expect more Turkish lira this year
But this year you might want to look at currency rates to choose your destination. The Australian, US, Canadian and New Zealand currencies are at year lows against sterling. For every £100 of spending money this year compared to last, you should get an extra $A30 if you plan an Australian holiday and it wouldn’t surprise me if the Aussie dollar hit 2 to £1 this year. The US currency hasn’t done as well for us as last January it was only about 3 cents below what it is now so you might get an extra $3 for every £100. But you should get an extra fifteen Canadian dollars for your £100 compared to last year and an extra 5 New Zealand dollars for your money.
Turkey has done well from British and Irish tourists over the last few years, partly due to its rate against sterling and the euro. This year you could get an extra 70 Turkish lira for each £100. Sterling has weakened slightly against the euro compared to this time last year but is till (just) above €1.20 to the £1 which it wasn’t for most of the year. As the British economy seems to want to continue to improve there is a reasonable chance it might hang around this level for most of the year.
Elsewhere you should get an extra 50 pesos for every £100 if you are off to Mexico and about 400 baht if you are considering Thailand. Political uncertainty there is weakening their currency. As it stabilises the rates probably won’t be as good for us. You should get an extra 40 ringgits for your £100 if you are Malaysia bound.
It’s harder to calculate what you’ll get if you holiday in Egypt or Tunisia but generally it is better to convert currency when you arrive rather than in our home countries.
Wherever you go try to order money in advance as you will certainly save over the walk up rates at the airports. And definitely avoid the currency booths at railway stations (such as at St Pancras International) where the rates tend to be visitor unfriendly if not downright hateful!
Bear in mind, these conversion rates are at early January rates and will vary throughout the year.
