The We Swap currency card is ideal for anyone going on holiday, who doesn't want to pay excessive currency exchange rates!
With We Swap You upload funds to the card and then transfer the funds to which ever currency you need via the app or website.
So if going to the USA you change it to Dollars, France into Euros etc.
This means that when you are shopping board, you are using the local currency, rather than GBP £ to shop with.
As an example, you are going to Paris. You have £500 spending money.
So you upload the £500 to your We Swap account. You then perform a swap from GBP £ to Euro's. Now your debit card has your funds as Euro's, not £'s. So when you use your card in Paris, you are paying in Euro's and so no further exchange rate charges!
If you come back with funds still on your card, then swap the Euro's back to £'s again, and use the card as normal in the UK. Simple!
It's cheaper than using your normal currency exchange place, (From as little as 1%) .
You have a couple of options when swopping the cash. If you want to do the swap immediately, then you will be charged a 2% fee. If, however, you have time on your side, you can set up a 7 day swap, meaning that the swap will be done in 7 days, not immediately, and you pay a cheaper 1% fee for doing this. My recent swap was £20 in my favour, by waiting a week!
They give you a free contactless pre paid Mastercard so you can use it in your holiday destination in restaurants, bars, shops etc, just like a normal debit card.
Prepaid cards are great: they’re secure (because they’re not linked to your bank), they’re brilliant for budgeting (you can track your spending online or on your mobile) and if you lose one, your funds are protected. But as with any deal, do check the numbers, example below:
Most banks will charge you an extra fee to convert your money when you’re using your debit card abroad.
We Swap only ever charge one small fee when you use the card and that takes place when you make the initial exchange. This will never be more than 2% and these fees will be incorporated into your initial exchange rate and so you won't get charged to use your card while away.
The card, as well as acting a regular debit card, will also allow you to withdraw cash from ATM's, and this will be charged to your card in the local currency, and therefore no horrific exchange rate charges, just at the normal ATM withdraws charges of £1.50, but no extra exchange rate fee, but they don't charge anything for withdrawals over £200. The sums below show you what this means in real terms for you in regards to cash withdraw fees and debit card transactions:
We Swap also offer a cash, currency, ordering service. Most currency exchange companies will change the exchange rate when you’re buying that cash, meaning you rarely get anywhere near the mid-market rate*.
All though most companies do this, the price hikes are much larger in certain places (we’re looking at you, airport bureax de change), so the key is to order in advance and scout out the best deals.
If you’re ordering in advance, be wary of delivery charges. These are often added if your order isn’t big enough. Whilst these providers didn’t include a delivery fee for our test order of £1000, many will charge £3-£5 to deliver smaller amounts of less than £500 or so. If you are taking lots of cash with you, make sure you keep it somewhere safe once you arrive at your destination.
*Also known as the true exchange or the interbank rate, the mid-market rate is the mid-point between the buy and the sell prices of two currencies in the FX market. I.e. the average rate a currency is being bought and then sold at. This tends to be the ‘real’ rate before banks or bureaux add their fees.
Examples of cash currency rates below:
As an opening offer they are giving you £5 for free on the card when you sign up. Once you add funds to the card they will add another £5 onto the card as well! You just need to use our special introduction link to take advantage of this deal.
I have found it's a good way to budget for your holiday, as you can add funds whenever you have a few spare pounds, ready for your holiday!
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