By Jennifer Hill

LONDON (Reuters) - Plastic card fraud might be falling at home, but it is booming overseas -- causing a headache for a growing number of holidaymakers.

Chip and PIN technology has helped cut such fraud to the lowest level for three years in Britain, according to payments body APACS.

There was a 3 percent drop in the amount of money lost to card fraud in 2006, with fraudsters stealing 428 million pounds from banks and other lenders, retailers and individuals using credit, debit and store cards.

But fraud committed abroad on British cards jumped 43 percent to 118.2 million pounds.

In fact overseas fraud accounted for 28 percent of total losses, up from 19 percent in 2005, and fraud hotspots included popular tourist destinations.

The countries where most fraud occurred on UK-issued cards were the U.S. (16.7 million pounds), France (7.5 million pounds), Spain (6.7 million pounds), Italy (6.4 million pounds) and Thailand (4.1 million pounds).

Losses in the U.S., which has no plans yet to introduce chip and PIN, were up 49 percent year-on-year, while those in France and Spain -- countries that are rolling out the technology -- declined 35 percent and 30 percent respectively.

APACS has published a guide on card usage overseas on its Web site, www.apacs.org.uk.