I have hesitated positing this but feel it should be posted to help people become aware of
problems they might encounter.

I have always used a visa card for everything for my safari and use in Kenya. I have never had a problem.
My safari company has kept my card information confidential and locked up over 10 years, and when I would write them to charge an upcoming trip only 1 or 2 people had access to the number. They could then send the charge to my visa company and were paid directly.

Last year I obtained a Delta Skymiles card through American Express. Very few people in Africa use American Express. I asked my tour operator to charge my trip and was told that with American Express they needed a copy of the card which I sent them. They had to take that to Barclay's bank to process the charge. They cannot just swipe a card in a machine as one can do with Visa or Master Charge.

Well, I got a call from American Express asking if I had made a $2,500.000 for Kenya Airways or a
$1,700.00 charge for Turkish Airlines. I had not. Obviously someone swiped all my card information and
fraudulently misused it. I trust the tour operator completely as they've had my information for 10 years and never has anyone misused it. I have come to the conclusion that is most likely someone at Barclay's Bank who got a copy of the card who 'robbed' my account.

Thus just to be safe and protect yourself, don't use American Express in Africa.

Jan, you might want to read the last few posts on the terrorism thread on Political Topics board. Cody and I have been talking about cards. Do you use a card that is not charging you extra fees for conversion? Most visa and mc cards now do that up to a whopping 3%. There are two cards that don't charge their own fee plus they eat the 1% visa/mc fee. You may want to look into a Capitol One Card or a Schwab card. The cards that do charge these fees charge even if the charge is in dollars and even if there is a US Branch of the business.

Thanks Jane. I will look into Capitol One.

However, I'm still trying to figure out a way to use AmEx with Delta so I can get skymiles. For instance, if I had my bank here wire the money, could they charge my credit card for that amount? That, in addition to miles flown, adds up quickly to help get another free flight. Guess I'll have to contact Am Ex and see what options, if any, I have.

Cap One does give 2% back on what you spend which for us helps make up for the fact that we are not getting our united miles. I do understand the mile thing but I figured out what it would cost us to do our safari and it was a couple hundred dollars more with the fees--so we went with Cap One and our 2% bonus. When we lived in Italy for a year, we really racked up the bonus money.

Jan - reading your post on Amex - I think what happened to you could have happened with any card; Visa or Amex. You just had the bad luck of finding some idiot who stole your details.
Like you - I have a Delta Miles card and Amex as well.
The only reason a lot of countries do not use Amex is purely because Amex tries to benefit the user (us) as much as possible and gives most payment to the shop / hotel / restaurant etc.

The only reason that the company could NOT swip your card directly at their own office using the electronic PDQ machine is that Amex as a company will only allow hotels / shops etc to physically type in an Amex card number if the hotel / shop etc turns over a minimum of 150 Thousand Euro (around 200 thousand US Dollars) per year per company.
They try and push the shops etc to use their card as much as possible but it is stupid as the shop owner has to pay Amex minimum of 3% of the revenue - at the end of the year it is quite a lot.
I know because I had this issue in my restaurants and company.

It is not an Africa issue - it is a global issue all over the world. Anyone who turns over a small amount of revenue with Amex must go to the bank to collect payment.

One last but VERY important issue - NEVER send your credit card details in one go via e mail.
BREAK the numbers in 2 - send the 1st 8 digits and then the last remaining and then the expiry date.

All companies who deal with Visa and MasterCard that can physically type the card number into their PDQ machine (companies you trust only) do NOT need the 3 security numbers. AVOID giving these numbers if you can. It is those last 3 numbers that is used for fraud -