ADO bus ticket in advance?

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The same strategy works there as here - make a few large withdrawals rather than a whole bunch of small ones.

"A few large withdrawals"? You must be a rich guy. I just need a little pocket money. Diving and hotel are by credit card. We generally get our pesos only once at the beginning of the trip.
 
"A few large withdrawals"? You must be a rich guy. I just need a little pocket money. Diving and hotel are by credit card. We generally get our pesos only once at the beginning of the trip.
Me? Rich? Not by a very long shot. I pay for diving, fishing, meals, taxis, beers... everything other than the hotel bill in pesos; there are two of us and we don't go AI. If you make ten $20 withdrawals the fees will eat you up. If you make one $200 withdrawal, not so much.
 
First time I used an ATM to obtain currency in Coz, I keyed in "50" thinking I'd get $50 USD worth of Pesos. Nope, got 50 pesos! :silly: Had to do over an pay transactions fees twice. Thinking helps.
 
We use a credit card at most restaurants we know. My Rapid Rewards card doesn't bang me for transaction fees AND I get the points to fly!!

For cash, we used to do a BOA account just to get money for free at Santander. They ruined that, so now I Xoom. Use the app on my phone to choose how much to send myself. 2 seconds later the money is 'ready' for pickup. I use Electra down by Chedruai. The exchange rate is always pretty darn good and the fee is 4.99 regardless of amount so as long as you do enough to minimize that fee, its a good deal. I walk in, hand them my passport and show them the email or text message, so they can get the transaction number. (You could just write the number down too.)
 
If you make ten $20 withdrawals the fees will eat you up. If you make one $200 withdrawal, not so much.

Almost certainly. But that one's obvious.

More generally, the question is: If someone were to withdraw X dollars in foreign currency from an ATM in which there is an exchange rate of Y and ATM fees of Z, would that be a better deal or a worse deal than if he were to exchange X dollars at a poorer rate than Y but no extra fee? My point is that it depends on X, Y, Z and exactly how much poorer the rate is (which we generally don't know). So, one would really have to go through the calculation to figure out which is the better deal--something I am expressly NOT willing to do on my vacation.

Granted, you may know from your own experience that in Cozumel (as opposed to somewhere else in the world), withdrawing $200 in pesos at a bank-owned ATM with a US ATM card is always a better deal than exchanging $200 at a casa de cambio. And I'll take your advice. But I don't think it's possible to generalize from that.

Not sure how we got here from bus tickets. Oh yeah--someone else asked whether to buy the tickets in dollars or pesos. Me, I'm definitely going to get pesos at the airport.
 
gopbroek's advice for the win.

I do buy ADO bus tickets at the Cozumel ferry pier (where they have an office) since the staff know based on which ferry I'm on which bus will be best. That works great and means I can take care of the ticket while I would otherwise be cooling my heels waiting for the ferry and don't have to deal with lines or anything at the bus terminal.
 
gopbroek's advice for the win.

I do buy ADO bus tickets at the Cozumel ferry pier (where they have an office).

Didn't they move the ADO office that was on the pier to Av. 10 across from the parking lot of Plaza del Sol?

---------- Post added March 6th, 2015 at 03:31 PM ----------

I think there are privies onboard, but I'm not sure.

The ADO long haul busses do have toilets aboard, but WATCH OUT! They are power assisted with compressed air and when you flush, they tend to atomize whatever you deposited into a fine (and sometimes not-so-fine) mist that envelops the whole booth and whoever is standing in it.
 
Didn't they move the ADO office that was on the pier to Av. 10 across from the parking lot of Plaza del Sol?

I hope not but since I typically buy my ADO ticket to the CUN airport at least a day in advance, I could walk to another nearby location.
 
We came down the 23 of Feb and landed at 4:30 Pm there were so many planes that it took over an hour to get thru Immigration and then we got in the bus line to buy tickets and there was someone asking question and it was over 15 minutes to get to the window. the couple in front of us got the last seat on the second bus and we end up on the 3rd bus at 7:10. We talked to a guy that landed at 11:00 AM and it took 5 minutes to get thru and caught the first bus. This was at the Cancun airport.
 
We came down the 23 of Feb and landed at 4:30 Pm there were so many planes that it took over an hour to get thru Immigration and then we got in the bus line to buy tickets and there was someone asking question and it was over 15 minutes to get to the window. the couple in front of us got the last seat on the second bus and we end up on the 3rd bus at 7:10. We talked to a guy that landed at 11:00 AM and it took 5 minutes to get thru and caught the first bus. This was at the Cancun airport.

Go outside and buy the ticket by the bus.
 
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