81–90 of 129 posts
In the Netherlands we just let dumb foreigners use their creditcard instead of making things complicated for them. You'll be charged an arm and a leg for it though but if you stick to the approved tourist areas your Visacard will be accepted.
You can of course use your credit card / cash to make spends while travelling in India as well. But UPI will feel more convenient. And it works everywhere.
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Hey best of luck with this! I would have loved something like this on my trip to India. To get anywhere and do anything required increasingly elaborate setups and even personal password sharing between myself and new inlaws that hardly knew me. A lot of time and money was wasted and somehow in the process I was banned from Uber for several months. I have the same advice for you I would give to basically every other b…
> It's so difficult to get around before you get some kind of digital payment setup. FWIW your outside-of-India Uber account should Just Work™.
> The Cheq UPI app works ONLY in India and we must verify your passport in-person before activating the UPI wallet. LOL, in person passport verification, really? No thanks. And even if that would be OK, where and when? The bullet points suggest that there is no sensible way for a foreigner to pay in India so I just won't go to India. That said, paying cash is probably an experience not as bad as depicted. I've been t…
https://transcorpint.com/find-us
Multiple branches. We can also arrange for at home verification.
> The bullet points suggest that there is no sensible way for a foreigner to pay in India so I just won't go to India.
Hahha, Think of Cheq UPI as a convenience for the foreigner while visiting India.
I am in SF currently and pay 3-5$ extra each time when I withdraw cash from ATMs.
Would've loved to use an app like Cheq here itself. But I don't think there's a parallel to what we're building in the US
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We're still playing with our pricing. 10$ joining fees and a 3.5% markup on adding funds is the current business plan. We'll observe customer usage over the next 3-6 months and figure out if fixed fee subscriptions can be cheaper. > Also how did you build a legal structure to allow this ? We've partnered with Transcorp International Limited to operate the Cheq app in India. They are an RBI approved AD2 and PPI licens…
3.5% is brutal. Wise is a near 0% solution, with just one time setup fee. I get the convenience aspect, but most people foreigners visit would accept a card (i guess?)
But cross border payments are expensive to facilitate. And this is the best rate we've been able to figure out currently.
Btw, In the US, Most ATMs are charging 3-5$ extra each time I withdraw cash. Plus the currency conversion charges.
Our prices are definitely better.
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3.5% is brutal. Wise is a near 0% solution, with just one time setup fee. I get the convenience aspect, but most people foreigners visit would accept a card (i guess?)
I can understand why 3.5% might sound high. But cross border payments are expensive to facilitate. And this is the best rate we've been able to figure out currently. Btw, In the US, Most ATMs are charging 3-5$ extra each time I withdraw cash. Plus the currency conversion charges. Our prices are definitely better.
Do you pass on the wholesale rate from your provider directly, or is there some spread too? My bank Monzo for example gives me Mastercard's rate on the day the payment (in-person abroad or online in foreign currency) settles, so I always use it for such transactions even though it wouldn't otherwise be my first choice of card.
(Or alternatively, can I be charged INR to load Cheq account, rather than card's native currency? Then anyone with a better option for the conversion can do that.)
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We're still playing with our pricing. 10$ joining fees and a 3.5% markup on adding funds is the current business plan. We'll observe customer usage over the next 3-6 months and figure out if fixed fee subscriptions can be cheaper. > Also how did you build a legal structure to allow this ? We've partnered with Transcorp International Limited to operate the Cheq app in India. They are an RBI approved AD2 and PPI licens…
The summary says: > Apart from the 10$ account opening fees, there are no other costs for using the product. Funds added can be spent anywhere across India. As mentioned above, there is a 3.5% fee for adding funds. I looked into Cheq before my recent trip to India. After doing the math I realised it was cheaper to take out some cash at the airport for smaller transactions and tips. I had no issue using my credit card…
I'd definitely prefer this next time, if I could count on being able to set it up. (Or knew I'd go again so set it up while there for next time.)
In the Netherlands we just let dumb foreigners use their creditcard instead of making things complicated for them. You'll be charged an arm and a leg for it though but if you stick to the approved tourist areas your Visacard will be accepted.
ignoring the tone of this comment, “charged an arm and a leg” = pennies. i guess pennies are now valuable in the netherlands? in any case, the Dutch supermarket chain albert heijn still doesn’t accept any cards except some non starter locally developed ones. i always found it interesting that the netherlands are so far behind places like the UK when it comes to payments. even countries in SE Europe have better paymen…
Some debit cards (or pre-paid 'charge cards', such as any specifically marketed for travel) like Monzo bank's don't, are just like using it at home in GBP (as long as you make sure you're being charged the foreign currency, not 'helpfully' converted for you (at a terrible rate) by the merchant's PoS provider).
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Won’t vpns circumvent geofencing? I use one often.
Yup they will. Because of Reserve Bank of India guidelines, Cheq needs to at least show that they are making an effort to prevent domestic transactions being made outside India
Because, on a basic high-level look, why would a country not want inflows of foreign cash, typically you do want to sell goods/services for foreign money, good for GDP.