A new fintech business which I was introduced to earlier this year. Currensea Card St Lucia…
It has won a couple of awards over recent months for what it does (offering you a low-priced way to invest abroad) however what I like about is that it is simple as hell. This is a good thing.
is, successfully, a direct debit travel card. It is a Mastercard which sits between you and your existing bank account. There is nothing to top-up or prepay. You simply spend as you would on a typical debit card and the money is taken from your current account– just without the normal 3% cost.
Oh, and is free to look for, which likewise helps.
There are also some intriguing travel benefits if you choose a paid plan, however the free plan works fine. You can use here.
There is a service design in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo and so on have actually all followed:
launch by doing something well, and totally free or more affordable than the competition
add increasingly more functions which your existing clients don’t actually require or desire
add charges, constraints or charges to the feature that made people get your product in the first place, removing any competitive advantage
is currently still in Stage 1 of this procedure and will ideally remain there. Revolut, monzo and curve are currently in Stage 3 …
is basic 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 St Lucia
It is a free direct debit card to use abroad and which automatically charges all purchases to your existing current account in Sterling, less a little 0.5% cost.
That’s it.
You do not (yet …) earn any airline company miles or points for using it.
Why would I want to get a card?
If you have a credit card offering 0% forex charges, then you do not require a card, unless you desire totally free ATM withdrawals. You can stop checking out now.
Credit cards which use benefits and charge 0% FX charges are few and far between. The only ‘miles and points’ options which use a partial solution 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 charge card particularly to utilize abroad
you desire an item which allows you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals monthly with no fees and just a very little FX mark-up (there is a small charge beyond �,� 500).
you want an item for you, your adult kids, parents, partner or anyone else in your life who requires a simple, easy to understand payment card that will save them cash when travelling.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I stated earlier, an extremely 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, globally).
Your bank account bank immediately 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. If you have the free card, adds a 0.5% fee. If you have one of their paid cards, there are no fees.
You get an automatic spend notification via the app, if you choose to install it.
The cash is taken from your current account a few days later on.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the journal, I chose to sprinkle 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:.
But converting pounds was expensive.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daytime robbery that is practically to happen (often in a different language) while not telling you about the outrageous currency conversion fees occurring in the background. Don’t get me started. Anyway back to the positives for a bit anyway.
In current years a handful of excellent travel debit cards have popped onto the scene … and like other great cards Currensea guarantees big cost savings (85%) and a great app.
But I think the best bit might be what no other card does: links to your existing high street checking account.
What this indicates is you can invest money you have in your existing bank account with less worry about lacking cash and the additional step. That does not mean it is perfect.
In this Currensea evaluation is the great, the bad, the unsightly and the options, so that you can choose.
FX markup.
While our premium strategies have no FX markup, we charge a nominal FX markup on our Vital Plan of 0.5% per deal, enabling us to make income from our Necessary Strategy whilst staying more affordable than other pre-paid cards and high-street debit cards. We likewise charge an FX markup on ATM usage over the complimentary quantity on all our strategies, full information can be discovered on our rates strategies.
Subscription charges.
We charge a yearly subscription fee of �,� 25 for our Premium Strategy, and �,� 120 for our Elite Plan. The membership cost likewise gets rid of all FX markup on transactions.
Interchange.
Every time you invest with your card we receive a small % of the transaction, called interchange, this comes straight from the merchant and won’t be charged to you. Currensea Card St Lucia