Blue Rate, What To Do As A Canadian Solo Female...

[lucha54]

When you arrive ask again for cueva contacts... some people will come to you. Although it's relatively safe trading money on the street, there are actual office locations where you can go to change privately and safely (Although these bigger operations often don't give as good a rate). And yes, only US $100

 

[mujoe]

If you want, you can contact me when you get here. I'll take you to a safe place (office building) where I usually change my dollars. I've never had any problems with this guy and no fake bills either.
Which city are you from? I used to live 8years in Montreal, miss that city a lot!

 

[Justin-eh]

Being canadian myself, another option that I have used twice is http://exchange4free.ca/

It will charge it to your credit card, which may or may not work for you. But then you just go to the location and pickup the pesos at the store downtown BA. The exchange is at a pretty decent rate as well, works good for Canadians because you usually lose some money exchanging to US anyways.

What month will you be arriving? I would like to get rid of a lot of pesos within the next month or so, CAD would be better for me than US.

 

[pierina]

isn't there any other place to change dollars that is not right in the heart of microcentro? I'm asking this because I'm sometimes scared of being followed. I'm also a solo female pesos buyer.

 

[thorsten]

I always go to a cuave in Recoleta, 2 blocks from Patio Bulrich. PM if you need directions.

 

[Alicia karr]

I always go to a cuave in Recoleta, 2 blocks from Patio Bulrich. PM if you need directions.

Haha I think we have a common friend! They will come to your place also for exchanges of $300US or more..that is if we are talking about our friend in the Galeria.......

 

[nlaruccia]

Careful though. Take a radio taxi after leaving a cueva if you change a lot of money and I mean call one. Don't take a radio taxi in the street because they're not traced by the radio company. I heard about a few incidents lately where people were robbed about a black away from their usual cueva. One guy had his car windshield broken and they stole the money while he was in the passenger seat horrified.

 

[Lulu-Kyoko]

I'm also Canadian (Montreal) and the first time I went to BA I did not do any research… and was therefore gouged at the ATM.

I'm with CIBC in Canada. I paid $5 CDN per ATM transaction to CIBC plus approximately $5 CDN in Argentinian bank fees. If I recall (this was two years ago), the daily withdrawal limit was somewhere around $1000 pesos, so a minimum of 10% in fees. Add to that that the CDN is worth at 0.9 USD right now and that you also pay a couple of percents to change the money, so maybe .88. It makes Buenos Aires very, very expensive.

All of this to say that you should avoid the ATMs.

I was also a solo female traveler. At first I found Florida creepy but now I'm totally comfortable with it. I don't change too much money at any one time. I basically go to the same place (a travel agent) every Monday and change $200 USD, which I live on for the week.

 

[Alicia karr]

Better yet find a cueva who is well established and will deliver the money to you.

 

[Redpossum]

I went to MORE today, to pick up some pesos from a xoom.com transfer, and my taxi driver pointed out to me a Western Union office near the intersection of Cerrito and G'ral Peron, which he claimed would give me 11 pesos to the dollar.

Xoom paid me 9.9 pesos to the dollar, but the main purpose wasn't changing money, it was getting the money here from the USA.