Prepaid Travel Cards guide

EveryWhere

PhylPho wrote: »

Been a Revolut GBP / Euro account holder for 18 months. No problems in that time. Added funds, withdrawn funds, various times and various places across Europe. Has seemed to me that MSE's recommendation of this particular financial services provider was justified.

Couple of weeks ago, an email arrived from Revolut announcing some mysterious "news" available on a YouTube video. I had a look. Revolut is launching a card made of shiny metal. Whoop-de-dooh. Excitement all round. Well, for some, perhaps.

I'm flying out on Wednesday to elsewhere in Europe and used my phone's Revolut app this morning to access my account for the purpose of adding some GBP funds to the amount already in the Sterling account. The account opened, displayed my present GBP total, and then flashed up a request that I log in again. No reason given. Just 'log in', even though I was already. . . logged in.

I did so. Phone number first, password next, and then. . . then I'm asked to await the arrival of a one-time passcode, which I'm asked to enter into the field that's waiting to be populated in the app. Passcode arrives within 30 seconds. But it arrives not only as an SMS message but also on-screen in the app. I can't, therefore, fill in the field because Revolut has already populated it.

There are no confirm or accept or enter buttons on-screen. So it just sits there. I wait, and wait. And then the app closes. And that's it. A message asks if I wish to report the "unexpected closure". I do. Then I try again to access my account. As before: phone number, password, and then wait-for-passcode. Which comes via SMS but also appears simultaneously in the log-in field. No instructions as to what to do next. No buttons to press. Nothing. Then the app closes. End of.

I have now endured this six times today with six different passcodes and six app "unexpected" closures.

Revolut has NO customer support desk. No IT response team. No facility for getting in touch urgently by telephone or email so as to trigger a Support Ticket. Nothing. Instead, it has a. . .'Community Forum'. How twee.

So I go there. I choose the "Bugs" section of the forum and file a request for help with the situation I'm encountering. That was at 10.30am. The request isn't regarded as an emergency customer support plea but as a, uh, "topic". As such, I'm told that "your post will be moderated" in due course. By whom? When? Why? I've no idea.

Now, six hours after failing to conduct a really truly routine IT process, I'm no further forward. The 'Community Forum' advises that if I need Help, "use the in-app Help". No mention is made of what to use if the app itself doesn't work. I've posted again. This time, I'm told that yes, I still have one post "pending" and now this post will also. . . pend. But hey, why worry? It's only a. . . "topic" after all.

But a financial services provider is not an online forum like MSE. It has -- or well, I thought it had -- obligations in regard to the nature of the relation it has with its customers. Bit like banks or building societies, really: email support, or telephone support, or Live Chat.

But Revolut? Nah. If the Revolut app fails to function, then the only apparent alternative is "topics". And a Community Forum "moderator" who will take as long to look over an emergency request for help from a customer as would be the case if that customer was posting a new recipe to somewhere else in the chat forum.

Is this really the way the UK financial regulator thinks a financial services business should be run? I don't know, but intend to find out when I'm back from my travels. Meantime:

Does anyone here know if there's any significant cost difference between using Revolut for my overseas ATM cash withdrawals and using my Halifax Clarity credit card (I appreciate, I need to settle with Halifax as soon as I'm back home.)

Reason for asking is that I am not taking my Revolut card with me because I have no faith in it now, nor would suggest that anyone else have any faith in it, either. Best let it carry on with its Generation Moron YouTubing of shiny metal cards for those with delusions of adequacy.

MSE carrying on though with its unqualified recommendation of Revolut -- because I certainly haven't read of anything to the contrary -- strikes me as another matter altogether.

Revolut do have a phone number. Though I wouldn't bank on them actually answering the call and dealing with the issue.
It's already been more than a week with them dealing with mine and often you have to wait until the next day before someone replies via the App. Atrocious!

The Clarity is just as good if not better, especially since there is no £200 per month ATM limit as per Revolut.
The exchange rates are much the same. So nothing to lose by using the Clarity but something to gain, as you won't be charged 2% extra for anything over £200 that month.

PhylPho

EveryWhere wrote: »

Revolut do have a phone number. Though I wouldn't bank on them actually answering the call and dealing with the issue.
It's already been more than a week with them dealing with mine and often you have to wait until the next day before someone replies via the App. Atrocious!

The Clarity is just as good if not better, especially since there is no £200 per month ATM limit as per Revolut.
The exchange rates are much the same. So nothing to lose by using the Clarity but something to gain, as you won't be charged 2% extra for anything over £200 that month.

MANY THANKS, EveryWhere. Apologies, too, to you and other MSErs who will have had to spend time reading through a long post. But then, I didn't start off today, thinking I was going to have to actually write a long post for MSE about the even lonnnnnger trial of having to deal with a blatant Amateurville financial services provider which on the basis of my own experience today shouldn't be licensed to operate in the UK at all. It's supposed to be handling money. Not running a chat forum with 'moderators' substituting for Live Support. Grrrrrrr.

I'll use my good old Clarity, as you recommend. (On which note, I wonder if Revolut might like to change the name of its card to 'Obfuscation'???? It'd look really impressive on the nice new shiny metal card this ludicrous outfit is apparently so excited about.)

eDicky

PhylPho wrote: »

. Passcode arrives within 30 seconds. But it arrives not only as an SMS message but also on-screen in the app. I can't, therefore, fill in the field because Revolut has already populated it.

There are no confirm or accept or enter buttons on-screen. So it just sits there.:(

When something like this happens, it's worth trying an uninstall of the app, then reinstall it. Log in and hopefully the glitch will not occur and the population of the OTP automatically proceeds to login.

My easyjet app developed a fault yesterday, telling me I was not the one who booked my flight so actions were limited. I reinstalled the app, logged in with my account again and everything worked fine.

If it still plays up you could log in with with your registered SIM in a different phone so that there is no automatic OTP capture. Then enter it manually.

PhylPho

Thanks eDicky: appreciated. In the midst of today's (unnecessary) scrambling around we're also contending with a sudden bereavement so what with one thing and another I'm only going to have time tomorrow to follow your advice -- which I definitely will. I had wondered if there was some way I could download the app to my Samsung tablet by way of an alternative approach to the problem but was advised by Google Playstore that my device isn't compatible. As it's Android 7.0 (Nougat) I've no idea why not. Ah well. Another day tomorrow. Thank you again.

SnappyJan

I’ve had a Travelex Cash Passport pre paid Euro card for a number of years & found it very handy & cost effective. It now needs renewing & I see that MSE no longer endorses Travelex can you please tell me why?

etienneg

The type of card now available may well differ from what you have, but the problems with the current card include:
Fee to load in foreign currency: 5.75%.
Poor exchange rate (I just looked at GBP to EUR: 1.096, compared with 1.127 for best foreign use credit cards).
Various fees to withdraw in UK (so it will cost to get back any money loaded but not used).

I suggest you look in the travel section of MSE for foreign use credit cards and read about the advantages, as compared with (rather outdated) pre-paid cards.

eDicky

SnappyJan wrote: »

I’ve had a Travelex Cash Passport pre paid Euro card for a number of years & found it very handy & cost effective. It now needs renewing & I see that MSE no longer endorses Travelex can you please tell me why?

It's because this kind of 'cash passport' card, with their adverse exchange rates and fees, have been superseded by the likes of Starling Bank, Monzo, Revolut and Loot.io (plus the various 'travel' credit cards), with which you keep your money in pounds until conversion using ideal rates at the time of transaction, without fees.

Robin_Davies

I already had an account with EasyFx so I took out this card as soon as it was introduced. I find it works perfectly and has excellent security features, including 2FA. If you were not aware of it, please do take a look.

accorian

I am wondering how much longer the Revolut card will continue to be a featured recommendation on MSE.

Not for the first time, I have encountered IT difficulties in regard to my account and, this time, a complete inability to obtain any kind of customer support. Revolut instead appears to rely upon a 'community' forum where any request for help must first be approved by an anonymous 'moderator' who may or may not be around.

That such a request has to go to a "Community" strikes me as downright bizarre, yet this is the only in-app option offered up if "Chat" with Support isn't responding -- which it certainly hasn't today, despite my attempts. That an unknown 'moderator' exists to intercept the management of someone's own private financial affairs strikes me as utterly unacceptable in a UK FCA-regulated financial services provider.

Today's difficulties led me to check the 'Net for any other information about this company. By pure coincidence, it turns out that an investigation by Wired magazine -- comprehensive, exhaustive, the specific details of which Revolut management has refused to rebut -- has been newly published. As an indictment of a business -- any business, never mind one in as regulated a sector as this -- I find it most disturbing:

https://www.wired.co.uk/article/revolut-trade-unions-labour-fintech-politics-storonsky

Also newly published is this from the Daily Telegraph about the resignation of Revolut's Chief Financial Officer:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/2019/02/28/revolut-cfo-resigns-company-faces-compliance-questions/

The MSE team may like to read both articles. The reported business ethos and reported business practices of Revolut appear to be very, very far distant from those which MSE has for so long endorsed and upon which MSE's reputation is founded.

Astewart60

Been using CaxtonFx card for number of years . Found Easyfx card which gives a better rate with no charges .Have yet to see it among best prepaid travel cards , is there a catch to what looks like a good deal.