A brand-new fintech company which I was presented to previously this year. Currensea Card Login…
It has won a few 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 basic as hell. This is a good thing.
is, efficiently, a direct debit travel card. It is a Mastercard which sits in 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– just without the typical 3% fee.
Oh, and is free to get, which likewise assists.
There are likewise some interesting travel benefits if you pick a paid plan, but the complimentary plan works fine. You can apply here.
There is a service model in fintech which Curve, Revolut, Monzo etc have actually all followed:
launch by doing something well, and free of charge or less expensive than the competition
add a growing number of features which your existing consumers don’t actually need or desire
include restrictions, fees or charges to the feature that made individuals get your product in the first place, eliminating any competitive advantage
is presently still in Stage 1 of this procedure and will ideally stay there. Curve, Revolut and Monzo are already in Phase 3 …
is easy enough that it passes my ‘Can you describe it to your mate in the bar in 30 seconds?’ test:
What countries can I use Currensea? Currensea Card Login
It is a free direct debit card to utilize abroad and which instantly recharges all purchases to your existing bank account in Sterling, less a little 0.5% fee.
That’s it.
You don’t (yet …) earn any airline company miles or points for using it.
Why would I want to get a card?
If you have a charge card offering 0% forex costs, then you don’t need a card, unless you want free ATM withdrawals. You can stop checking out now.
Nevertheless, credit cards which provide rewards and charge 0% FX costs are scarce. The only ‘points and miles’ alternatives which provide a partial service are the Virgin Atlantic charge card which have 0% FX charges in the Euro zone.
IS perhaps for you if:
you do not have a charge card offering 0% FX costs and do not wish to affect your credit report by getting another credit card particularly to use abroad
you want a product which allows you to make �,� 500 of foreign currency ATM withdrawals each month with no costs and only a very little FX mark-up (there is a little charge beyond �,� 500).
you want an item for you, your adult kids, parents, partner or anybody else in your life who requires a basic, easy to understand payment card that will save them money when travelling.
How does operate in practice?
It is, as I said previously, a really easy procedure. You use your Currensea card in the same way as your existing debit card.
You make your purchase in local currency (any currency, globally).
Your bank account bank immediately validates that you have enough cash in your account and authorises the transaction.
The transaction goes through at either the interbank rate or the Mastercard rate, depending on the currency. includes a 0.5% charge if you have the complimentary card. If you have one of their paid cards, there are no charges.
You get an automatic invest notification by means of the app, if you pick to install it.
The money is drawn from your bank account a few days later.
Here is an example. With no 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 arranged to leave my HSBC account a couple of days later:.
But transforming pounds was pricey.
A pet peeve of mine is when ATMs forewarn you about the daytime break-in that is almost to take place (typically in a different language) while not telling you about the exorbitant currency conversion charges occurring in the background. Do not get me began. Anyway back to the positives for a bit anyway.
In current years a handful of excellent travel debit cards have actually popped onto the scene … and like other great cards Currensea guarantees big cost savings (85%) and a fantastic app.
I believe the best bit might be what no other card does: links to your existing high street bank account.
What this means is you can spend money you have in your existing current account with less stress over running out of money and the additional action. But that does not imply it is perfect.
In this Currensea evaluation is the great, the bad, the awful and the alternatives, so that you can decide.
FX markup.
While our premium plans have no FX markup, we charge a nominal FX markup on our Important Plan of 0.5% per deal, enabling 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 usage over the totally free quantity on all our plans, full information can be found on our rates plans.
Membership costs.
We charge an annual membership charge of �,� 25 for our Premium Strategy, and �,� 120 for our Elite Strategy. The subscription fee also eliminates all FX markup on deals.
Interchange.
Whenever you spend with your card we receive a small % of the transaction, known as interchange, this comes straight from the merchant and won’t be credited you. Currensea Card Login