Cash. Currency exchange. Used to be a tourist trap, intransparent and bad rates, commission on top; take only mint banknotes. Now often we see: No commission, rates with low spread (same as the best bank rates available to consumers). Takes bank notes and coins at no surcharge, no discussion.

This is for countries where cash is still king and practically required. It’s competition at work; there are multiple local shops and they advertise their rates publicly. With internet in everyone’s pocket, there’s little room for cheating. Just enough spread for this to be a profitable business without robbing the customer.

Compare to ATM operators, which are usually a oligopoly charging growing fees to foreigners. Because they can.

Real people, live!

Also:

Selection process

The department expects a high volume of applications and it will not be possible to provide funding to all eligible applicants.

Selection will be a non-competitive process. Once an applicant satisfies the eligibility criteria they will be included in an anonymised random sampling process to determine the pilot participants from the pool of eligible applicants for the BIA Pilot.

Funding for the scheme will allow for approximately 2,000 eligible applicants to participate in the pilot scheme.