A new fintech business which I was presented to earlier this year. Can You Use Currensea Card At Atm…
It has won a couple of awards over recent months for what it does (offering you an inexpensive method to spend abroad) but what I like about is that it is simple as hell. This is an advantage.
is, successfully, a direct debit travel card. You simply invest as you would on a regular debit card and the money is taken from your current account– simply without the usual 3% fee.
Oh, and is totally free to request, which also helps.
There are also some fascinating travel advantages if you select a paid strategy, but the totally free plan works fine. You can apply here.
There is an organization model in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have all followed:
launch by doing something well, and totally free or more affordable than the competitors
include increasingly more functions which your existing clients don’t really need or desire
include restrictions, charges or charges to the feature that made people get your product in the first place, eliminating any competitive advantage
is currently still in Stage 1 of this process and will ideally remain there. Monzo, curve and revolut are currently in Stage 3 …
is easy enough that it passes my ‘Can you explain it to your mate in the club in 30 seconds?’ test:
What countries can I use Currensea? Can You Use Currensea Card At Atm
It is a totally free direct debit card to use abroad and which automatically charges all purchases to your existing current account in Sterling, less a small 0.5% charge.
That’s it.
You don’t (yet …) earn any airline company miles or points for utilizing it.
Why would I want to get a card?
If you have a charge card offering 0% forex charges, then you do not need a card, unless you want complimentary ATM withdrawals. You can stop checking out now.
Credit cards which use benefits and charge 0% FX costs are couple of and far in between. The only ‘points and miles’ options which use a partial solution are the Virgin Atlantic credit cards which have 0% FX fees in the Euro zone.
IS potentially for you if:
you don’t have a credit card offering 0% FX fees and do not wish to affect your credit report by getting another credit card specifically to use abroad
you want a product which enables you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals per month with no fees and only a minimal FX mark-up (there is a little fee beyond �,� 500).
you want a product for you, your adult children, moms and dads, partner or anyone else in your life who requires an easy, easy to understand payment card that will conserve them money when taking a trip.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I stated previously, a really simple procedure. You utilize your Currensea card in the same way as your existing debit card.
You make your purchase in regional currency (any currency, internationally).
Your current account bank immediately validates that you have adequate money in your account and authorises the transaction.
The transaction goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending upon the currency. adds a 0.5% charge if you have the free card. There are no costs if you have one of their paid cards.
You get an automated invest alert via the app, if you select to install it.
The money is drawn from your current account a couple of days later.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the journal, I chose to splash out and purchase 1,000 MeliaRewards points for EUR5.
This is what you see in the Currensea app, which shows �,� 4.33 set up to leave my HSBC account a few days later on:.
Transforming pounds was expensive.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daytime break-in that is practically to take place (typically in a various language) while not telling you about the inflated currency conversion costs happening in the background. Don’t get me began. Anyway back to the positives for a bit anyhow.
Fortunately in the last few years a handful of terrific travel debit cards have actually popped onto the scene … and like other great cards promises huge cost savings (85%) and an excellent app.
I believe the best bit might be what no other card does: links to your existing high street bank account.
What this means is you can spend money you have in your existing bank account with less worry about running out of money and the extra action. However that does not imply it is ideal.
In this Currensea evaluation is the great, the bad, the unsightly and the alternatives, so that you can choose.
FX markup.
While our premium plans have no FX markup, we charge a nominal FX markup on our Vital Strategy of 0.5% per deal, allowing us to make revenue from our Essential Plan whilst staying much cheaper than other prepaid cards and high-street debit cards. We also charge an FX markup on ATM usage over the totally free amount on all our strategies, full information can be found on our pricing plans.
Membership fees.
We charge a yearly subscription fee of �,� 25 for our Premium Plan, and �,� 120 for our Elite Strategy. The subscription fee also gets rid of all FX markup on transactions.
Interchange.
Each time you spend with your card we receive a little % of the transaction, known as interchange, this comes straight from the merchant and will not be charged to you. Can You Use Currensea Card At Atm