A brand-new fintech business which I was introduced to earlier this year. Currensea Card Deposit…
It has won a couple of awards over recent months for what it does (providing you a low-priced way to spend abroad) but what I like about is that it is easy as hell. This is an advantage.
is, efficiently, a direct debit travel card. It is a Mastercard which sits in between you and your existing bank account. There is absolutely nothing to top-up or prepay. You merely spend as you would on a normal debit card and the cash is drawn from your bank account– just without the usual 3% fee.
Oh, and is totally free to request, which likewise assists.
There are likewise some interesting travel benefits if you choose a paid strategy, however the complimentary strategy works fine. You can apply here.
There is a company model in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have all followed:
launch by doing something well, and for free or less expensive than the competition
include increasingly more features which your existing customers don’t actually require or desire
include costs, constraints or charges to the feature that made individuals get your product in the first place, getting rid of any competitive advantage
is presently still in Stage 1 of this process and will ideally remain there. Monzo, curve and revolut are currently in Stage 3 …
is simple 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? Currensea Card Deposit
It is a free direct debit card to utilize abroad and which instantly charges all purchases to your existing bank account in Sterling, less a little 0.5% fee.
That’s it.
You do not (yet …) earn any airline miles or points for utilizing it.
Why would I wish to get a card?
If you have a credit card offering 0% forex fees, then you do not require a card, unless you want totally free ATM withdrawals. You can stop reading now.
Nevertheless, charge card which use rewards and charge 0% FX fees are scarce. The only ‘miles and points’ alternatives which provide a partial service are the Virgin Atlantic charge card which have 0% FX fees in the Euro zone.
IS possibly for you if:
you don’t have a charge card offering 0% FX fees and do not wish to impact your credit report by getting another charge card specifically to use abroad
you desire a product which allows you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals each month with no costs and just a minimal FX mark-up (there is a small fee beyond �,� 500).
you desire an item for you, your adult kids, 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 travelling.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I stated previously, an extremely basic process. You utilize your Currensea card in the same way as your existing debit card.
You make your purchase in regional currency (any currency, worldwide).
Your current account bank instantly validates that you have adequate cash in your account and authorises the transaction.
The deal goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending on the currency. includes a 0.5% charge if you have the free card. If you have one of their paid cards, there are no costs.
You get an automatic spend alert through the app, if you pick to install it.
The cash is taken from your bank account a few days later on.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the journal, 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 on:.
But converting pounds was costly.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daylight break-in that is almost to happen (frequently in a various language) while not telling you about the outrageous currency conversion costs happening in the background. Don’t get me started. Anyway back to the positives for a bit anyway.
In recent years a handful of excellent travel debit cards have actually popped onto the scene … and like other excellent cards Currensea guarantees big savings (85%) and a terrific app.
I think the best bit may be what no other card does: connects to your existing high street bank account.
What this implies is you can spend cash you have in your existing bank account with less fret about running out of money and the additional step. That does not mean it is ideal.
In this Currensea evaluation is the good, the bad, the ugly 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 Plan of 0.5% per transaction, allowing us to make income from our Necessary Strategy whilst remaining much cheaper than other prepaid cards and high-street debit cards. We likewise charge an FX markup on ATM use over the free quantity on all our strategies, full details can be discovered on our rates plans.
Membership costs.
We charge an annual membership charge of �,� 25 for our Premium Plan, and �,� 120 for our Elite Strategy. The subscription fee also removes all FX markup on deals.
Interchange.
Every time you spend with your card we receive a small % of the deal, referred to as interchange, this comes straight from the merchant and will not be charged to you. Currensea Card Deposit