I recently travelled to Europe and had a very uncomfortable experience trying to use my debit card for a security deposit in a hotel. In the spirit of never having to go through that again, which of these credit cards would you pick?
Also open to any other suggestions. Mainly looking for no international fees, no/very low annual fee, some travel insurance + any additional insurances are a bonus. A relatively easy to use app would be great too.
Thanks in advance :)
I looked at latitude, but no international travel insurance :(
They did for a while after covid but gone again now I guess.
I have Latitude & BankWest. Just handy to cover your bases.
Bendigo because they are an ethical bank!
I concur. I usually don’t go out of my way to seek out ethical products and services for neutral products (and often the premium is substantial) but when it is a close thing it is a good decider.
Share more please. Ethical towards the customer relationship or the vacuous type. I'm seeking the former.
Bendigo bank branches are owned by local shareholders, typically members of the community who join together because the want a bank branch.
In my community, initial investors all chipped in $5k, I think there were 100 of them.
These people elect the board who runs the branch, who operate it as a Bendigo agency.
In my community, the local branch provides a lot of support to local charities, sports teams and other good causes.
They also favour branch counter service, and opened in another local town when the last big bank closed.
I mean, they are still a bank, but more like a building society or credit union - not just cutting costs and stripping services to pay more to investors.
@mskeggs: Thanks for sharing. Appreciate you taking the time 🙏🏻. Going to have a closer look at them.
Thanks, I did look at this - I used my Macquarie debit card last trip with no issues (bar one). Just looking for the personal experience of others!
I've got the bankwest and used it for pre paid canada expense which equaled the google cad/aud rate. also has some solid free travel insurance
Very sad that Bendigo is closing down their operations in Nauru.
Nobody knows Bankwest, might as well get the full CBA card. Their app is fine if you have internet so super safe. Xfer fees are refunded.
Ubank debit card was the fastest. Westpac are just robbers!
I have both and I use the Bankwest while travelling, mainly out of habit though.
Bendigo has a joint cardholder which my partner and I find useful, might be a factor if you're travelling with someone. Bankwest is easier to set up auto payments from external savings accounts, Bendigo will do it but only from Bendigo accounts. Both apps are pretty good, Bendigo's maybe a tiny bit nicer.
Travelling soon. I opened an HSBC Everyday Global Account. Zero fees. They use the Visa Exchange rate for currency conversion. That's roughly 1% on either side of the average rate you'd see on Google. Opened 2 days ago. Card should be delivered tomorrow or next Wednesday (2 to 3 business days).
The Travel Wallets are scams. Stay away.
Bank charges you 4% converting in and another 4% out. That's over and above the Visa or MasterCard mark-up.
They use the Visa Exchange rate for currency conversion.
Not quite. They use the HSBC rate for any of the 9 foreign currencies you can hold in the account (i.e. the most common ones); it is only for other currencies that the Visa exchange rate is used. Read the Ts&Cs carefully.
You are correct that converting into one of the 9 currencies will be performed at the HSBC rate. I don't intend converting. Simply going to leave the funds in AUD. That will be converted using the Visa Rate. This was confirmed by the consultant and is stated as such in the T&C's.
Hmmm, not from my reading of the T&Cs.
See https://www.hsbc.com.au/content/dam/hsbc/au/docs/accounts/tr…
Page 11
- Overseas transactions
Quote: "Where a currency is not one of the listed currencies available on the Everyday
Global Account (see above for the list of available currencies) or is a restricted
currency … the money will be deducted from the AUD account and ATM withdrawals will be automatically converted
into the local currency at the Visa exchange rate."
- Where you don’t have enough foreign currency:
Quote: "If you use your Visa Debit card to make payments or withdraw from an ATM in
a particular foreign currency and you don’t have enough money in your foreign
currency sub- account, we’ll deduct the full amount of the transaction from your
AUD account (applying the HSBC Daily Exchange Rate – please see clause
‘Foreign currencies’ in the Personal Banking Booklet). If you don’t have enough
money in your AUD account, we won’t authorise the payment."
@leigh8904: Will look into that. I didn't opt in to any additional currencies on the account - there was a specific option to add and I opted not to. None are thus listed on my account. I was specifically told that any transactions on my upcoming trip would be at the Visa rate. It's unclear whether this was because they recalled the destination - not one of the nine currency destinations - or whether it was because of how the account was startup. I'll query.
@OrderedChaos: If you can/preferred only use a debit card, I suggest to look at Macquarie or Bankwest transaction account. I had used them in NZ last earlier this year and all went well. Exchange rates were pretty good. ATM withdrawal with no fee (used mainly Macquarie card for that) from BNZ or ASB.
latitude