Still Looking for the Perfect Card

So at the bar the other night I met a very nice lady who told me about her Bank of America, Military Bank credit card that did not charge any foreign currency transaction fees.

Too good to be true I thought.

So I went to BOA's web site, and they did have a web site for military banking - but when I clicked on the terms and conditions of the credit card, their web site was non-operational and said I should call their 800-number. (The fact that their web sit was not working should have probably alerted me this was not going to easy).

So I called. The woman said "I have a great offer for you" and proceeded to offer me a card with 3% foreign currency transaction fee.

I thanked her and tried to hang up, but then she persisted and asked specifically what I was looking for. When I said I wanted a card that did not charge a foreign currency fee, she put me on hold for a couple of minutes more.

When she came back she told me "I have another great offer for you". Apparently Bank of America is full of great offers.

This offer I thought was very interesting - She offered me a "Bank Of America Military Preferred American Express" and insisted this card only carries a 1% foreign currency transaction fee.

There is no cash-back program with this card (only points that I'd never use) but the interesting part was this is the only American Express card I've ever heard of that charges only 1% for purchases in a different currency. Usually it's between 2.7 and 3% depending on the issuing bank.

I find this encouraging, because frankly I think this fee should be abolished. Visa, MasterCard and American Express already make a decent profit on every transaction charged to the vendor - there is no reason to bill the card member / traveler again for the same purchase.

There are banks that don't charge these fees. I'd just really like to see more of them.