Free FX Rip-off Calculator for Australians
How to use this calculator
For a purchase, enter the item cost in the foreign currency, select the currency, then enter what was debited from your account in Australian dollars. If your bank charged an international transaction fee on top, enter that separately — it gets excluded from the spread calculation so you can see the two costs clearly.
For an ATM withdrawal, enter what you withdrew in the local currency and what was debited in AUD. Add the ATM fee if you know it. Hit Check my rate and the calculator fetches today’s live mid-market rate and shows you the gap.
Once you have a result, save it against a card. Over time the Rankings tab will show you which card costs the least for purchases and which is best for ATM withdrawals — they’re not always the same card. If you want to dig into which cards actually get you into airport lounges, the Lounge Finder covers 34 airports and 196 lounges.
Frequently Asked Questions
The mid-market rate is the midpoint between the buy and sell rate for a currency pair — the rate you’d see if you Googled AUD/USD right now. It has no markup applied. Banks use a worse rate than this, and the gap between what you got and the mid-market rate is the margin they’re making. We use it as the benchmark because it’s the closest thing to a fair rate that exists.
The FX spread is hidden inside the exchange rate — your bank gives you a worse rate than the market rate and keeps the difference. The international transaction fee is a separate, explicit charge shown on your statement. Some cards charge both. The calculator treats them separately so you can see exactly where the money is going.
Always pay in local currency. When a merchant or ATM offers to charge you in Australian dollars — called Dynamic Currency Conversion — they apply their own exchange rate, which is almost always far worse than your bank’s rate. You end up paying two margins instead of one. Choose local currency every time.
Wise and similar specialist travel cards consistently sit at or below 1% spread with no international transaction fee. Among bank-issued cards, the Bankwest Zero Mastercard and ING Orange Everyday (when conditions are met) are frequently cited as low-cost options. Premium travel credit cards vary widely — some waive the FX fee entirely, others charge 3% regardless of the annual fee. The only way to know for certain is to measure what your card actually charges, which is what this tool is for.
Yes. If you exchange cash at an airport kiosk, enter the foreign amount you received and the Australian dollars you handed over. The calculator will show you the effective spread — airport kiosks typically run 8–12% above the mid-market rate, which makes the cost very visible very quickly.
No. Everything is stored in your browser’s local storage — on your device only. Nothing is sent to Points Brotherhood or any third party. The only external call the tool makes is to fetch the live exchange rate, and that request contains no personal information. Clear your browser data and your history clears with it, so use the export feature if you want a long-term record.
The Points Brotherhood Lounge Finder covers 34 airports and 196 lounges, searchable by airport and card. You can see exactly which Australian cards provide access at each airport. Used alongside this calculator, it gives you the full picture — what each card costs on FX and what it gets you at the airport.