Got a prepaid Mastercard? You won't be offered rip-off currency conversions from this week - MSE New 8 April 2019 at 5:24PM in Flights, Currency & Car Hire 8 replies 1.7K views

Former_MSE_Naomi

We've long warned travellers to pay in the local currency rather than pounds to avoid hideous exchange rates - and from Friday, if you've a Mastercard prepaid card you won't be offered transactions in pounds at all...

Read the full story:
'Got a prepaid Mastercard? You won't be offered rip-off currency conversions from this week'

Click reply below to discuss. If you haven’t already, join the forum to reply.

NoodleDoodleMan

So, what is/are the best prepaid Mastercard(s) for Euroland ?

There were different T&CS involved, it took a while to work out the pros and cons when comparing.

zerog

Revolut is the best prepaid card, but I think they don't offer Mastercards for UK customers.

Otherwise it's any card that offers some sort of cashback deal for new customers e.g. load £50 into euros at a poor rate, but get £10 extra free (as long as the rate is not 17% poorer than the interbank rate)

dj1471

zerog wrote: »

Revolut is the best prepaid card, but I think they don't offer Mastercards for UK customers.

Revolut are now a bank so their cards are presumably classed as debit cards. You're correct that all new customers get Visa cards, existing customers get to keep their MasterCards for now.

I don't think there are any good prepaid cards left, they've all converted to full bank accounts.

Squirreling

I’m pleased that Mastercard are simplifying matters. I have a pre paid FairFX card that works well and will now work better!

etienneg

The official reason for doing this is:
"Mastercard says it's made the new rule because customers who opt to pay with a prepaid travel card have already effectively chosen to convert their pounds to the local currency. This means it doesn't make sense for these customers to be given the choice to convert the transaction back into pounds."

So, if I write to my CREDIT or DEBIT card issuer and say that I NEVER want to be offered the DCC option, I have explicitly made the same choice. Will they then change my card to one that prevents DCC always?

NoodleDoodleMan

The Caxton FX looked a decent deal - no fees for usage.

Perhaps they recoup that by a pooer exchange rate ?

dj1471

NoodleDoodleMan wrote: »

The Caxton FX looked a decent deal - no fees for usage.

Perhaps they recoup that by a pooer exchange rate ?

Yep. It's not terrible, but beatable.

NoodleDoodleMan

Yep. It's not terrible, but beatable.

The (generally) fee free aspects will balance out the slightly better FX rates of other cards which do charge fees.


Six of one, and half a dozen of the other.