10 Money Wasting Mistakes Tourists Keep Making in ITALY

0:00 we know many of you are planning a trip to Italy and are saving up to make it truly memorable but we keep seeing mistakes made by tourists that cost a lot of money and add no enjoyment to their trip we don't want that to happen to you so in this video we'll share 10 money wasting mistakes that tourists make when they travel to Italy and how you can avoid them number one not buying trip insurance now this is a biggie and it's one that we routinely ignored when we were much younger and traveling to Europe Etc but it is the one that of all the things on this list can cost you the most money but what is trip insurance

0:45 basically it's a safety net for travelers that can provide a number of of coverages uh lost luggage trip Interruption trip cancellation emergency medical care and even emergency evacuation it medical emergency to a place where you can get the care you need as an example let's say that you and your spouse are partner are on a trip to Italy and one of you Falls ill and has to be checked into the hospital well Medicare won't cover you and neither will your us health insurance policy and let's say because of this hospitalization you have to miss the next steps of your trip you have to cancel your flights you have to cancel your hotels and maybe even excursions

1:31 and tours this can really add up and cost you a lot of money if you're not covered we know a bunch of you are saying yes but my credit card covers those things but do you really know exactly what it covers have you read the fine print read the terms and conditions very carefully the insurance companies that provide this coverage with your credit card really don't want to pay out a reimbursement so they're going to make it very difficult to get reimbursed you're going to have to fill out a million forms and paperwork and you're going to have to work with the hospital in Italy to get that done which ought to scare you because the bureaucracy is a nightmare anyway Our advice is just read the fine

2:20 print very carefully so that you know what's covered and how much and what's not covered the alternative is to buy trip insurance yourself it may still a bit of a hassle to get the insurance company to reimburse you but it'll be a lot easier than going through the credit card company when you're looking for insurance like this a good website to go to is insuremytrip.com there are a lot of options for what you can get covered and what you decide on really depends on your own risk profile obviously the more comprehensive the coverage the more expensive it's going to be but also the more piece of mind you will have that if anything goes wrong you're all taken care of for us Medical Care and evacuation if that

3:07 should be needed are the things that we think are the top priority the risk of needing those things might be small but catastrophic if they do occur other options to protect you can include things like covering prepaid expenses for hotels airfare cruises and tours those last two are big ones also things like a trip you have to interrupt because of an emergency or your luggage being lost and a number of other things beyond that one really important thing that you should know relates to pre-existing medical conditions generally speaking you have to buy your trip insurance within 10 days of booking your first expenditure in order to be

3:55 covered by this because we travel to Italy frequently we have an annual with a company called medjet assist which provides emergency evacuation and we also have an annual plan with Travel Guard which covers the other potential medical expenses Beyond just evacuation mistake number two not setting up a phone plan one of the big mistakes that people make often is not making a plan for how they're going to use their phone while they're in Italy if you're not prepared you'll be we charged high prices for texts and calls and outrageous prices for data if you plan to use your existing phone plan you

4:40 should know a couple of things first of all if you have T-Mobile you're probably covered for international usage though the the data might be limited on that if you have Verizon or AT&T you need to alert your carrier before you go and pick an international plan for calls they will will typically charge you about $122 a day for every day that you use your phone while you're traveling now if you don't get AT&T or Verizon's international plan before you go you leave yourself open to huge charges for example $2 a minute for a phone call 50 cents per text and over $2,000 per gigabyte of data which just

5:26 equates to about 1 hour of video yeah she said over $2,000 yeah shocking it's a shocker if you want to save even more money there are options to get a SIM card in Italy now it's important to know that your phone has to be unlocked from your carrier to be able to do this if you got a locked phone your best options are probably the two we just mentioned with the international plans mistake number three using the wrong credit and debit cards the good news is that credit cards are accepted almost everywhere in Italy particularly visa and MasterCard but they may charge you up to

6:12 3% of each transaction if you don't have a card that specifies as a no foreign transaction fee card that can really add up so before you go to Italy make sure that you get yourself a no fee credit card one of the cards that we use is the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card in addition to not having any foreign transaction fees you get a 60,000 Point bonus when you sign up and then you also get bonus points for every expenditure that you make now it does cost $95 a year but if you travel and spend a quite a bit of money on your trip that's more than makes up for it another good one is

6:58 capital 1's venture Rewards Card you get a 75,000 Point bonus and it also cost $95 a year if you really can't stomach any annual fee at all Capital One has a no fee card called Venture one it's $0 a year you get a smaller signup bonus and your bonus rates on purchases are lower than the other cards that we've mentioned so when you go to pay for something in Italy with your credit card usually you will be asked if you want to use your home currency conversion or to pay in local currency which in this case would be the Euro always choose the local currency because the conversion rate will be much less

7:45 and you'll save more money take number four is choosing the wrong place to get the Euros for your trip now even though most places in Italy do accept credit cards you are going to want to carry some cash with you for small expenditures tips um trinkets Etc now there are four ways that you can change your money two which must be avoided at all costs one which is marginally okay and one which is the right way to go the absolute worst place to get money is at a nonbank ATM on the street or in the airport they're generally labeled just ATM in big letters and they're very profitable so you'll find them all over in tourist towns just to give you an

8:32 example if the current exchange rate is a18 per Euro they'll charge you at least a116 and then they'll add a fee in total you can end up paying 15% more when you're getting your euros and that's all wasted 15% the other absolutely horrible place to change your money is at one of those booths or storefronts that say change or money exchange or currency exch exchange and you see them in the airport you see them on the street and the reason they're terrible is because they give you a horrible exchange rate and on top of that they charge you a big fat fee so you end up wasting a lot of money the sort of okay option is to get Euro from your bank at home they'll probably give

9:18 you an unfavorable exchange rate and may charge a fee but it might be a little lower than the two examples we've given already this might be a good thing if you want to get a small amount of cash before you start your trip the absolute best way to get your money changed in Italy is to go to a bankomat a bankomat is a bank ATM and it's usually in front of the bank or inside the bank and you will get the best exchange rate and the lowest fee there however when you go to do your transaction make sure that you specify that you want to pay in euros and not in dollars now many US Banks will charge a fee and the foreign Bank in Italy may also charge a fee so what

10:06 you should try to do before you go on your trip is to get a card a debit card or a cash card that has no fee one of the best no fee cards comes from Charles Schwab it's tied to an investment account which you'll have to open but you don't need to use it for Investments you just put in the cash that you'd want to have and there's no minimum that that you'll be then you'll be able to withdraw that in Euro when you're in Italy now Fidelity also has a no fee card but requires an investment account now we all already had an investment account with Fidelity so that's what we use we have a Fidelity card that we can use in any bankomat in Italy and we get the absolute best rates and no fee

10:51 mistake number five is not booking trains well in advance when you're traveling in Italy the the train is definitely the way to go it's fast efficient and affordable however if you don't book it ahead of time you could end up paying substantially more than if you do book it ahead of time now this doesn't apply to the regional trains what I'm talking about here is the fast train the high-speed train like the freta Rosa with train Italia that goes for example from Rome to Venice or Rome to Florence and those trains fill up quickly and they charge a lot more for for a trip that's happening for example tomorrow or in a few days than they do for a trip if you book it out a month or

11:37 two months out just to give you an example on the freter Roa the high-speed train between Florence and Rome if you bought a ticket for tomorrow it might cost you something like €100 if you bought it for a week from now it probably cost about 75 if you bought it for a month from now it probably cost 60 and then if you bought it for 3 months from now it would cost 50 so you can see you can make significant savings by buying your tickets in advance mistake number six eating in tourist trap restaurants why is that a mistake well it's simple because you get mediocre food at inflated prices and worse than just mediocre food

12:24 you might not even be getting authentic Italian dishes but rather what they think Americans like one of the great Pleasures about visiting Italy is the wonderful food but don't eat in the wrong restaurants and miss that experience eat where the locals do you'll get authentic recipes at very reasonable prices how to tell if a restaurant is a tourist trap restaurant well there's some signs there's some red flags first off if the restaurant is located right next to a major tour tourist attraction it's probably going to be a tourist trap restaurant second of all if you see the menu posted in a whole bunch of languages and even has pictures on it

13:11 well run as fast as you can away from that restaurant if you see a waiter standing outside beckoning you to come in probably not a good restaurant after all why does he have to beckon you in if it's such good food and if you see that the restaurant opens for dinner at like 5:30 or 6:00 in the evening that is probably not going to be a great restaurant because local Italians don't go out to eat dinner that early so it's strictly for Americans and other tourists also if you happen to notice that the people are speaking mostly English and people aren't speaking Italian in the restaurant probably not a restaurant where the locals go so how do you find a good place well first stay away from the

13:58 major sites even if you walk just two or three blocks away you'll often find better options second is the menu in all sorts of languages or is it in Italian or just Italian and English that's what you're looking for Italian only or Italian and English and extra points if it's a handwritten menu a third way to find a good restaurant is to ask a local but not necessarily somebody on the hotel staff cuz they may have an arrangement with a restaurant for example we were in Florence a few months ago and got a recommendation from the hotel and we went into this place nice cute little place but it ended up being filled with tourists and in fact other tourists from our same Hotel not exactly the Italian Vibe we

14:45 were looking for so another thing to do is to check the reviews on trip advisor and Google but here's a pro tip set the language filter to Italian not English and and you will find out what the Italian patrons think of this restaurant and really focus on what they say about the food not necessarily the ambients and Italians are very critical about the cuisine so you'll get a really good idea what they think of the food in this restaurant now of course if you don't speak Italian sometimes the app itself will have a translator but you can also use Google Translate to see what they thought about it one final point for the best place is you're going to want to make a reservation in advance certainly for a

15:33 Saturday night or Sunday at lunch we found that in major areas you've got both the tourists and the locals competing for the spots in these in these nice restaurants and they generally get filled very early mistake number seven tipping like you're in the United States you should know that tipping culture is very different in Italy than it is in the United States for example we routinely will tip 15 20% or more for service that's really good in the United States but Italians do not do this most Italians tip very little if at all some don't leave any tip at all and that's because servers in Italy are salaried

16:18 employees just like someone who works in a shop or has any other kind of a job so they're not depending on tips in the same way that our servers here in the states do if Italians do leave a tip they'll typically just round up and leave a few coins if their service was good for example if the bill is 48 EUR they might leave 50 they might leave a little more but rarely more than three or5 so if you tip like you're in the United States you're going to be wasting hundreds of dollars during your entire trip having said that there are two extra charges that you may see on your bill in an Italian restaurant the first is the coperto or translated Loosely as

17:04 the cover charge now this is not a tip what this refers to is the table Linens the bread the silverware Etc it's usually just two to four EUR per person it's not a scam it's charged essentially everywhere and there's really no way to get out of it unless they don't put it on the menu that there is a CER or a c or a cover charge if they don't put it on the menu then you don't need to pay it legally the other charge you'll see is Cito which means service and this is generally in fancier restaurants where they would add 10% to your bill now that really is a tip and you can ask to have it removed or you can add more to that

17:50 if you want but in general that would be a very sufficient tip in a in a restaurant yeah you don't need to pay anymore if they've added a cervio to your bill the other place that you can save money in tips is in taxis taxi drivers typically do not expect a tip now again what you can do is round up if your taxi fair was 9 you can give them a 10 and say keep the change and they'll be very happy with that but again you don't need to add the 15 or 20% onto your taxi fair mistake number eight not experiencing street food a great way to save money and also sample the local Cuisine is to enjoy street food

18:36 particularly at lunchtime because during the day you want to maximize the amount of time you have to do sightseeing and other things and at the same time you want to save a few bucks you can accomplish both of those goals by eating street food for example in Rome try suple which are rice balls filled with mozzarella and tomato sauce or pizza by the slice in Florence TR skata which is an awesome local sandwich um it's just Divine or you can try a local favorite Lotto which is basically a sandwich made with tripe not everybody likes it but it is delicious and the locals love it in Venice try scoso de pese Frito or fried

19:23 fish in a paper cone in Naples trionz small half Half Moon shaped pieces of dough stuffed with mozzarella and fresh tomatoes in short save your money at lunchtime and go for a nice meal at dinner mistake number nine is falling for scams and there's a number of these we'll sort of walk through some of the big ones one has to do with taxis now fairs are generally posted on the side of the taxi it would include your luggage and any extra passengers but there are unscrupulous drivers who will try to take advantage of you particularly at train stations and airports they'll do things like take your bill and not give you back enough

20:08 change and hope you won't notice or they say they don't have change for your € 100 EUR note the thing to do is to make sure you've got some small bills and be careful about counting your money outgoing and incoming another common trick is to tell you that their credit card machine isn't working now legally they must accept credit cards in taxis in Italy so don't believe them when they say this they just they really want to get your cash because then they don't have to declare it so the best thing to do uh to avoid having a problem with this is to tell them before you even get into the cab that you intend to pay by credit card and that way if they don't want to accept it they can tell you to go away never accept a ride with a driver that solicits you inside an

20:55 airport or train station they're going to offer you a good deal and tell you won't have to stand in the taxi line but the truth is you'll generally pay a lot more that way so instead you should only use the official taxis in the taxi line okay another typical scan you'll see especially around big tourist sites are people giving you gifts it might be a friendship bracelet or a flower or some other little trinket and they'll come up to you all smiling and friendly and then they'll put this friend ship bracelet on your wrist and then they'll say oh but can you give me a small donation or can you pay me for this friendship bracelet and you're like well I didn't want any friendship bracelet but now it's kind of hard to get it off so if you see

21:41 somebody coming towards you with those things those little trinkets just keep walking go straight ahead say no thank you don't engage with them um and you'll be fine now sometimes these these friendly people with the friendship bracelets are really just trying to ract you so that their accomplice can pick your pocket while you're talking to them so also be on guard for that and keep your belongings close MH that sort of interaction Al often comes from oh where are you from and it's and it and they trying to engage you in in a conversation showing you that they're interested in you while there's a scam going on behind you they're interested in your wallet interested in your wallet another thing to look out for is when

22:27 you see art displayed on the ground you'll have sellers of these posters of artwork or skylines things like that uh out just sitting on the street particularly in art Centric areas what they're looking for they will sell some but what they're looking for is for people to step on them and then they can claim that you damaged it even if they damaged it in advance themselves once you've stepped on it they will demand that you pay an outrageous price for this valuable print which is just a piece of paper uh a regular poster what you want to do is just be firm walk away if you have any problem tell them you're going to call the police and that generally makes them back off because

23:13 they don't want to have anything to do with the police uh one more typical scan you'll see in hight trffic areas especially in the patas around Rome Venice Florence and these are people who have petitions and they'll have these friendly young people usually come up to you with a clipboard and and they'll say that they've got a a petition for the envirment or to help blind people or deaf people or whatever charity and they try to engage you in conversation they ask you where you're from and they ask you to sign their petition and once you sign it then they ask you for a donation so they're trying to get a donation but really what they're more likely trying to do is they have an accomplice who's

23:58 trying to pick your pocket while you've engaged in a conversation with a petitioner just avoid those people just keep walking don't engage with them and just say sorry no thank you many people look forward to buying leather goods while they're in Italy genuine Italian leather is known for its quality its craftsmanship and the strict standards under which it's produced Italy has a long tradition of leather craftsmanship making its products considered some of the finest in the world because Italian leather is so sought after by tourists there are many unscrupulous vendors who try to pass off inferior quality products as genuine Italian leather at Bargain Basement prices and you'll find

24:45 this especially in the open markets where you got tons of Handbags and jackets and all sorts of other leather items now they may be leather but they may be inferior leather or they may not be leather at all so you really have to watch out the stuff that you find in the open markets is not going to be the Primo leather that you may be looking for what you need to know is real Italian leather is not cheap and if it seems too good to be true it probably is and just for reference a genuine leather handbag for example will cost anywhere from 170 to 300 end up so if you're seeing something that's 20 or 30 EUR it's not the good stuff now here's how you

25:30 know if you're getting real Italian leather there are two labels to look out for the first label is made in Italy what this tells you is that some of the major steps in the process were performed in Italy but there leather was probably sourced somewhere else but because of the high level of craftsmanship in Italy these can still be very nice products and and worth buying for Italian leather the label Vera Pelle is a the must what that means is that it's true leather a true leather product and it's made according to certain regulations for thickness quality and craftsmanship these two labels ensure that the product that you're getting is not only real leather

26:16 but also made in Italy now that you've learned about the money wasting mistakes take a look at this video and learn about some other mistakes that tourists often make that you're going to want to avoid cow for now cow for now