A brand-new fintech company which I was presented to earlier this year. Currensea News…
It has won a couple of awards over recent months for what it does (offering you an inexpensive way to invest abroad) but what I like about is that it is easy as hell. This is an advantage.
is, efficiently, a direct debit travel card. You merely spend as you would on a normal debit card and the money is taken from your current account– simply without the typical 3% charge.
Oh, and is totally free to make an application for, which also helps.
There are also some intriguing travel advantages if you select a paid strategy, however the complimentary plan works fine. You can apply here.
There is a business model in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have all followed:
launch by doing something well, and for free or more affordable than the competitors
add more and more features which your existing consumers don’t really require or desire
include fees, constraints or charges to the function that made people get your item in the first place, eliminating any competitive advantage
is presently still in Phase 1 of this procedure and will hopefully stay there. Revolut, monzo and curve are currently in Stage 3 …
is easy enough that it passes my ‘Can you describe it to your mate in the club in 30 seconds?’ test:
What countries can I use Currensea? Currensea News
It is a totally free direct debit card to utilize abroad and which instantly charges all purchases to your existing current account in Sterling, less a small 0.5% fee.
That’s it.
You don’t (yet …) make any airline 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 don’t require a card, unless you want free ATM withdrawals. You can stop reading now.
However, charge card which offer benefits and charge 0% FX charges are scarce. The only ‘miles and points’ alternatives which use a partial option are the Virgin Atlantic credit cards which have 0% FX costs in the Euro zone.
IS possibly for you if:
you don’t have a credit card offering 0% FX costs and do not wish to impact your credit report by getting another credit card specifically to use abroad
you desire a product which permits you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals each month without any fees and just a very little FX mark-up (there is a little charge beyond �,� 500).
you want an item for you, your adult children, parents, partner or anyone else in your life who requires a basic, easy to understand payment card that will save them cash when taking a trip.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I stated earlier, a really easy process. You utilize your Currensea card in the same way as your existing debit card.
You make your purchase in local currency (any currency, globally).
Your bank account bank automatically confirms that you have enough money in your account and authorises the transaction.
The transaction goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending on the currency. If you have the free card, adds a 0.5% charge. If you have one of their paid cards, there are no costs.
You get an automatic invest notice by means of the app, if you select to install it.
The money is taken from your current account a couple of days later.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the diary, I decided to splash out and purchase 1,000 MeliaRewards points for EUR5.
This is what you see in the Currensea app, which reveals �,� 4.33 arranged to leave my HSBC account a few days later:.
However transforming pounds was pricey.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daytime robbery that is just about to take place (often in a various language) while not telling you about the exorbitant currency conversion fees taking place in the background. Don’t get me began. Anyhow back to the positives for a bit anyhow.
In recent years a handful of great travel debit cards have actually popped onto the scene … and like other excellent cards Currensea assures big cost savings (85%) and a great app.
I believe the best bit may be what no other card does: connects to your existing high street bank account.
What this indicates is you can invest cash you have in your existing bank account with less stress over running out of money and the extra step. That does not mean it is ideal.
In this Currensea review is the good, the bad, the unsightly and the alternatives, so that you can decide.
FX markup.
While our premium plans have no FX markup, we charge a small FX markup on our Necessary Strategy of 0.5% per deal, enabling us to make profits from our Important Plan whilst staying more affordable than other prepaid cards and high-street debit cards. We also charge an FX markup on ATM use over the free quantity on all our strategies, full details can be discovered on our prices plans.
Membership fees.
We charge a yearly subscription fee of �,� 25 for our Premium Strategy, and �,� 120 for our Elite Plan. The membership charge likewise removes all FX markup on transactions.
Interchange.
Each time you spend with your card we get a small % of the transaction, called interchange, this comes directly from the merchant and won’t be charged to you. Currensea News