A brand-new fintech business which I was presented to earlier this year. What Is Currensea Card Good For…
It has actually won a few awards over recent months for what it does (providing you a low-cost method to invest abroad) however what I like about is that it is simple as hell. This is an advantage.
is, effectively, a direct debit travel card. You simply invest as you would on a typical debit card and the money is taken from your current account– simply without the normal 3% fee.
Oh, and is free to request, which also helps.
There are likewise some intriguing travel advantages if you select a paid plan, however the free plan works fine. You can apply here.
There is a company design in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo and so on have all followed:
launch by doing something well, and for free or cheaper than the competitors
include more and more features which your existing customers don’t really need or desire
include charges, constraints or charges to the feature that made people get your item in the first place, removing any competitive advantage
is currently still in Phase 1 of this process and will ideally stay there. Revolut, monzo and curve are already in Stage 3 …
is simple 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? What Is Currensea Card Good For
It is a free direct debit card to use abroad and which immediately charges all purchases to your existing current account in Sterling, less a little 0.5% fee.
That’s it.
You don’t (yet …) make 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% foreign exchange charges, then you don’t need a card, unless you desire totally free ATM withdrawals. You can stop reading now.
Credit cards which offer rewards and charge 0% FX costs are few and far in between. The only ‘miles and points’ choices which use a partial service are the Virgin Atlantic charge card which have 0% FX costs in the Euro zone.
IS perhaps for you if:
you do not have a credit card offering 0% FX fees and do not wish to impact your credit report by getting another charge card particularly to utilize abroad
you want an item which permits you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals monthly without any fees and just a very little FX mark-up (there is a little cost beyond �,� 500).
you desire a product for you, your adult children, parents, partner or anybody else in your life who needs a basic, easy to understand payment card that will conserve them money when travelling.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I said earlier, an extremely basic procedure. You utilize your Currensea card in the same way as your existing debit card.
You make your purchase in local currency (any currency, internationally).
Your bank account bank immediately verifies that you have adequate cash in your account and authorises the deal.
The deal goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending on the currency. adds a 0.5% cost if you have the free card. There are no costs if you have among their paid cards.
You get an automatic spend alert by means of the app, if you pick to install it.
The cash is drawn from your bank account a couple of days later.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the diary, I decided to sprinkle out and buy 1,000 MeliaRewards points for EUR5.
This is what you see in the Currensea app, which shows �,� 4.33 scheduled to leave my HSBC account a couple of days later on:.
However transforming pounds was costly.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daytime robbery that is just about to take place (often in a different language) while not telling you about the expensive currency conversion fees taking place in the background. Don’t get me started. Anyway 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 fantastic cards Currensea guarantees big cost savings (85%) and an excellent app.
However I think the best bit might be what no other card does: links to your existing high street bank account.
What this means is you can invest money you have in your existing bank account with less fret about lacking cash and the additional action. That does not mean it is perfect.
In this Currensea evaluation 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 Essential Strategy of 0.5% per transaction, allowing us to make revenue from our Necessary Strategy whilst staying more affordable than other prepaid cards and high-street debit cards. We likewise charge an FX markup on ATM use over the totally free quantity on all our strategies, complete details can be found on our pricing strategies.
Subscription costs.
We charge a yearly membership charge of �,� 25 for our Premium Plan, and �,� 120 for our Elite Plan. The subscription charge likewise removes all FX markup on deals.
Interchange.
Whenever you spend with your card we get a small % of the transaction, called interchange, this comes directly from the merchant and will not be credited you. What Is Currensea Card Good For