Santander Zero Credit Card Questions

vienly

Hi,

Couple of questions if anyone can advise please (Thanks)

1) Is there a withdraw limit set by Santander if I was to withdraw money from a cashpoint abroad, or would that be set by the cashpoint provider (bank)?

2) Who sets the exchange rates at the cashpoint, Mastercard or the ATM cashpoint provider (bank)?

Thanks

chattychappy

1) Set by Santander. It's the equivalent of £300 per day. "per day" is UK time, and it is timed pretty much to the minute in my experience. It applies across all withdrawals for the (UK) day. I withdrew £200 in Saigon and 15 hours later couldn't get anymore than £100 in Paris. I suppose some ATMs might impose a lower limit if they had only low value notes or because of local restrictions. Of course you're also subject to your credit limit.

2) If you don't get a choice, then you should get the MASTERCARD rate, which is pretty much the interbank rate. If the machine offers to do the conversion for you (DCC), then refuse and you'll also get the MASTERCARD rate. If you allow the machine to convert and charge you in GBP, then a typical loading in my experience is 7 to 9%.

NiftyDigits

There is a daily limit plus as well as a proportion of your total credit limit.
Mastercard.

vienly

chattychappy wrote: »

1) Set by Santander. It's the equivalent of £300 per day. "per day" is UK time, and it is timed pretty much to the minute in my experience. It applies across all withdrawals for the (UK) day. I withdrew £200 in Saigon and 15 hours later couldn't get anymore than £100 in Paris. I suppose some ATMs might impose a lower limit if they had only low value notes or because of local restrictions. Of course you're also subject to your credit limit.

2) If you don't get a choice, then you should get the MASTERCARD rate, which is pretty much the interbank rate. If the machine offers to do the conversion for you (DCC), then refuse and you'll also get the MASTERCARD rate. If you allow the machine to convert and charge you in GBP, then a typical loading in my experience is 7 to 9%.

Brilliant, thank you for the quick and informative response!

YorkshireBoy

1) Could be both, but my Zero card is £500. Can't remember if there's a cash limit on the card, but my limit is large enough for me not to have to worry about it.

2) Could be either, depending on which button you press! The one you want is usually tagged 'without conversion'.

vienly

Thanks all! One less thing I need to worry about

chattychappy

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

but my Zero card is £500..

Wow. I only get £300 and I'm pretty sure that was the advertised figure when I applied, some years ago. I mostly now use Clarity which is £500.

As an aside, once again, Zero fraud prevention has gone into overdrive. After doing exactly what I have done many times before (withdraw £300 at a certain ATM in Hsinchu, Taiwan), I had 4 missed calls on my mobile from them including a voice message. As it was bed time by the time I noticed, I thought I'd call in the morning. No such luck, the computer started calling my mobile again, starting at about 3am local time. I only managed to answer and successfully navigate the "system" on the 3rd effort.

If I had been paying normal roaming rates, this would have cost several quid. Thing is, I did previously opt out of this system, prefering instead just to have my card blocked. It seems to have come back to life.

vienly

After reading your comments I've decided to apply for the Clarity card also, however in the past for whatever reason they had rejected me, but this time accepted.

So now I have a bumped up limit of £800 combined

Planning on going to Hong Kong for 2 weeks, I thought it would be a better idea to withdraw money from the cashpoints there than take money out here and change it here not getting market rate.

I assume the cashpoints there are market rate as you guys have mentioned above.

I also read somewhere Hang Seng bank cashpoints don't charge anything so it's a win/win so long as I pay off the card straight away online.

pauljoecoe

Don't forget you will immediately be charged interest on these cash withdrawals whcih will run until you pay the amounts off. If I am using cash on my Clarity card and I am away for a while I make an online payment back to the card to repay it almost immediately therefore minimising interest charges.

vienly

If I worked it out correctly withdrawing £1000 in cash over 2 weeks would cost me (19.5% / 365 days = 0.0534% per day x 14 days = 0.747% of £1000 = £7.47) at most, but I will be paying it off as soon as I see it by logging in online.

Or to break it down further, £0.53 a day in charges, not bad

YorkshireBoy

vienly wrote: »

If I worked it out correctly withdrawing £1000 in cash over 2 weeks would cost me (19.5% / 365 days = 0.0534% per day x 14 days = 0.747% of £1000 = £7.47) at most, but I will be paying it off as soon as I see it by logging in online.

Or to break it down further, £0.53 a day in charges, not bad

There's a flaw in your calculation.

Hint: What's your average balance over the 2 weeks?