Pathetic services. Here’s the heads up to people who are looking for forex card services, so that they can avoid such Institutes:
1. The staff here is full of trainees that are not given proper training. It was me who was enquiring about basic charges in transactions abroad, such as charges on ATM withdrawal, Balance enquiry, Swiping, etc. No one even thought of informing me the type of card they are giving unless I asked for it and the answer was as blunt & unprofessional as "aap student hain to student wala card hi milega", clearly not what I meant to ask. Otherwise, they would have just handed me the forex card like they are selling burgers. Despite my enquiries, I had to figure out that there are many more hidden charges that were not at all introduced, by paying them. Many ECOM/contactless transactions like Paypal, Wending machines, etc. will deduct $0.5 to $1 per transaction if you link your Thomas Cook card.
2. As your charges on balance enquiry abroad is avoided by checking balance through mobile/net application of the card provider, the application plays an extremely important role. Even a 3rd class public bank has a better application, both interference-wise & functionality-wise. The "Borderless Prepaid Card" application by Thomas cook is worse & useless. After every transaction, it will update the balance after an unfixed amount of hours, sometimes more than a day, ruining the sole purpose of the application. Even if the no. of hours to update the balance after each transaction was fixed, things could have been manageable. I never opened the app after bearing losses cause of this uninformed & unsystematic delay in updation. I rather made my own spreadsheet to be updated.
3. Regarding withdrawal, no one informed that one has to find the ATM of the same provider the card is issued by like VISA, Mastercard, etc in order to withdraw money. Why this fact is important? As Thomas Cook is not well known abroad, If you randomly insert your card at any ATM, some ATMs might just lock your card under suspicion. And as you have no name printed on the card, you cannot claim the card to be yours once the bank retrieves it. You will end up losing all your money. I just dodged the bullet as the bank abroad stopped me just before I was about to enter my card in the ATM for withdrawal. This is how unbothered Thomas Cook is regarding your funds.
4. Regarding putting money on your card, Sameer at Thomas Cook first informed me that I could simply add money in my card through net banking or UPI. But avoided to clarify that once I land abroad, if I am a student, I cannot add money in my own account, even if I am simply transferring the amount from my own Indian bank to Thomas Cook card. As per their policy, even if the student in his/her mid 20s, only & only the parents can add money & the procedure is as follows:
- Each parent must register by filling registration form.
- Ask Thomas Cook for Quotation for transaction.
- Once you get the Quotation, the parents will provide the amount to Thomas Cook.
- Then Thomas Cook will take 2 working days to reflect the transaction in your card. And they will definitely take more than 2 working days.
And yes all these points were not at all informed & it was almost a lie that I can transfer money by myself.
5. In the end, when I had about $10 left in my card. I couldn’t make any payment, not even a dollar payment & was simply getting the message of insufficient funds. At this point of time, I was so frustrated that I couldn’t waste 2 days shaking Thomas Cook to stop these shenanigans & release the remaining amount. I simply took the loss of $10 just for the sake of peace of mind.
I understand that this has been a lengthy review, but I wish no other student suffers like me as Thomas CROOK is least bothered about your needs. Avoid it at all cost. Better carry cash. This is coming from a person who avoids carrying cash.