Wise card doesn't work on Amazon

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Wise

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  L3tstaxth1s on 12/09/2024 - 20:54

  My one works fine. Initially i had issues with Visa generally so relied on Amex. That issue seems to have disappeared. How about Revolut? Works for me as well.

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  ace310 on 12/09/2024 - 21:22

  I have used wise many times on Amazon, just not in last couple of months. So if that has changed anything, not sure.

  In saying that, have you used wise before on Amazon or is it the first time. Have you tried saving the card in the payment methods section? Try adding a virtual card there and see. I think there is additional security, which is turned ON in wise. Like to confirm the transaction, you need to approve it in wise app. Not sure if that's by default or you need to enable it.

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    sunshinenz on 13/09/2024 - 17:23

    Yes I tried saving it as payment method, as well as adding on the fly. Both failed. I've never used Wise on Amazon before. I've given up now.

    On a different issue: I booked a hotel on agoda, paying in AUD but using an NZ credit card. Then I changed my mind and cancelled the booking. I was fully refunded in terms of AUD but in NZD I was short changed by 5%, which can be quite a lot when booking a few hotel nights.

    Is it fair for the NZ bank to charge forex commission and again on the refund like that? (We can ignore forex rate movements in this case, the exchange rate hardly moved between when I made the booking and when I cancelled.)

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      wildeny on 13/09/2024 - 19:42

      Is it fair for the NZ bank to charge forex commission and again on the refund like that? (We can ignore forex rate movements in this case, the exchange rate hardly moved between when I made the booking and when I cancelled.)

      In the past (long time ago), I had a credit card like this and complained this to the issued bank. Bank said it's because of Visa, so I switched to MasterCard.

      However, according to Consumer NZ:

      Visa in NZ will no longer charge currency conversion fees on refunds (2019 April)

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      Alan6984 on 13/09/2024 - 23:04

      Is it fair for the NZ bank to charge forex commission and again on the refund like that? (We can ignore forex rate movements in this case, the exchange rate hardly moved between when I made the booking and when I cancelled.)

      I appreciate that this is not what you will want to hear, but my view is that it is entirely fair. I'll illustrate why I think that with an example (the rates aren't right - just examples, but I will assume that the actual forex rate does not move, and there is no 'bid-offer spread'):

      You first asked your bank to pay out AU$ 100 (by converting it from NZD) which your bank did, converting at, say, NZ$ 110 plus a fee of say, NZ$ 2.50, coming to a total of NZ$ 112.50.

      You then asked your bank to receive AU$ 100 (and convert back to NZD) which your bank did, and converted it back to NZD for you, crediting you with NZ$110 less a fee of NZ$2.50, coming to a total of NZ$ 107.50.

      You 'lost' $5.00, but that was because you asked your bank to do two currency conversions for you - there is always going to be a 'fee' for that.

      In reality, your bank might not charge a fee, and might load it into the cross rates, but the principle will be the same. You converted a sum from NZD into AUD, and then converted AUD back into NZD, and paid for the service in each direction.

      Having said that, I don't know what the terms and conditions that you 'shook hands on' with your bank say - might be worth checking those.

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        kumspal on 15/09/2024 - 01:13

        Adding to the above comment - bank buy rate is generally not the same as bank sell rate for the same inter currencies . For example :

        ANZ website ( https://tools.anz.co.nz/foreign-exchange/fx-rates/)
        for Australian Dollar
        ANZ buys AUD dollar @ 0.8978 rate
        ANZ sell AUD dollar @ 0.9388 rate

        this is where wise card is very useful . it cuts loss in exchange rate conversion.

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          Alan6984 on 15/09/2024 - 22:08

          +1

          @kumspal: That is what 'cross rates' and the 'bid-offer spread' refers to.

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      richms on 16/09/2024 - 14:05

      +1

      If they didnt do that with the conversion, then people would use the refund as a way of speculating on exchange rate shifts and only refund things if they would get more back than they have spent.

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  flembots on 14/09/2024 - 10:12

  I used my Wise on amazon last week

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  blam on 16/09/2024 - 18:34

  +1

  I’ve had this problem before. You just need to retry with the same card 1-2 times and it eventually goes through