Is Revolut Safe?

Samantha295

I am getting married abroad in September and have been paying for my suppliers using Revolut. I was intending on transferring the maximum £1,000 into euros each month to save on paying fees on my transfers.
Although, someone has now advised me that they are not FSCS regulated. Are they safe to have upwards of £9,000 of my money? What protections are in place to guarentee my money? I have tried looking online but can't find the information I am after. Thanks in advance 

grumbler

Samantha295 said:

I was intending on transferring the maximum £1,000 into euros each month to save on paying fees on my transfers.

Although, someone has now advised me that they are not FSCS regulated. Are they safe to have upwards of £9,000 of my money?

Yes, AFAIK, there's no FSCS protection.

If you are concerned, just don't transfer each month and don't build a big balance there? Keep money in some more safe account and transfer as much as you need to pay/withdraw.

As simple as that.

flaneurs_lobster

FSCS is not a regulator, it's a scheme to reimburse account holders if an institution becomes unable to pay them. Revolut is not a Bank and is not covered by this guarantee. 

Personally, I've been happy to have a grand's-worth of Euros on my Revolut card to use while travelling. I'd be wary of having more than that deposited with them (in EUR or GBP). Do you need to have £9K on the one card at one time?

I'm sure others can suggest other options.

brucefan_2

I have used Revolut to hold up to £1000 worth of Euros for spending whilst abroad on holiday, funding regularly each month over the course of a year to rebuild my spending money.

I have found the platform reliable and easy to use.  The virtual card access had been useful too.

Personally I wouldn't hold much more than that on the card but that's just me. I prefer to have my different 'pots' with different institutions.
David

wmb194

Samantha295 said:

I am getting married abroad in September and have been paying for my suppliers using Revolut. I was intending on transferring the maximum £1,000 into euros each month to save on paying fees on my transfers.
Although, someone has now advised me that they are not FSCS regulated. Are they safe to have upwards of £9,000 of my money? What protections are in place to guarentee my money? I have tried looking online but can't find the information I am after. Thanks in advance 

Fineco, an Italian bank that offers accounts in the UK, and HSBC's new Global Money account are covered by the FSCS and their rates are very competitive. The FSCS will cover non-sterling deposits.

https://www.fscs.org.uk/what-we-cover/#!/synthetix/article/qed00357

Band7

I wouldn’t touch Revolut with a barge pole. They have been  in the news for an exodus of their senior staff and they have twice failed to file their accounts for 2021/22 (still not done as of now). Their application for a banking licence has been in for coming up 2 years, I believe. This is an extraordinarily long time. Challenger bank Kroo got their licence in 2021 within 6 months. Revolut CS does not have a good reputation, to put it mildly.

That said, I don’t have any reason to suggest Revolut would go bust but as a matter of principle I would never put my money in accounts that don’t come with deposit protection

There are several bona fide banks with FSCS protection. Starling or Fineco would be good choices, both have Euro accounts. If you can make all your payments with a debit card, Chase is also an option. They don’t have a Euro account but very decent exchange rate, and you get 1% cashback

 

Marchitiello

I would also recommend  Fineco and HSBC Global Money account (you need to first open one UK current account and then you can add Global Money). I have and use both with larger amounts then £9k

jbrassy

Revolut is ok, but there are definitely better options. As others have said, Revolut has no FSCS protection, so if you have money in the account and it goes bust, you might lose it all. I used to use Revolut all the time on holiday, but their customer service is so bad I stopped using them.

Firstly, I would ask if you can pay the suppliers by card? If so, I would suggest getting a Barclaycard Rewards or Halifax Clarity credit card. These don't charge any fees for overseas spending and you'll get Section 70 protection if something goes wrong with the suppliers. If you pay the balance off in full every month, you'll pay no interest.

If these suppliers don't accept card, then you could use Starling. They are a proper bank with FSCS protection. They are also good for two reasons. First, they offer Euro current accounts which will let you save money in Euros. Second, if you cannot pay your suppliers by card and have to use bank transfer, they offer low fees on overseas transfers. Just looking now, you can send £1000 worth of Euros for a £4.30 fee at the current spot rate (i.e. the best rate you can get).  

Band7

jbrassy said:

Firstly, I would ask if you can pay the suppliers by card? If so, I would suggest getting a Barclaycard Rewards or Halifax Clarity credit card. These don't charge any fees for overseas spending and you'll get Section 70 protection if something goes wrong with the suppliers. If you pay the balance off in full every month, you'll pay no interest.

Very good point about the Section 75 protection (that you wouldn't get with the Chase or other debit cards I mentioned earlier)

jbrassy said:

  

If these suppliers don't accept card, then you could use Starling. They are a proper bank with FSCS protection. They are also good for two reasons. First, they offer Euro current accounts which will let you save money in Euros. Second, if you cannot pay your suppliers by card and have to use bank transfer, they offer low fees on overseas transfers. Just looking now, you can send £1000 worth of Euros for a £4.30 fee at the current spot rate (i.e. the best rate you can get).  

If you have a Starling Euro account, you pay no fees for making Euro payments, online or by debit card. You do pay a 0.4% fee when converting your GBP to EUR (so that's approx the £4.30 you mention).

Fineco would offer a slightly keener bottom line deal but they are generally somewhat slower in near enough everything. If you want minimum delay in everything, Starling is a better choice. Though neither Starling nor Fineco offer you Section 75 protection.....

Samantha295

Thank you so much for your responses, I think based on this I should remove my money out of Revolut and either use Starling or still use Revolut but only when money is being transferred in and then out again immediately     

Band7

If you have Starling, there’s no reason for using Revolut at all for any EUR transactions