Attracted by the weakened value of the U.S. dollar, international buyers have brought a flood of business to domestic merchants. The biggest winners now offer dynamic currency conversion (DCC) and/or multicurrency conversion (MCC) at the point of sale, enabling consumers to buy with credit cards in their own currency and know exactly what they will be charged.

The weak dollar, coupled with the growth of travel and global online commerce, has been the driving force behind the growing popularity of POS currency conversion, notes Jim Morin, vice president and director of international and emerging payment solutions at First National Merchant Solutions. “As they travel more, cardholders get pretty savvy,” he points out. It’s not unusual to have a customer pull out a BlackBerry and check the current Reuters exchange rate when he’s deciding at the cash register whether to accept the exchange rate offered by a DCC program, he says, particularly when purchasing high-ticket items such as jewelry.

 Download the full PDF