MasterCard estimated exchange rate when traveling

It would be great to have the Mastercard exchange rate appear in the app when traveling, and explain that it is only an estimation. The app could tell that the user is currently not in the UK and next time the app accesses the web to download the current rate and cache it for when traveling without Internet (with a timestamp)

What do you guys Think?

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Or always display a second notional value in the currency of your choice wherever you areā€¦i.e. even if in UK have option to display approx equivalents of your GBP transactions and account balance in say US$ or ā‚¬UR

Once youā€™re signed up for the early access to travel reports, you do receive a feed item with the MasterCard exchange rate when you arrive in a country & the message mentionā€™s that the rate is an estimate -

When you spend, the amount paid is displayed in both the local currency & GBP.

Travel reports are explained in more detail in this post -

The piece thatā€™s not currently available is the current dayā€™s rate, from day 2 onwards (thereā€™s no need for live rates because the rate will change by the time the transaction settles anyway).

Having it cached so that it can be used to calculate how much something will cost in advance, while youā€™re offline, would be useful.

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The app does do that.

But not this -

It looks like the travel reports option is essentially exactly what I was looking for. Great job and canā€™t wait for it to be pushed out!!

I was looking essentially for an information center I could use instead of having to access the mastercard exchange rate directly.

Thanks everyone

Iā€™ve only had the opportunity to join recently and the only feature I seem to have on Android is topup, freeze, view timeline of transactions, and a basic encite to these transactions

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yep. not interested in any transaction I do in another currency showing in the local currency and GBP but all my transactions done in GBP also displayed in say EUR, CHF or AUD

Great! Iā€™m not sure that the reports are available for Android yet & theyā€™re not on the roadmap. But Monzo is aiming for feature parity so theyā€™ll get there.

I see, I think your request is slightly different to Deanā€™s in that case. It might be worth posting it separately. My guess is that the functionality that youā€™re looking for would be developed once Monzo expands into Europe.

Iā€™m intrigued about how often the rate does change, as I thought it basically only once a day. The Mastercard page: https://www.mastercard.us/en-us/consumers/get-support/convert-currency.html Monzo directs us to in the ā€˜Welcome to [COUNTRY]ā€™ message only supports the ability to add a date, yet I managed to recieve two slightly different rates for different times on the same date.

I know thereā€™s only Ā£0.08 difference, but as the pound is faffing about so much at the moment, Iā€™d been working on the basis that there was 24 hours between Exchange Rate changes. Probably exceedingly naive, but intriguing nonetheless.

BTW: Mastercard also quotes a slightly different rate, but Iā€™m assuming thatā€™s down to the highlighted text. Is this the actual rate which will ā€˜settle in a few daysā€™ according to Monzo, and will that change in my app?

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I thought (perhaps wrongly) that the MasterCard rate was live and changing by the minute

I think youā€™re probably right, but Iā€™m just wondering if there is at least an hourly graph view we can see. Iā€™ve probably just not done enough research, I just thought it looked a bit odd in my feed mostly, especially if the amount is definitely going/subject to change. (Which, if it is, Iā€™d like to know whether this will also change my balance and feed as well.)

Thanks for sharing this, Iā€™ll let someone from Monzo answer as Iā€™d like the conclusive answer to this & I donā€™t want to create any confusion.

I donā€™t even know whether thereā€™s a difference between the way that ATM withdrawals vs transactions are processed, in terms of authorisation & settlement.

The only question I can answer is that the app will show you the final transaction amount once it settles - the figure will be updated.

Would you mind posting a link to that page from your screenshot of MasterCard website? This is the page -

https://www.mastercard.us/en-us/consumers/get-support/convert-currency.html

I assumed that youā€™d posted the link to the page displaying the historic rates. I didnā€™t recognise the page because itā€™s been redesigned!

It looks like it might be useful.

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blog post from way back when -

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The graph shows seems to be from MasterCard US not MasterCard Europe so not sure if they handle things differently, but that page seems to be not real-time but historic and perhaps shows daily averages or midday rates? but of course they donā€™t explain that :slight_smile:

the link was in his post as Mastercard Currency Converter | Currency Exchange Rate Calculator

Hmmmā€¦ thatā€™s the one linked from inside the App, so I imagine itā€™s the one they use.

@anon95680666, that is also one hell of a blog post. Iā€™ll need to read it again (and again) to actually get to grips with it, but Iā€™m still not sure whether it answers the question as to whether there is somewhere we can view the history of ā€œexchange ratesā€¦ Fixed based on a 60 second sample at a given time of dayā€ or their Mid Rates, and if thatā€™s even what Mastercard and Monzo use.

Genuinely, I donā€™t actually care, but Iā€™ve started down this rabbit hole, so Iā€™ll keep having a look until the oven beeps.

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Turns out that page is the one thatā€™s been referenced throughout the community, MasterCard have just redesigned it within the past week or so. Iā€™m pretty sure itā€™s the midday rate that theyā€™re showing us there.

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I couldnā€™t find the answer there either. So I thought Iā€™d post the question there which means itā€™ll be visible at the bottom of the post for anyone else who reads the blog :slight_smile:

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Hereā€™s your answer :slight_smile:

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Maybe the day/date when the M/card rate changes is based on GMT ( or some other international time zone) and not on ā€œlocalā€ time :thinking: