These terms and conditions apply to your FairFX Currency prepaid Mastercard® card. You must read them carefully.
- Introduction
In these terms and conditions:
- “The card” means the FairFX Currency prepaid Mastercard card.
- ‘Group’ means Equals Group Plc and any other firms within the Equals Group.
- FairFX is a trading style of FairFX Plc
- ‘our website’ means www.fairfx.com
- ‘app’ means FairFX mobile apps
- ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘our’ means FairFX
- ‘we’, ‘us’, ‘our’ in relation to the FairFX Currency prepaid Mastercard means Valitor Ltd or FairFX acting on its behalf
- ‘you’, ‘your’ means the customer in whose name an FairFX Currency prepaid Mastercard is held. This customer has access to all account transactions
- ‘e-money’ means electronic money, a surrogate for cash intended for making payments of limited amounts
- ‘Wallet Exchange’ will allow you to exchange balance from one currency wallet to another
- Scope of this agreement
- These terms of business.
- The General Retail Terms and Conditions and any other additional terms issued by us.
- Together referred to as this ‘agreement.’ These terms are the only ones which govern both FairFX and you in relation to any order you may place.
- The card
- The prepaid card is issued by Valitor Ltd, Paternoster House 65, St. Paul’s Churchyard 2nd floor, London, EC4M 8AB, which is authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority to conduct electronic money service activities under the Electronic Money Regulations 2011 (Ref: 900688) and an issuer of e-money. Your prepaid card is the property of Valitor Ltd, and is not transferable to anyone else.
- You can use the prepaid card/e-money account at any location that displays the Mastercard Acceptance Mark. This includes shops, restaurants, online or on the telephone. You can also use the card overseas.
- Your card is a prepaid card This means you need to make sure there are enough funds loaded on it to pay for each purchase.
- If for any reason a transaction is processed which exceeds the available balance on your prepaid card, you must repay us the excess amount. We will be entitled to stop any existing or subsequent transactions from completing until we have received this repayment.
- You will not be able to use the card after its expiry date. Close to the expiry of your card, you can renew the card for a further three years via our website. If you renew your card, your balance will automatically be transferred to the new card.
- Your card is not a credit card or debit card and can only be funded by you.
- You will not earn any interest on any funds loaded on your card.
- Applying for and activating your card
- To apply for our card you must be at least 18 years old and a UK resident.
- We will require evidence of who you are and your address. We may ask you to provide some documentary evidence to prove this and/or we may carry out checks on you electronically.
- You must activate your card before you attempt to use it. To activate your card follow the steps outlined on our website and app.
- You must sign the signature strip on the back of your card as soon as you receive it.
- Topping up your card
- You can load funds to your card through our website or our app.
- You can make payments either by a credit or debit card, or by bank transfer. Once we have received your order, funds will normally be available for use within a few hours.
- When you purchase your card and make subsequent payments, you must ensure that the billing address on your payment card matches the address on your account.
- The minimum single load for card purchase and following top ups is £50.00.
- The maximum single load for card purchase or following top ups is £12,500.00.
- Your card cannot be loaded more than four times in any one day.
- We reserve the right to refuse or suspend any top up at any time without notice.
- The balance on your card can never exceed £50,000.00 or currency equivalent.
- Wallet Exchange
- To initiate a Wallet Exchange you need to sign in to your account online or via our app and select the currency you want to exchange from and to. Once your order has been placed the balances will update as instructed.
- The minimum value you can exchange is a denomination of 1, for example £1.00 or €1.00.
- You will be able to exchange from and to any of the 15 currencies you hold funds in.
- You will be provided with a rate at the time of placing your order. This will be shown on the order page and will be decided by FairFX. The rate used for Wallet Exchange will reflect changes within the foreign currency markets.
- Using your card
- Find detailed instructions on how to use your card on our website. Follow these instructions when using your card.
- We will deduct the value of your transactions from the balance on your card and we will deduct any applicable fees associated with the transaction. See our fees section below.
- If you use an ATM machine which applies fees on behalf of the ATM operator or bank, your card will be subject to these fees.
- We cannot guarantee that a merchant or ATM will accept your card.
- If, for any reason, a transaction is completed when there are insufficient funds on your card, you will need to reimburse the difference between the transaction value and available balance. If this was caused by the merchant’s error, we may directly engage with the merchant.
- We may ask you to stop using the card and return it to us or destroy it. We may, at any time, suspend, restrict or cancel your card or refuse to issue or replace it for the following reasons:
- We are concerned about the security of your account or card
- We suspect your account is being used in an unauthorised or fraudulent manner or we need to do so to comply with the law
- If we ask you to stop using your card, we will tell you as soon as we can or when we are permitted to do so after we have reviewed these conditions:
- If we are concerned about the security of your card or we suspect your card is being used in an unauthorised or fraudulent manner
- If sufficient funds are not loaded on your card at the time of a transaction to cover the amount of the transaction and any applicable fees
- If there is an outstanding shortfall on the card in accordance with section 13
- If we have reasonable grounds to believe that you are acting in breach of this agreement
- If we believe that a transaction is potentially suspicious or illegal (for example, if we believe that a transaction is being made fraudulently) or because of errors, failures (whether mechanical or otherwise) or refusals by merchants, payment processors or payment schemes processing transactions.
- If we refuse to authorise a transaction, suspend or close your card and account, we will, if possible, tell you why. However, we will not notify you if it would be unlawful for us to do so.
- We may at our discretion choose to block the use of a card within a jurisdiction due to high levels of fraud at any given time.
- Authorising transactions
- The authorisation of a transaction can include:
- Authorising any single transaction
- A series of recurring transactions (including transactions for an indefinite period)
- Pre-authorising future transactions of a certain or uncertain amount
- A card transaction will be regarded as authorised when you:
- Enter your PIN or provide any other security code
- Sign a sales voucher
- Provide the card details and/or provide any other details as requested
- Wave your contactless card over a card reader to pay. You may have to enter your PIN if it's your first transaction or after 5 consecutive transactions. The contactless feature will follow banking standards.
- Insert your card into a card reading device for the purpose of making a payment
- Insert your card and enter your PIN to request a cash withdrawal at an ATM
- Make a request for a cash advance at any bank counter
- You may not withdraw the authorisation of a transaction after it has been received unless FairFX and the merchant agrees to remove it.
- The following transactions may be withdrawn if you receive notice from the merchant and provide this notice to FairFX:
- Any transaction which is agreed to take place on a date later than the date it was authorised, as long as notice was provided no later than the close of business on the business day before it was due to take place
- Direct debits if they are to occur after the date of withdrawal
- We may charge you a fee if a transaction is revoked by you under this condition.
- We will pay the funds we receive to cover the authorised transactions to the merchant acquirer within three days of receiving instruction to make payment. A transaction (the payment order) will be received as follows:
- For purchases and ATM transactions, at the time we receive the transaction instruction from the merchant acquirer or ATM operator
- We consider to have received transaction instructions or requests on the same day if we receive instruction before 15:00 on a working day. If you ask us to complete the transaction after 15:00, the instruction will be deemed as received by us on the following business day.
- The authorisation of a transaction can include:
- Wallet alignment and Out of Currency Transactions
- The card is a multi-currency card. FairFX will allow you to purchase and top up the card in the following currencies:
- Sterling: GBP
- Euros: EUR
- US dollars: USD
- Australian dollars: AUD
- Canadian dollars: CAD
- New Zealand dollars: NZD
- Polish zloty: PLN
- Hong Kong dollars: HKD
- Swiss francs: CHF
- Japanese yen: JPY
- Danish krone: DKK
- South African rand: ZAR
- Swedish krona: SEK
- Norwegian krone: NOK
- Hungarian forint: HUF
- If you make a transaction on the card in one of the above 15 currencies, the card will automatically default to this currency and take the value of the purchase from this wallet.
- If you make a transaction in one of the above 15 currencies for which you have an insufficient balance, but enough funds exist on your card in another currency, the currency with sufficient funds will be debited. This is referred to as wallet alignment.
- Where wallet alignment is necessary, we will manage the conversion of the currency using a rate set and determined by us. This rate will update daily.
- Funds for wallet alignment are taken from positive balances in the following order: GBP, EUR, USD, AUD, CAD, NZD, PLN, HKD, CHF, JPY, DKK, ZAR, SEK, NOK, HUF.
- The transaction will be successful as long as the total value of your currency wallets can be combined to support the full value of the transaction.
- If a transaction is made in a currency which is not supported by the card, funds will be allocated from the first available positive balance to cover the cost of the transaction. This transaction is an out of currency transaction and will incur the out of currency fee, see section 14.
- For out of currency transactions, the exchange rate applied will be the Mastercard Daily Settlement Rate. More information about this rate can be found onMastercard’s website .
- The card is a multi-currency card. FairFX will allow you to purchase and top up the card in the following currencies:
- Cancellation and expiry of your card
- This agreement will continue indefinitely unless terminated.
- You have a legal right to cancel your card up to 14 days after you receive it without being charged the refund fee. This 14 day period is known as the ‘cooling-off period’. If you cancel your card within the cooling-off period, the funds remaining on your card will be returned to you within five days subject to satisfactory checks being completed. Whenever foreign currency is unloaded/removed from the card because the cooling-off period cancellation has been requested, it will be exchanged at the current buyback rate, not the rate at which the currency was initially loaded.
- We may also cancel your agreement for any reason by giving you at least two months notice:
- If this agreement or your card expires on a set date and we have not agreed to renew it
- If you break an important part of this agreement, or repeatedly break the agreement and fail to resolve the matter in a timely manner
- If you act in a manner that is threatening or abusive to our staff, or any of our representatives
- If you fail to pay fees or charges that you have incurred or fail to put right any shortfall
- In the event of your death
- We may also cancel this agreement or suspend your card or account immediately if we believe your card is deliberately being used by you to commit fraud or for other illegal purposes. If we do this, we will tell you as soon as we are permitted to do so.
- If we cancel your card you must tell us what you want us to do with any unused funds within three months of the date we tell you. You will not be entitled to a refund of money you have already spent on transactions authorised, or pending, or for any fees for using the card before it is cancelled or expires.
- If you decide to cancel your card outside the cooling off period, a refund fee may be charged (see Fees in Section 14 below) unless you have arranged to transfer any unused funds to another card managed by us. To cancel your card please contact us using the details on our website’s contact us page.
- Your card will be valid for three years.
- When your card is due to expire, we’ll be in touch to let you know how to renew it.
- If your card has expired and it has a leftover balance, we will apply an administration fee of £2.00 (or other currency equivalent) per month.
- Keeping your card secure
- Taking care of your card, PIN and other security information is essential to help prevent fraud and protect your FairFX account. Please make sure that you follow the advice given below.
- Do not let anyone else use your card, and do not tell anyone else your PIN, password or other security information.
- We will never ask you to tell us your PIN. If you are in any doubt whether a caller is genuine, or if you are suspicious about them, take their details and call us.
- When you change your PIN at an enabled ATM, choose your new PIN carefully. Avoid selecting a PIN that can be compromised using other information about you, such as numbers from your date of birth or house number.
- Memorise your PIN, password and other security information. Never record your PIN or other security information.
- Always take reasonable steps to keep your card safe and your PIN, password and other security information secret at all times.
- Never give away your FairFX account details or other security information.
- Keep your card receipts and other information about your FairFX account, such as statements, safe and destroy them carefully.
- You must sign the signature strip on the back of your card as soon as you receive it.
- If your card is lost or stolen, if you suspect that it has been used by someone other than you, or that someone else knows your PIN, password or other security information, you must tell us as soon as you can by logging on to your online account or via the app. We will take immediate steps to try and prevent your card from being used.
- Treat your card like cash. If it is lost or stolen, you may lose some or all of the money in your card account.
- Upon request, we will investigate any disputed transactions or other misuse of your card. To do this, we may need more information and assistance from you. After the investigation, we will immediately redeem the transaction amount and associated charges that were not authorised by you, provided you have kept your card and PIN secure, you have not acted fraudulently, and you have acted with reasonable care. However, if the investigation shows that the disputed transaction was authorised by you, or has been completed due to negligence by you, we will reverse the redemption and we may charge an administration fee.
- Transactions less than £35.00 in value may not be investigated. You may be liable for that loss, and you will be responsible for recovering any losses from the merchant.
- Should you become aware of an unauthorised or incorrectly executed transaction, you must inform us within 13 months of the transaction debit date to attempt to execute your chargeback rights. If you don’t inform us within 13 months, FairFX cannot be held responsible for any loss that occurs.
- We encourage you to review your card spend and account order history on a regular basis.
- Liability for losses
- If you act fraudulently or without reasonable care, you will be responsible for all losses on your FairFX Currency Card account. (This may apply, for example, if you do not follow the advice in section 11 or violate these terms and conditions).
- Unless we can show that you have acted fraudulently or without reasonable care, your liability for misuse of your card will be limited as follows:
- If someone else uses your card before you tell us that it has been lost or stolen or that someone else knows your PIN, the most you will have to pay is £35.00
- If someone else uses your card details without your permission, and your card has not been reported lost or stolen, you will not be liable for those transactions
- If someone else uses your card details without your permission for a transaction where the cardholder does not need to be present (for example, buying something over the internet), you will not be liable for those transactions
- If your card is used before you have received it, you will not be liable for those transactions
- If you have acted with reasonable care (as defined in the section above) and have not acted fraudulently, you will not be liable for losses caused by someone else which take place on your card.
- We will refund an incorrectly-executed transaction immediately, unless we have any reason to believe that the incident has been caused by a breach of this agreement, gross negligence or we have reasonable grounds to suspect fraudulent activity. If the investigations show that any disputed transaction was authorised by you, or you have acted fraudulently or with gross negligence (for example by failing to keep your card or PIN secure), we will not refund the transaction amount and will charge you a fee of up to £35.00 for any loss we suffer because of the use of the card.
- We will not be liable for any loss arising from:
- Any cause which results from abnormal or unforeseen circumstances beyond our control
- Consequences which would have been unavoidable despite all our efforts to the contrary
- A retailer refusing to accept your card
- Our compliance with legal and regulatory requirements
- Loss or corruption of data unless caused by our wilful default
- We are also not liable for:
- Business interruption, loss of revenue, goodwill, opportunity, or anticipated savings
- Any indirect or consequential loss
- We reserve the right to charge you for any reasonable costs that we incur in taking action to stop you using this card and to recover any monies owed as a result of your activities.
- Your right to a refund
- You may request a refund of the funds on your card as long as you have more than £5.00 (or foreign currency equivalent) loaded on your card. To request a refund please contact us via the Contact page of our website. We encourage you to keep the card, which is valid for three years, and use it on your next trip. We will arrange an electronic transfer to a bank account nominated by you. However, to enable us to comply with our legal obligations, we may ask you to provide us with certain information before we can process your refund request.
- You may be entitled to claim a refund in relation to transactions where:
- The transaction was not authorised under this agreement
- Where the transaction was incorrectly executed in line with section 12.4
- A pre-authorised transaction did not specify the exact amount at the time of its authorisation and the amount charged by a supplier is more than you or an additional cardholder could reasonably have expected, taking into account normal spending patterns on the card or the circumstances of the transaction
- A claim for a refund in the circumstances set out above will not be accepted if the amount of the transaction was made available to you at least four weeks before the transaction date or it is made more than eight weeks after being debited to your account
- We were notified of the unauthorised/incorrectly executed transaction within 13 months of the debit date
- Fees and limits
- We do not charge any fees for checking your online balance and transactions. However, the following fees do apply:
Fee type Cost Card order fee FREE Replacement card £6.00 Card renewal FREE Card load fees FREE PIN change FREE Monthly management fee FREE Expired card administration fee £2.00 per month or currency equivalent on expired cards with leftover balances Point of sale FREE when in one of 15 currencies UK ATM fee(1) £1.00 International ATM fee(1) £1.00 Out of currency fee(2) 1.75% of the value of the transaction when spending outside 15 currencies. Refund Fee £5.00 Over the counter cash withdrawal £2.00 flat fee + 3.75% of the transaction amount. (1)When you use your card at an ATM, you may also be subject to applicable fees, surcharge rules, and regulations of the relevant ATM, or other financial institution or association.
(2)A 1.75% out of currency fee is charged when you use the card in a different currency to what is held on the card (including ATM withdrawals).
- All fees will be debited in GBP. If there is an insufficient balance in GBP, funds will be deducted from other currency wallets in the following order: 2.EUR 3.USD 4.AUD 5.CAD 6.NZD 7.HKD 8. CHF 9 .JPY 10. DKK 11. ZAR 12. PLN 13. SEK 14. NOK 15. HUF.
- If we decide to increase or impose any new fees, we will tell you by email, text, or post, at least two months before any changes take effect.
- We do not charge any fees for checking your online balance and transactions. However, the following fees do apply:
- How to get in touch with us
You can contact us:
- Via the Contact page of our website.
- By phone on 0345 034 9998 between 08:30 and 17:00 from Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays). Calls are charged at your standard network rate.
- Lost or stolen cards can be reported on our app or your online account.
- By post at FairFX, PO Box 3634, Chester, CH1 9NL.
- Complaints
- If you are unhappy in any way with your card, please tell us so we can try to resolve the situation. You can write to us via email or post, or call us on 0345 034 9998 between 08:30 and 17:00 from Monday to Friday (excluding bank holidays). Calls are charged at your standard network rate.
- We will try to resolve any complaints you have about your payment method or the service we provide to you within 15 business days of receiving your complaint and in exceptional circumstances, within 35 business days (and we will let you know if this is the case).
- You can request our complaints procedure via email, phone or by visiting our website.
- If we are not able to resolve the complaint to your satisfaction, and you are eligible, you may be able to refer it to the Financial Ombudsman Service.
- The Financial Ombudsman Service is a free, independent service which might be able to settle a complaint between you and us. Their contact details are: The Financial Ombudsman Service, Exchange Tower, London, E14 9SR; phone 0300 123 9 123. Financial Ombudsman Service website.
- Compensation
- The card is an electronic money product. Although it is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), it is not covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). No other compensation scheme exists to cover losses claimed in connection with the card. This means in the unlikely event that Valitor Ltd becomes insolvent, the funds held on your FairFX Currency Card account may become valueless and unusable and as a result you may lose your money. However, as a responsible e-money issuer, Valitor Ltd ensures that once it has received your funds, they are deposited into a secure account specifically for the purposes of redeeming transactions made by your card. In the unlikely event that Valitor Ltd becomes insolvent, these funds should be protected on your behalf.
- Assignment/transfer
- We may assign the benefit and burden of these terms and conditions to another company at any time, on giving you 60 days prior notice. If we do this, your rights will not be affected.
- We may transfer the unused balance on your card to a new prepaid card provider other than Valitor Ltd at any time, on giving you at least 60 days notice. If there are new terms and conditions, we will provide these to you. Unless you advise us within the 60 day notice period that you do not want the new card, you agree that we can transfer the balance on your existing card to the new card when you activate it.
- Commission charges (padding)
- Should you place a transaction using an FairfX Currency Card in a currency that the card is not denominated in, we will authorise a further 2% of the value of the transaction to cover any difference in exchange rates while the transaction remains authorised.
- The 2% padding covers any difference between the rate you received initially and the average rate on the date that the transaction finalises. In nearly all cases, the rate finalises at the same rate you purchased at and the padding marked on the statement as ‘auth commission’ will be returned to your card as an available balance as soon as the transaction finalises.