Major CORRECTION I did some research in my CS account, to find the two transactions I did to compare Banco Popular ATM, and Banco Nacional ATM, both in Sosua.
The day I made the withdrawals was back in June 2020. So I was way off as far as the year. When I made the 10000 peso withdrawal at Banco Popular, $178.78 came out of my Charles Schwab account. That includes the 250 peso ( $4.35 ) charge. Without the charge they really only took $174.43 out of my account. Because I was going to be reimbursed at the end of the month.
When I did the math, that comes to a rate of 57.33. That was close to the going exchange rate in Sosua at that time. So thats good. If you keep the $4.35 charge in, it cost you more to get the 10000 pesos. The rate would look like you only got 55.93.
If you have a fee less debit card, you will get reimbursed for that fee. So your rate is realistically 57.33. The mistake I made back then, and held onto, was I did not factor in how the $4.35 charge would impact what the exchange rate would look like.
The Banco Nacional ATM did not charge an ATM fee at the time. So whatever money was taken from your Charles Schwab account, with no fees, your currency exchange rate would be easy to determine. In this case my ATM transaction at Banco Nacional yielded a 57.33 currency rate. Same as Banco Popular.
If your card does not reimburse you for fees, that means your rate would be good, but the fee would increase what it cost to get those pesos.
Having seen my error, Now I will have no problem withdrawing money from Banco Popular in Sosua generally, as long as I am using my Charles Schwab DC. Any other DC I would NOT use because my own bank would charge fees, plus BP ATM fee.
The only problem is, BP still only allows one to withdraw a maximum of 10k pesos per transaction. Banco Nacional in PP allows up to 30k pesos per transaction. Sometimes it defaults to a lower withdrawal amount, like 20k. But even 20k per transaction is good.
Hope my clarification helps those that will use Banco Popular ATM. Im sorry I mislead some folks by not factoring in the impact of the ATM fee, when a person is not going to be reimbursed.
Good to know and good on you for taking the time to figure this out. It matters.
That being said and the get the gringo mentality is in effect because in Colombia you get the option to accept or decline the Bank's conversion rate.
Only Banca Villa tries to pull a fast one by not clearly stating that you can or not accept their conversion rate.
I'll also say this on the app. It appears that Wise charges more than Remitly does at least in Colombia Remitly also charges less for a 5 business day transfer if you want to save every penny and it's a big purchase like rent where you can plan ahead.
Still like the idea of an additional rechargeable debit card so I still might get it.
