are you a savvy saver?
In the past year, exchange rates have rocketed to an average of 4.6% at major currency converters meaning travellers will lose out by a typical £135.77 per household which is equivalent to one month’s energy bill for the average home in the UK.
The research by the peer-to-peer currency exchange service shows that the average adult traveller spends £583.56 on a single trip abroad and takes more than two foreign holidays a year.
Whilst savvy savers get online to book bargain breaks abroad, research reveals that about 26 million people from the UK will travel abroad and spend £33 billion buying foreign currency. The research collected from 1,000 people reveals that due to hidden charges and unseen elevated rates, £1,488,252,930 worth of customers’ cash will be lost.
Last summer 6 in 10 holidaymakers in the UK said they believed the reason they lost out on money was down to the fact that they didn’t understand the travel money exchange rates.
Founder and CEO of WeSwap, Jared Jesner said: "This research has proved that people are confused by currency exchange rates, which is unnecessarily wasting everyone a lot of money.”
Additionally, 50% of Britons used their debit or credit cards up to five times while abroad on low cost items. 12% used their cards on a cup of coffee, 7% on a bottle of water, 11% on a sandwich and 6% even used a card to pay for a cocktail drink at the pool. A refreshing cocktail at the poolside doubles in price, with debit and credit card charges of up to 3% and flat fee transactions of about £1.50.
Money exchange services on the high street typically charge between 4 -7% and above the mid-market exchange rate. Whereas those based at airports are usually around 12% however then can be as high as 17% and those at hotels can be just as high.
Jared added: “We believed the fees being charged to travellers were unfair, but up till now people did not have an alternative.”
Co-founder of WeSwap, Simon Sacerdoti said: "The best way to get a good deal on travel money is to find a fellow traveller going in the opposite direction to exchange with and WeSwap allows that to happen on a much bigger scale for the first time."
If you are confused by exchange rates and foreign currency deals, WeSwap can help you! The first ever social currency exchange website and app offers travellers an alternative way to exchange foreign currency. It matches people in different countries who are going on holiday so they can swap currencies at the interbank rate to get the very most from their money without having to suffer from the poor exchange rates or commissions. It also gives people returning from a holiday abroad the option to change their currencies back by matching them again, directly at the mid-market exchange rate. It claims to save the average UK household up to £106.26 on foreign currency per year by charging commission of 1% - sounds simple enough!
By Natasha Akpan for www.femalefirst.co.uk