A new fintech company which I was presented to previously this year. How Much Can You Have On A Currensea Card…
It has won a couple of awards over current months for what it does (using you an affordable way to invest abroad) but what I like about is that it is simple as hell. This is an advantage.
is, effectively, a direct debit travel card. It is a Mastercard which sits between you and your existing current account. There is nothing to top-up or prepay. You simply invest as you would on a normal debit card and the cash is drawn from your current account– simply without the normal 3% fee.
Oh, and is totally free to apply for, which also helps.
There are also some intriguing travel benefits if you choose a paid plan, however the totally free plan works fine. You can use here.
There is a service design in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have all followed:
launch by doing one thing well, and free of charge or more affordable than the competitors
add more and more features which your existing consumers do not actually need or desire
add charges, constraints or fees to the function that made individuals get your product in the first place, getting rid of any competitive advantage
is presently still in Stage 1 of this procedure and will hopefully 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? How Much Can You Have On A Currensea Card
It is a totally free direct debit card to use abroad and which instantly recharges all purchases to your existing bank account in Sterling, less a small 0.5% charge.
That’s it.
You do not (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 require a card, unless you want complimentary ATM withdrawals. You can stop reading now.
Nevertheless, charge card which use rewards and charge 0% FX fees are rare. The only ‘miles and points’ options which use a partial option are the Virgin Atlantic credit cards which have 0% FX costs in the Euro zone.
IS potentially for you if:
you don’t have a credit card offering 0% FX charges and do not wish to affect 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 per month without any costs and only a very little FX mark-up (there is a small cost beyond �,� 500).
you desire an item for you, your adult children, parents, partner or anyone else in your life who needs an easy, easy to understand payment card that will save them money when taking a trip.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I said previously, a really 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 current account bank immediately verifies that you have enough cash in your account and authorises the deal.
The transaction goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending on the currency. If you have the totally free card, adds a 0.5% cost. If you have one of their paid cards, there are no fees.
You get an automated spend notice via the app, if you select to install it.
The cash is drawn from your current account a couple of days later on.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the journal, I chose to splash out and buy 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 couple of days later:.
Converting pounds was expensive.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daylight robbery that is almost to happen (often in a different language) while not telling you about the expensive currency conversion costs 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 huge cost savings (85%) and a terrific app.
I believe the best bit may be what no other card does: connects to your existing high street bank account.
What this suggests is you can invest cash you have in your existing bank account with less stress over running out of money and the additional step. That does not mean it is best.
In this Currensea evaluation is the excellent, the bad, the awful and the alternatives, so that you can decide.
FX markup.
While our premium strategies have no FX markup, we charge a small FX markup on our Essential Plan of 0.5% per transaction, allowing us to make profits from our Important Strategy whilst staying much cheaper than other pre-paid cards and high-street debit cards. We also charge an FX markup on ATM use over the totally free quantity on all our plans, complete information can be found on our pricing plans.
Subscription charges.
We charge a yearly membership fee of �,� 25 for our Premium Strategy, and �,� 120 for our Elite Plan. The subscription charge likewise gets rid of all FX markup on deals.
Interchange.
Whenever you invest with your card we receive a little % of the transaction, referred to as interchange, this comes directly from the merchant and will not be charged to you. How Much Can You Have On A Currensea Card