All about Revolut

Life Hacking
63

Wait, so you charged your Revolut for FREE, as in 3? Half Life 3 confirmed! :stuck_out_tongue:

I logged into my Transferwise and I see they have developed strongly since. They also offer a card and multiple accounts, like Revolut, and they have web access to your accounts, which Revolut doesn’t have. It’s almost all better than Revolut, with the exception of currency exchange fees, which are around the said 0.5%.

I am really surprised that they provide a Swiss IBAN to charge your account and even more surprised that they will send your CHF to UK free of charge. This has to be a hack, or? The make money by charging for currency exchange, so if you don’t exchange, they don’t earn.

You are quoting the pricing of the card, not of the bank transfer. Or is it how it’s done? No way to make a regular bank transfer?

64

The same Page also contained this quote further down:

Spend in currencies in your account: Free

So I assume this applies.

It is probably more of an unintended use (then again these days everything is a hack).

This seems to be the most likely option. I mean this is relatively tame, have you seen US Credit-cards and their insane cashback and rewards programs (there were like some 2-5% ones) that are probably mostly paid by other users paying 20+% interest because they have no Idea how to deal with money?

65

Also we are polluting @Josh’s thread (sorry about that). Could somebody move this to one of the revolut threads if possible?

66

Your wishes are granted :wink:

3 Likes
67

I can confirm the method works! The only (one-time) fee I’ve every paid with this method was the shipping cost of the Revolut card (CHF6.99).
The workflow is slightly convoluted, and maybe not always worth it if you value your time, but I just love avoiding all bank & conversion fees!

  1. Send X CHF to Transferwise from my Swiss bank account (IBAN transfer).
  2. Wait for money to arrive (takes several days, that’s the slightly annoying part).
  3. Load Revolut account in CHF using the Transferwise Debit card (must specify that currency is CHF, even though it suggests using GBP).
  4. Exactly X CHF are on the Revolut account and can be spent anywhere, with cheap / free currency conversions on the fly.

Transferwise will be eliminated from the workflow when Revolut gets a Swiss IBAN, but until then, it works really well!

3 Likes
68

Guys, one more thing. I was just checking top-up methods on Revolut website and they write that top up by credit or debit card is free.

Topping up via debit or credit card in GBP, EUR, USD, PLN, DKK, SEK, NOK, RON, and CHF is completely free.

Can you tell me where’s the catch? Why don’t people simply charge Revolut like this?

69

I just tried topping up Revolut with my credit card, and there were some fees with a tip telling me there would be none with a debit card. For a 1’000.00 top-up, this amounts to 18.40 of fees.

70

I see. Well, the debit card I have is not even supported. They support Maestro and Visa Debit, but not Plus (that’s what PostFinance is using).

71

I have opened an account with TransferWise and requested a debit card. Should be there next week. Seems like the sensible thing to do to use Revolut. (On a side note, I just checked my monthly statement with my current CC and they just charged me the yearly fee… frak. Should have looked into this a month ago.)

72

Swiss banks doesn’t offer the debit card you need for Revolut. Credit card transfer is free from their side, but CC takes 1.5% for foreign transaction (even if in chf)

73

I had an account at UBS for a year and I had a Maestro debit card. You’re saying it wouldn’t be good?

74

I have been using the TransferWise debit card to top up at Revolut without an issue. Just keep in mind that once you receive it, you can only top up 250 a day for around two weeks. TransferWise has a Swiss IBAN so depositing CHF there is pretty straight forward.

75

I don’t remember where I’ve read it, but it seems you need to have a specific debit card to top up.
I honestly have no idea how to top up with any debit card, actually. Is it doable from the app itself?

76

Yes, it’s like paying online. You provide the card number and CVV in the app, and it charges the card itself.

77

Then I don’t get the mess on revolut’s website. why that post about the swiss IBAN if you can just use any simple debit card? I’m puzzled

78

PF and UBS debit cards don’t work. They only have an IBAN on them, there are not 4 sets of 4 digits (like a credit card). You are forced to use the built in scanner and it cannot detect a valid card with the ones I tried, however the moment I gave it a credit card style debit card it worked.

However, on the Revolut thread Top up with UBS, numerous people have said they can transfer for free directly from their UBS accounts.

2 Likes
79

I recently got an E-Mail from TransferWise saying that they will charge 1 CHF for outgoing transfers. Not really a big difference, just letting you know.

80

It is only for bank transfers if I understood it correctly. That means that if you use the TW debit card to load Revolut, this won’t change anything.

1 Like
81

That’s correct. I have tested it recently (again), and Revolut top-ups from a TW debit card are still free.
And anyway the Revolut transfers are free - also no fees on the incoming side (at least in EUR, CHF, and PLN I tested).

2 Likes
82

Just wanted to say that I’m in a country with an exotic currency and first I have used the Revolut card, which gave me an equivalent of 100 CHF for 110 CHF (10% off the market exchange rate) and then I used the TransferWise, and the exchange rate was exactly the same as the market rate.

Kinda sucks that they can’t just make one product that will do well in all circumstances.