Using leftover money after you buy foreign currency online can be tricky because you might not be sure what the best use of it really is. If you buy foreign currency online and have a smaller amount of leftover money you can always keep it as a souvenir as mentioned in the previous blog post, but there are several other good uses for leftover travel money.

Keep it for your next trip

One of the best uses for leftover travel money is to keep it for your next trip. If you plan on visiting a country more than one time in the future you should definitely consider using it for this purpose, as you won’t have to convert the currency back to your home currency and spend more money on another currency exchange. If you have a lot of currency left you may not even need to buy foreign currency online before your next trip.

Donate it

If you find that you have a lot of money left after you buy foreign currency online, you should consider donating it, and most charities will accept many different types of currency. Just contact your favorite charity and ask them what they recommend you do with the foreign currency that you want to donate, they may ask you to convert it to a different currency or they may just take it as it is. There are also ways to buy foreign currency online for the purpose of donating to an overseas charity, so you may want to ask about that if your favorite charity is overseas.

Give it to a family member or friend for their trip

If a friend or family member is traveling to the country that you just visited, you can help them out with their trip expenses by giving them a little extra currency. It will be appreciated, and at least in the United States you are legally able to gift several thousands (USD) per year without tax consequences.

Think about how much you’ll need the next time you buy foreign currency online

Try to predict more accurately how much money you need the next time you buy foreign currency online or at a currency exchange and you’ll have less left over after your trip. Sometimes you don’t really know how much you really need and may have to learn from experience, but if you carefully plan out your travel budget you won’t have much left over after you buy foreign currency online.