Euro Cash Withdrawals from a Spanish ATM

Up until about a year or two ago the cheapest way for me to get Euros for holiday money from my UK Sterling bank account was to use my UK debit card in an ATM in Spain.  Lloyds have now started charging transaction and foreign currency fees which total 4.5% on the max 300 euros that I am able to withdraw at any one time.  Getting the euros from the post office before I travel would cost about 3%.  Does anyone know a cheaper way to do this?.  I have a "current" account with banco popular and it costs me about 1.5% using xe.com to transfer sterling into my euro account there for mortgage payments etc.  Has anyone had any success getting a free ATM cash withdrawal card on this type of account.  All help gratefully received.

Steve

I used to have a Banco Popular debit card for cash ATM withdrawals but only used it several times a year and the bank charged an annual  fee for the card plus a new card had to be collected from the bank each year. So it was not so economic an option.

These days I just collect cash from the bank banch on showing my passport.

Just take care to note public holidays when the banks are closed - they are more numerous that one might suspect. 

http://www.andalucia.com/calendar/bankholidays.htm

Hi, if you go online ( travelmoneymax.com ) there you can compare all the exchange  rates, most of them do not charge commission over a certain limit,  this is what we do before we travel.

Chris

This may not be entirely relevent but we now use Currencyfair, based in Dublin and we get a very good rate, even better than Smart Currency who we thought was the best. The transfers cost approximately 3€ and are very quick. Barclays here in Jerez make no charges for receiving, and I can withdraw obviously free from their cash machines or withdraw in the bank or at any SERVICE RED cash machine with absolutely no charges. We changed over from Banco Popular as they were charging (not much) then to Santander who were free to start with, then started charging horrendously for any debit card use and withdrawals even from their machines. Barclays do not charge us anything and so far so good, we are very pleased with them. Banking in Spain appears to have changed and one needs to clarify the situation before opening another account, as some banks now charge you for just walking through the door!!

Thank you for all your replies, very helpful.

Steve