 USD

That's the official rate. it's higher when you add in charges by the company doing the exchange. They always add on a a fee. Better to pay in US $ at the restaurant or store and avoid the "change" stores. But no one will accept CAD in St. Martin.

It just really depends on where you go. Some places on the French side do €1=$1, so you would be better off using USD in those circumstances.

No, I wasn't expecting anyone to take CAD. The question is to which currency we might want to convert our CAD. We would get more Euro now than 2 years ago but fewer USD. So aside from the places that take USD at par to Euro (where we would be about 12 cents ahead per dollar), what is the going exchange from USD to Euro when buying at local markets?

The short answer is: it's a moving target. In my view, you'll do best if you show up with U.S. dollars and take your lumps when making purchases in Euros. Sometimes, you'll be able to use dollars at par with Euros (i.e. 1:1), and other times you'll pay a premium using dollars (such as at the Simply market in Hope Estate, or at restaurants that don't offer 1:1). Overall, there are better ways to spend your time on vacation that worrying about a few cents more or less on the conversion rate.

If you know that you will be spending money with the relatively few vendors (particularly on the french side) who publish or have prices in both US Dollars and Euros and who have an effective exchange rate of 1 Euro to 1.2 US Dollars (or higher) between the Euro price and the Dollar price, then you can buy from your home bank and bring Euros because you can do significantly better on the exchange even with the fees. Or, you can just not worry about it because with the fees the savings are not all that much. I have no idea what they are doing now, but I have always felt that CO gives a decent exchange rate related to the actual forex number - but they do not (at least did not) adjust the rate but every so often.

Unless a vendor is offering a special cash rate (such as 1 USD = 1 euro), I'd just use a no foreign fee credit card and have the vendor charge it in euros.

That's the way

Exactly.

Does the Perch take credit cards?

That was about the only place the I spend money on the french side that was not 1:1?

The Perch takes credit cards. If you have a no fee one, just have them charge through in Euro. If you pay cash with Dollars, you get the conversion fee that ClubO has set for the period. They usually reset it once a week and it's pretty close to what the true exchange rate is, depending on how fast the rate is changing.