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Travel money update: from my research the 28 Degrees Latitude credit card is the best for credit and UBank seems to be the winner for best debit card.
Both are free to sign up for and it's always good to have multiple payment options overseas in case one fails you. Both have Google Pay/Apple Pay contactless payment options.
Both charge $0 fees for foreign exchange and the UBank card has $0 fees for ATM withdrawals overseas (although local ATM operators may charge their own fee).
28 Degrees uses the Mastercard Exchange Rate and UBank uses the Visa Exchange Rate with no extra fees on top.
UBank has a $2000 (AUD) daily withdrawal limit, which is up from the $1000 limit I've seen on competitors, and no monthly withdrawal limit like some cards do (Wise has a $7000 monthly limit).
So my plan is to use the credit card to pay for things like hotels, meals etc and then use the debit card for ATM withdrawals and as a backup other payments. This means I don't need to keep too much cash sitting on the debit card balance.
I've done a bunch of research and read lots of terms and conditions so hopefully this info can help someone avoid nasty fees and gotchas. The one thing to note is that the exchange rate is calculated when the payment is cleared each time you spend, so if you want to lock in an exchange rate you need to use a travel card which 'loads' foreign currency rather than a debit/credit card.
Does the ubank debit card have to be linked to a specific type of account?
It's linked to a USpend account, which is a normal bank account. You basically open a new bank account with them and they give you a USaver and USpend account. The card they give you is linked to the USpend so you just put your money into that account.
undefined> Both charge $0 fees for foreign exchange and the UBank card has $0 fees for ATM withdrawals
This is awesome, so much money can be lost with fees , tho with possible atm fees it's still a good idea to make fewer bigger withdrawals than many small withdrawals.
Why UBank over ING? One benefit UBank seems to be missing is the free ATM withdrawals where ING covers the ATM vendor’s fee too. I think it’s 5 withdrawals with the fee covered. So the withdrawal is completely free. Card was pretty widely accepted payment in the US so I barely took any cash out. In Japan (my most recent trip) a little less so, but it was easy to stay under 5 withdrawals in a month.
I’m just curious because I’ll switch over to UBank for my next trip.
Have a look at the ING fees and limits PDF. They've stopped the international vendor rebates, which you only got for the first 5 transactions anyway, but they charge $5 every time you withdraw from an international ATM and also charge you 3% of the transaction. That's what they'll rebate by the looks and only the first 5 times if you meet their criteria to get the special features.
UBank doesn't have any of these requirements and just never charges those fees so no need to rebate.
Oh I didn't know the ATM vendor rebates are stopping! And foriegn transaction fee reimbursements too, that's crazy. The rebate was the main benefit it had over its competitiors when I did my research. Will be switching over for my next trip.
ING is ending their foreign transaction fee reimbursement in August.