(upbeat music)
Hello and welcome.
My name is Emmanuel,
and today we are doing our first card review.
You might've guessed it from the title,
but we are checking out the Revolut Black,
which is a metal card, just arrived in the mail.
So this will be kind of an unboxing video slash overview
of the card, what it has to offer.
It's brand new in Australia.
It's a little bit different than the European version.
So you're gonna check out what features
we have so far in Australia,
and if it's worth your money over the standard free cards.
Let's get into this and open the envelope it came in.
So the metal cards can be had for 200 Australian dollars
if you pay up front.
It's for one year.
It comes with a complimentary express shipping.
So it arrives via DHL.
Only took a couple of days,
and then it comes in this nice little package.
Very fancy.
This is a metal card.
So I think it's 18 grams.
Fairly hefty.
Comparable to my Platinum American Express card.
First impressions, it's pretty nice.
I'm not a big fan of the brushed look.
So, yeah, it's cool, but I mean,
we've got American Express Platinum
which is already a metal card,
and I think that one looks the part.
So why did I go for the black one?
Well first of all, I just wanted to check it out.
I had the basic one before this, just to try it out.
It all depends on the app.
So Revolut is an app.
It allows you to do a whole bunch of things.
It's a digital bank, so we could call this a neobank
comparable to Up Bank in Australia,
Xinja, 86400.
There are a few alternatives.
So in Australia, there's a lot of competition in this niche.
Now the Revolut one is slightly different.
Now they offer a 1% cashback on the black metal cards.
This is only overseas.
In Australia, you get 0.1% cashback,
which is still better than every other debit card
on the market.
However, you're paying $200 a year.
So you have to offset that and see if it's actually
worth your time and money.
Now the app, very user-friendly.
You can pretty much do everything you can do
with a normal bank account.
The cool thing is that you can load this card up.
You can fund it with your frequent flyer credit card.
So you can actually earn points
as well as spending your cash normally.
The other thing is with Revolut,
they have no foreign exchange fees
when you're using your cards,
when you're taking money out overseas,
and also for transferring money overseas.
So I've done some testing, and usually I use InstaReM,
which is regarded as the cheapest money transfer platform
in Australia.
And I've compared it with the Revolut app
and you actually get a better rate.
So for example, I'm sending 1000 Australian dollars
to Europe.
I would get 608.06 euros with InstaReM.
With Revolut, I would get,
let me check real quick.
With Revolut I would get 610.84 euros.
So slightly better rate.
And that's compared to TransferWise and the likes as well.
So Revolut does offer the best rates
for sending money overseas.
There are no limits to it, so it's pretty good.
Then the other thing they advertise is no ATM fees.
Now in Australia, we already have a lot of debit cards
that are completely free
and don't have any ATM fees overseas and no currency markup,
meaning that you get what you pay for.
There's no secret exchange rates.
You get the best rate.
This one is based on the Visa rate.
Surprisingly it seems to be better
than MasterCard these days.
I don't know why.
Now, they advertise with the black one
that you get $1,400 each month free ATM withdrawals.
That's all good and well, but you already get that for free
with most neobanks in Australia.
And the other thing is,
that after that, you're paying 2%, which is huge.
Now, when they advertise no ATM fees,
you have to keep in mind that the ATM provider
may still charge a fee.
So at the end of the day, it is not 100% free
'cause most ATMs will charge you
for using their ATM machine.
The only debit card that does offer
free ATM withdrawals completely free
is the ING Direct in Australia.
That's also free, but you have to spend
X amount of dollars each month to unlock that feature,
so keep that in mind.
So cashback, we've talked about that.
0.1%, better than everything else out there.
So if you do spend a lot of money,
and for some bizarre reason,
you're not into frequent flyer points like I am,
this might work for you.
At the moment, the black card in Australia,
I don't think it's worth the money.
There's just not enough features on it.
So in Europe you can use it for,
you can use your Revolut account for trading.
You can use it for, there's a concierge feature.
They have insurance features as well.
At the moment, this is quite bare bones for what you pay.
Now that said, I do like the feature
of being able to load up my debit card with a credit card,
earn points in process, and then use it overseas
to spend my money.
The other thing I really like about the Revolut cards
is that you can create as many virtual cards
as you want in the app.
So for example, let's say you are trying out a new service.
You don't wanna give them your real credit card number
because you'll probably forget to cancel it
and then it'll charge you, and it's annoying.
You can just generate a virtual card right on the spot,
a disposable one, generate a number,
and use that to pay for whatever it is that you paying for.
So you can then, set and forget when the renewal comes up,
they won't be able to charge you because there's no money,
and it's a dud number.
And you can do that as many times as you want.
So pretty handy.
The other thing is if you lose your card,
they'll just ship out another one.
So there is, oh, that was my cat.
There is forum posts on Reddit
where people are just ordering as many cards as possible.
It's bizarre.
I don't know why, but you know, it's a feature.
And I think that pretty much sums up
Revolut Australia so far.
Let me know what you think of the Revolut.
Will you get the black?
I don't think it's worth the money yet.
I think they can improve on the features.
Oh, one thing I forgot.
Lounge Key.
Apparently you can buy Lounge Key with this now.
The thing is, I think you get one free-
they don't really advertise,
and I can't really find in the terms and conditions.
So I believe you get one free lounge entry
into the Lounge Key network.
Lounge Key, similar to Priority Pass
if you're familiar with that.
I get unlimited Priority Pass
through my American Express card,
so I've got no need for it.
And then they advertise that you can purchase
Lounge Key passes when you need them,
which you also can do at the lounge,
so I don't see the actual benefit of that.
But it is an advertised feature.
Some people might find it useful, the one free Lounge Key.
I think the main reason why you would spend $200 on this
for a year of use is the cashback feature.
So if you really hate credit cards,
and you only wanna use debit cards,
or maybe if you are too young to have a credit card,
this is great for people that can't have a credit card yet.
So to get started and at least earn some sort of reward
for spending your money
that you would spend otherwise anyway,
this is a great idea.
So in that case, it might actually be beneficial.
Apart from that, I will definitely be sticking
to my normal credit cards.
I will use this for overseas travel
where I need a little bit of cash out of the ATM
to spend the local currencies
because I do like the idea that I can lock this.
It's very easy to manage on the app.
You can manage your money,
you can transfer money internationally really fast.
The best rates.
So that's definitely something that I use,
sending money back to Europe for example.
Apart from that, that's pretty much the first look
at the Revolut Black.
Let me know what you think about the Black.
Will you get one?
Will you stick to the basic one?
Yeah.
If you liked the video-
Like the video, and hopefully I will see in the next one,
another card review.
Maybe we look at a credit card,
maybe look at another debit card.
There are a lot of free debit cards here in Australia.
Similar features, they're absolutely free.
For example, the Up Bank debit card.
We have an exclusive $10 signup bonus for that.
Absolutely free.
Link is in the description, so go grab one.
Support a channel.
Thank you very much, and I'll see you next time.
Hm, that's great coffee.
(upbeat music)