A brand-new fintech business which I was introduced to earlier this year. Is Currensea Good…
It has won a few awards over recent months for what it does (offering you an affordable method to spend abroad) however what I like about is that it is easy as hell. This is a good idea.
is, successfully, a direct debit travel card. It is a Mastercard which sits between you and your existing bank account. There is absolutely nothing to top-up or prepay. You just invest as you would on a typical debit card and the money is drawn from your current account– simply without the typical 3% fee.
Oh, and is totally free to get, which also assists.
There are likewise some interesting travel benefits if you pick a paid plan, but the complimentary plan works fine. You can use here.
There is a company design in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have all followed:
launch by doing something well, and totally free or more affordable than the competitors
include more and more features which your existing customers do not really require or desire
include costs, restrictions or charges to the feature that made individuals get your item in the first place, removing any competitive advantage
is currently still in Phase 1 of this procedure and will hopefully remain there. Revolut, curve and monzo 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? Is Currensea Good
It is a complimentary direct debit card to use abroad and which immediately charges all purchases to your existing current account in Sterling, less a little 0.5% charge.
That’s it.
You don’t (yet …) make any airline miles or points for utilizing it.
Why would I wish 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 totally free ATM withdrawals. You can stop reading now.
However, charge card which provide rewards and charge 0% FX charges are scarce. The only ‘miles and points’ options which use a partial option are the Virgin Atlantic charge card which have 0% FX charges in the Euro zone.
IS potentially for you if:
you don’t have a credit card offering 0% FX costs and do not want to affect your credit report by getting another charge card particularly to use abroad
you desire a product which permits you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals each month without any costs and just a very little FX mark-up (there is a little charge beyond �,� 500).
you want a product for you, your adult kids, parents, partner or anybody else in your life who needs a simple, easy to understand payment card that will save them money when taking a trip.
How does work in practice?
It is, as I said earlier, a really easy process. You use 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 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 totally free card, adds a 0.5% fee. There are no costs if you have among their paid cards.
You get an automatic spend notice through the app, if you pick to install it.
The cash is taken from your bank account a couple of days later on.
Here is an example. Without any foreign travel in the diary, I decided to splash out and buy 1,000 MeliaRewards points for EUR5.
This is what you see in the Currensea app, which reveals �,� 4.33 set up to leave my HSBC account a few days later on:.
However converting pounds was expensive.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daylight robbery that is just about to take place (often in a different language) while not telling you about the expensive currency conversion fees happening in the background. Don’t get me started. Anyway back to the positives for a bit anyway.
Luckily in the last few years a handful of excellent travel debit cards have actually popped onto the scene … and like other terrific cards guarantees huge cost savings (85%) and an excellent app.
I believe the best bit might 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 current account with less worry about lacking money and the additional step. But that does not indicate it is best.
In this Currensea evaluation is the great, the bad, the unsightly 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 Necessary Plan of 0.5% per transaction, permitting us to make profits from our Vital Plan whilst staying much cheaper than other pre-paid cards and high-street debit cards. We also charge an FX markup on ATM usage over the totally free quantity on all our strategies, full details can be found on our pricing strategies.
Subscription charges.
We charge an annual membership fee of �,� 25 for our Premium Strategy, and �,� 120 for our Elite Strategy. The subscription charge likewise removes all FX markup on deals.
Interchange.
Every time you spend with your card we get a small % of the transaction, referred to as interchange, this comes directly from the merchant and won’t be charged to you. Is Currensea Good