Hi, do I need to exchange in the app my currency with the local currency abroad before making payments or withdrawals ? If not what is the use of exchanging in the app ?
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If you plan to use it during the weekend (= Saturday, Sunday British time) it would be advisable to exchange beforehand. Otherwise not.
it gives you the option to fix the exchange rate if you want to. For example if you were taking a long holiday abroad and wanted to take advantage of what you considered to be a very favourable exchange rate at the time.
Also, as said above, it enables you to avoid the poorer weekend exchange rates.
I too am still a bit vague on the purpose of the difference currency ledgers and the facility to change between them.
I sort of get the idea of changing into one of the currencies you will be using over the weekend ahead of rate markup, although that feels a bit weird. What are other circumstances in which you would want to the FX facility to move money between different currency ledgers?
As I said above, if you want to fix the rate of exchange on offer at a particular time.
OK, but how would I know if I wanted/needed to do that? Whatâs the use case for a payment that needs that?
I have yet to use my Revolut card outside the UK. I have a business trip next week (Romania, Hungary, Germany) that I want to use it on, and am keen not to screw it up.
For example
My son is studying in Holland and I make regular payments in euros to his Dutch account.
I recently changed a significant sum fro GBP to EU at around the 1.15 to the pound rate as I thought the rate was good and was unlikely to go higher in the short term.
In this instance I was right (I could have got it wrong however and the exchange rate went the other way). I took the decision to to effectively fix the rate for known future expenditure at a rate I felt to be advantageous.
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Thanks, Tony. I still donât understand when I need to do this, though. How does one determine that the rate is âunlikely to go higherâ?
It seems quite confusing to me - why am I in a better position to know this than Revolut Is?
Looking at the graphs for trends and gut feeling.
You donât âneedâ to - you merely have the option if you want it. If you donât consider it a benefit just take the rate at the time of purchase.
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Not sure what you mean here. Revolut merely follow the market rate.
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Looking at the graphs for trends
I have no idea how to do that. What is the process?
Not sure what you mean here
I am unclear what is unclear about this. I donât know how to know that the rate at particular time is better than it is going to be for the next few days.
That is what you say you are doing, right? You have some means for knowing that the rate Revolut is showing today is better than it will be when you want to make a transaction tomorrow.
This is what speculators do. Quite an art, time and energyâŚ
For example, I have a business trip next week. From Mon night to Thu afternoon Iâll be in Romania, then I travel to Hungary until Friday night, then I am in Germany until Sunday morning.
I understand that I need to estimate my expenditure in Germany in advance and make sure I have that amount on my Euro ledger by 23:59 UTC on Friday.
What about my Romanian Lei and Hungarian Forint costs, though? How do I know at what point to make sure I have adequate funds in those currencies on those ledgers?
As you do not plan to make any purchases on the weekend it should not really matter, unless there are going to be dramatic changes in the exchange rate, which is probably unlikely though and nobody can foresee anyhow (well, some probably can but they wont post here 
).
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Thanks. So, the sensible model is to just use the foreign currency ledgers to make sure that at least some money is available for the bigger transactions (hotel bills, etc) over the weekend, and not to bother with them during the week?
You disagree with Tonyâs suggestion that you use them to fix rates that you know are going to worsen over the next few days?
The information on how to use the product really needs to be improved - this is so confusing for someone who just wants a card to use abroad.
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No, if that is important to you it definitely is a use-case.
I donât pretend to know which way rates will go over the next few days, unfortunately. But if you THINK the current rate is pretty good and you have some significant foreign currency spend coming up buying ahead gives you some certainty. As I said before, you may be completely wrong of course.
If this option carries no perceived benefit then just take the rate at the time.
Oh, OK - yeah, getting certainty on the rate makes sense. I read you as saying you tied in the rate when you knew it was going to get no better over the next few days.