Travel specialist card vs National card

Mikkelzzz3

Hi all. I have the Aqua Reward card. I go to Denmark once a month, where I also have a debit card issued by a danish bank, and the currency in crowns.

I usually have most of my funds here in UK, but so far I have always just used my danish card when in Denmark.

Considering I won't withdraw any money, would the Aqua Reward card give me the exact same price as using my danish card?

[Deleted User]

It will give you the Mastercard exchange rate, with no fees.

Mikkelzzz3

Okay. So I suppose using my danish card is better. According to mastercard online currency converter, 1000 dkk would get me, 123,66£.

Using my danish banks currency converter 123,66£ would get me 1109,13 dkk.

1000 dkk is 111,49£, so the mastercard is noticeable more expensive costing 12.17£ more. So Mastercard charges 10.91578% commissions. Stunningly high.

I would not have expected the difference this big, as I thought with a 0% credit card, and Mastercards "low" exchange rate, should give me the perfect conversion rate.

Thanks for reminding me that it uses the mastercard exchange.

bigadaj

Your calculations don't sound right, there may be a difference but it would be nowhere near that high.

Mikkelzzz3

I am definitely right though.

1: went to Mastercard currency converter, typed 1000 dkk, and it showed me what I would get in pound.

2: Then I went to my danish banks currency converter, and typed in the same amount of pound Mastercard showed, and it showed me the 1109 dkk for the same amount of pound.,

So my calculations are right.

Nebulous2

You can't possibly be right - unless your bank is trading currency at a significant loss. Mastercard rate gives 1000 kroner for £123.66, as you said.

The mid-market forex rate, which no-one actually gets, is 1000 kroner for £122.60 Less than that is not likely to be possible without breaking the bank.

What you must be looking at with your bank is how many kroner they want to give you £123.66, which is something quite different.

bigadaj

Mikkelzzz3 wrote: »

I am definitely right though.

1: went to Mastercard currency converter, typed 1000 dkk, and it showed me what I would get in pound.

2: Then I went to my danish banks currency converter, and typed in the same amount of pound Mastercard showed, and it showed me the 1109 dkk for the same amount of pound.,

So my calculations are right.

Danske bank calculator shows very much the opposite, are you calculating the inverse somewhere?

eDicky

Mikkelzzz3 wrote: »

I am definitely right though.

Obviously not, but you need to give a link to the Danish bank's currency calculator and other details for us to see why.

Is the source of the DKK on your debit card Danish, or transferred from a GBP account? If the latter, how transferred?

Roger1

i don't follow the OP's theory, but using MSE's Travelmoneymax @ 08:59 this morning, I get these results for spending 1,000 DKK:

• £117.54 using Nationwide FlexPlus Visa debit card for cash in ATM
• £117.54 with Nationwide Select Visa credit card purchase
• £122.77 with Halifax Clarity MC credit card purchase
• £122.77 with Santander Zero MC credit card purchase
• £122.77 using Aqua Reward MC credit card purchase

On this limited example, Visa beats MC, but FlexPlus may not be available to everybody.

Aqua Reward beats the other MasterCards as it earns 0.5% cashbasck.

SnowTiger

Roger1 wrote: »

i don't follow the OP's theory, but using MSE's Travelmoneymax @ 08:59 this morning, I get these results for spending 1,000 DKK:

• £117.54 using Nationwide FlexPlus Visa debit card for cash in ATM
• £117.54 with Nationwide Select Visa credit card purchase
• £122.77 with Halifax Clarity MC credit card purchase
• £122.77 with Santander Zero MC credit card purchase
• £122.77 using Aqua Reward MC credit card purchase

On this limited example, Visa beats MC, but FlexPlus may not be available to everybody.

Aqua Reward beats the other MasterCards as it earns 0.5% cashbasck.

Are those figures from the app? I couldn't find them at http://travelmoney.moneysavingexpert.com/, which suggests Halifax's Clarity as the best card.

Visa's exchange rate for Danish Krone yesterday would have bought 1,000 Danish Krone for £123.69.

Roger1

SnowTiger wrote: »

Are those figures from the app?

Yes, on my mobile.