Grupo Global Exchange Reviews 40

Was forced to use their service on June 10 at BCN T1 (inside after checkin). The company needs to be investigated for anti-trust law violation and fraud. Surprised EU didn't ban or fine them. The service fee was 15.4% of my refund, I was not notified of that at all. The cashier was refusing to pay in euro trying to impose an exhuberant exchange rate. I asked her 5 times for refund in euro and only after I requested the written refusal dated and signed she finally paid. How come they freely operate in EU ?

Horrible HORRIBLE SCAM ARTISTS. TO ALL TOURISTS PLEASE DONT USE THEM. Run and save your tax refund for elsewhere

Be careful with that company. They are dishonest. They use a rate exchange well under the current rate. I had exchanged at another place two days earlier and these guys told me the exchange rate depends on how much I exchanged. I had exchanged the same amount at a higher rate two days before. Clearly lying.

Global Exchange in Madrid Airport engaged in deceptive practices. My tax refunds, explicitly stated on forms, were significantly reduced by one-third at the counter under the pretext of company deductions. They retained the forms without issuing a detailed receipt for the deductions. Additionally, they pressured me to accept refunds in alternative currencies, likely to profit from the exchange rates. The customer service was extremely poor.

I don’t understand how the tax authorities allow them to operate this way.

Scam company keep away! Only different from thieves this company doing it legally.

Changed at Madrid Airport. I didn't think much at the time of exchange however, now I have realised that the rate is absolutely horrible.

Exchanged 100 british pounds to receive about 86 euros (probably should have received 110 euros - and thats already a bad rate). Meaning I lost 30 euros by changing 100 pounds to euros. I thought I was scammed and that they made a mistake in reversing the exchange rates. But turns out, their rates are just so bad. Just avoid

Really bad exchange rate at Istanbul Airport in Turkey. I got 15% less then in high streets in the city. Don’t use them at the airport.
They charge me 1€ : 28.30 TRY
When my friend got In town 1€ : 35.9 TRY

On October 9, 2023, I exchanged euros for Moroccan dirhams at one of their outlets at Alicante airport.
I was in a hurry because my flight to Tetouan was almost ready to board, so I didn't pay much attention to the exchange rate. When I arrived in Morocco, I realized that I'd been ripped off. Their employee had charged me an exchange rate of 7.1631, whereas the average exchange rate at the time was 10.78. The result was a loss of The result was a loss of 605 dirhams, or almost 60 euros. It's not acceptable to take a commission of more than 30%, it's theft pure and simple. I wrote to this company and after waiting 3 months for a reply, they simply said that they were free to set the exchange rate. NEVER USE THIS EXCHANGE OFFICE !!!!

At Malaga Airport, they have large advertisements for processing the tax refund (for non-Europeans getting a VAT refund). The unsuspecting customer, not realizing that this is not the official refund outlet, is then denied the refund in Euros (the official refund is obviously in Euros!) and forced to exchange the refund into a foreign currency -- and they keep 21% of what they would have to hand over in foreign currency if they had applied the market rate. -- It only became clear to us afterwards (when it was too late) that they are not the officially authorized refund office and that they charged a usury exchange rate. This is deception and gangsterism at its best.

Converting Euro to Thai Baht at Paris CDG today. The receipt indicated a €5 fee/commission. Actually, for ~€400…,I received 11,000 Baht. Comparing to an on-line currency transfer service…I would have received closer to 15,000. Back-calculating… it means they charged over €100 for the transaction…..closer to a 25% commission. Lesson learned. I accepted and signed., but feel shafted and shortchanged and will never use them again. Avoid if you can.

We were at Madrid airport wanted to claim back our tax refund in EUR in Spain's Madrid Airport with Global Exchange T2, the ladies that served us were polite and friendly but little did we know they were scammers. First, we asked for our tax refund be refunded in EUR cash but they replied that we could only get refund in USD or in our home currency. (At first we thought it was an EU or company policy but this turned out to be totally untrue as we later confirmed with Ms Maria Lopez of Global Exchange customer service that we could have it in EUR!) Second, in the guise of convenience, we were asked to "top up" the difference in EUR so that we could get our refund in one full USD note, for eg, top up 75 EUR to our refund of 42 EUR to get a $100 USD. As we were in a rush to catch our flight, we did not think much of it and trusted the lady scammers. But later on, upon checking our receipt, we were shocked to find out that we exchanged about 117.27 EUR for only USD100, and the forex rate given to us was 0.8527! In total, there were 2 transactions made, one above and the other by my wife from EUR23.45 to USD20. We felt so stupid and scammed that left a bitter taste in our mouth of Spain as we thought we could only be scammed by other unlicensed companies and not by such a big company like Global Exchange. In the end, we forked out an additional 80-90 EUR plus of our cash for an exorbitant rate of 0.8527 whereas it should have been about 1.09-1.1, we lost more than 29% of our value to these scammers. I wrote an email to Global Exchange about this but they have not replied. Anyway, I do not expect a reply and I will bring up to the relevant authorities in EU to complain about them in due course about their cut-throat forex rates! So please, if these scammers try anything like this, please make sure that you insist in getting back your tax refund in EUR in Europe and not let them make you think otherwise. Do not ever "top up" to make up for any difference, you will regret it! Don't ever give a single cent to these wolves at the tax refund companies! We have the receipts to load as proof but the site do not have such a feature.

Bunch of thieves. Gave me £280 worth of Turkish Lira for £363. Left out the receipt too.

Not sure how honest the staff are here.

Also in Antalya airport arrivals.
Worst rip off ever.

AVOID AT ALL COSTS.

I withdrew money in Antalya airport and on my slip it said 14588 lira but only got 12500 lira and she said it was fine so I have paid over 500 kroner to withdraw money from them

Just asked for rate quote at Bristol Airport from the Global Exchange desk.

Told that for £106 I would get 700 Danish Krona.

Thought that was a poor rate, so checked post office money….and indeed, it is shockingly poor rate…for £109, I would get 900 Danish krona.

I was told by the agent, well you would be paying the exchange at an airport…..I would accept a little but a rate that is 29% worse, that is profiteering in my view.

We arrived at the Liberia airport in Costa Rica on Dec 21, 2021 and right after baggage claim saw the “Global Exchange Casa de Cambio” window. It looked like a great place to obtain some local currency and they advertised it as without “commission fees”. We provided $400 US and they gave us 215,083 colons, so an exchange rate of $1 = 537.7 colon.
Later, we realized that the official exchange rate at the time was $1 = ~640 colon.
We were thus fleeced through a horrible exchange rate, losing $64 on the transaction, the same as paying a 16% fee.
Am still baffled that the Costa Rican government would allow such rip-off agencies to do business in their airport, what a great way to welcome foreign visitors!!!
June 9, 2023. So today I received a note from Trustpilot asking if I reviewed the wrong business. Apparently, globalexchange.co.uk (in UK) complained. This group has 330 branches in 23 countries. I reviewed their branch in Liberia airport Costa Rica with URL globalexchange.co.cr. I also note that the majority of customer reviews rank this group with 1 stars.

I arrived at the Antalya (Turkey) airport. I asked the 3 Global Exchange employees if they could point me to an ATM. They couldn't but could provide me the same service as an ATM. I asked if I would get same exchange rate. They promised a better one. Not knowing the current rates I accepted the offer. It turned out I had paid 20% commission. So far worse rate than Atm. I complained via email, but Global exchange said the rate was matching their service and I could only exchange back in their office at istanbul. I wrote they missed the point that the colleagues lied to me. No response is given to that.