Bits: mystery Supercard charges, LAN Madrid to Frankfurt deal back, Luxury Travel Diary deals

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• Andy S says:

  13 Jul13 July 08:18

  Looking at some reviews on play (for the supercard app) they mention Revolut – is this another card like this, any good ? (I assume not as it’s not been mentioned on this site)

  • Rob says:

    13 Jul13 July 08:32

    Revolut is a product for people who can’t get credit cards, which is not exactly the HFP target market. It is fiddly as you need to load it up. Far easier to use a 0% credit card, and the Lloyds Avios card beats it as you earn Avios on top of getting 0%.

    • Sandgrounder says:

      13 Jul13 July 09:47

      Revolut is much more than a product for people who cant get credit cards. You can hold balances in GBP, USD and EUR and swap between them at veey close to spot rates. Topping up and converting £2k when it started to become clear we were brexiting took seconds and saved me quite a bit of cash on the summer spend. You can also send SEPA transfers for free. No point earning options, but it is a useful tool in your wallet.

    • John says:

      13 Jul13 July 12:23

      Really? I thought it uses Mastercard rates.

      Your second sentence is incorrect. Mastercard rates are better than spot over 50% of the time (but you don’t know what it is in advance). Visa rates are fixed for the next working day shortly after midnight CET. If your home currency falls after that, the Visa rate will be better.

      If pilot supercard was still working on June 24/25, you could have withdrawn £1000 in foreign cash at pre-referendum rates.

    • Rob says:

      13 Jul13 July 17:10

      But not so far off that the rewards element from using Supercard or Lloyds Avios would outweigh it ….

• Phil Layton says:

  13 Jul13 July 08:33

  Just returned from Spain last week, and apart from a few PIN declines (which I have never experienced on other cards) it all went well. Everything showed up on the app. Yesterday I noticed 5 new transactions on my linked Tesco card with small transactions of £2 or less marked IC CASH 01 and wondered what they were… until this post of Raffles.
  Separately, on Monday I paid the balance of some accommodation in the US for October and this has gone through twice on the app. I rang support (who after 15mins wait) told me that one was for approval and one was for pending and the funds would be ‘released’ in a few days. However, both transactions have hit the Tesco card and I cannot see a ‘release’ coming without a credit refund going through. Still to be sorted.
  I have to agree, not worth the aggro with all these small charges and worry…shall stick with the Clarity card (and its contactless) in future.

  • Worzel says:

    13 Jul13 July 09:00

    Good move Phil;

    ‘……not worth the aggro with all these small charges and worry…shall stick with the Clarity card….’ .

    Keep domestic and foreign spend separate.

    Annual statement here(Santander Zero-but could be Clarity)- £9k spend(£6k purchases/£3k cash)/£0 interest/ zero aggravation!

    • Callum says:

      13 Jul13 July 10:15

      Why keep them separate?

      • Mr Dee says:

        13 Jul13 July 10:22

        As it can be hard to reconcile which random supercard charges were for business or pleasure as they are not tagged to the original transactions.

      • Worzel says:

        13 Jul13 July 11:40

        Reply to Callum 10:15:

        ‘Why keep them separate?’ .

        There are enough posts here today to summarise why(!)- these posts further to previous discussion on HFP.

        I don’t see any positives, however, if it works for a few then well done.

        Politely posted.

• Mr Bridge says:

  13 Jul13 July 08:39

  As a Pilot user, I experienced problems with charges showing up on the app, although they ever hit my card. I was hoping the new card would prove to be glitch free. Not used it yet, think i will send it back

  • Mr Dee says:

    13 Jul13 July 10:22

    Just keep it or bin it, there wasn’t a charge for it so no need to return it.

• Thywillbedone says:

  13 Jul13 July 09:26

  Have been using the supercard for over a week in Italy and was only checking spend on the app rather than my underlying credit card – have now noticed a raft these mystery “cash” charges. Very very sneaky; depending on how it is handled by Supercard I will likely be binning this card.

• Leon says:

  13 Jul13 July 09:27

  I too have these charges, albeit only totalling a couple of £’s.

  I’d compare the values in the app with what I have been charged, but the app has gone back to wanting me to activate my card. I tried going through the process, but it rejects the last four from my card. So now I’m left with a duff app.

  6 months from now, Super what?

• Nick Price says:

  13 Jul13 July 09:41

  So, reading the comments here and the feedback from @SupercardUK on Twitter, this isn’t really “we didn’t read the fine print”, but more that the Supercard technology is not quite as good with Mastercard as it was with Visa.

  If the comment from John above (https://headforpoints.com/2016/07/13/supercard-additional-fx-charges/comment-page-1/#comment-195581) is accurate – which I believe it is, since he’s done a ton of research – we’re not losing out at all.

  What seems to be happening is that the Supercard system is only ever getting “yesterday’s” rates from Mastercard. These rates then get used in the initial transaction – and show in the App – but once Supercard finally get “today’s” rates one day later, they have to apply a correction to the charge.

  @SupercardUK has stated on Twitter that if the rates had moved the other way, people would have received a refund – of course, we’ve yet to see that happen!

  For me, this means the Supercard is still a great solution for saving money on Foreign Exchange, but it’s no longer better than any other 0% card.
  During the Pilot, it was amazing, since I could submit my expenses (and holiday budgets) immediately without waiting for transactions to clear, since I knew exactly what I was going to be charged. This meant I could happily pay for things abroad for friends, and let them know straight away how much they needed to pay me back… not so easy now!

  • Singing Dwarf says:

    13 Jul13 July 14:12

    In reply to a tweet about somebody querying a 42p charge against a £28.41 transaction, @SupercardUK said “@liam_martin Hi Liam, this will be due to the FX rates changing between the time of purchase & the money leaving your account….” They go on to say “@liam_martin This is reflective of the MasterCard wholesale rate and no extra charges are being made.”

    This doesn’t really make much sense to me – the changing rate between the time of purchase & the money leaving your account? Doesn’t Supercard rely on being able to charge your underlying card at the time of the transaction? Which account are they talking about the money leaving – and why would there be a delay?

• Gulz says:

  13 Jul13 July 09:50

  I spent €1600 on 5th July on Supercard (Supercard said I saved £33 something). Got a charge of £30.59 yesterday as IC Cash from supercard. So effectively I saved maybe just a couple of quid. Not happy about it. Won’t be using Supercard anymore.

  • Mr Dee says:

    13 Jul13 July 10:21

    Awful service there, that just wiped out the most benefit of any points gained

  • Jason Cousins says:

    13 Jul13 July 10:38

    I had similar. I’ve disputed this with my credit card as the second transactions were not authorised.

• signol says:

  13 Jul13 July 09:53

  I did the MAD-FRA flight in J a couple of weeks ago, and made a video report. https://youtu.be/nnOinYZ8B7c

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