Travel FX Review: Is It Safe? How Does It Work? What Are the Rates?

How can you use Travel FX to send money abroad? Is their service reliable? Can you trust Travel FX with your money? How good are their fees and exchange rates? Learn more in our guide.

What Monito Likes About Travel FX

• Very good exchange rates
• Excellent customer reviews
• Hassle-free home delivery of foreign currency
• Travel FX services are safe, secure and regulated

What Monito Dislikes About Travel FX

• No options to pick up money locally
• Fixed fees for transfers to other bank accounts can be expensive for sending smaller amounts
• Limited options for paying for currency exchange

Our Independent Review of Travel FX

Travel FX is a specialist, U.K.-based currency exchange provider that provides a couple of travel money, bank account transfers and foreign currency services to customers. We'll cover their home delivery and bank transfer services.

Travel FX foreign currency home delivery

The main service offered by Travel FX is the delivery of travel money to your home address. You can order your travel money online through their website. Travel FX does have some limitations on orders for home delivery:

• The minimum order value is £300
• The minimum amount per currency is £100
• There is no maximum order value
• You can only pay via a bank transfer—you cannot pay by credit card, debit card, cheque or cash
• You can use internet banking, telephone banking, BACS or CHAPS to make a payment
• You will need to pay no later than one business day after placing your order
• If you want specific denominations of currency notes in your order, there is a fee of £5
• The most travel FX can send in one delivery is £7,500, if you order more than this they will split your deliveries across two or more days
• Once you have placed your order, you cannot typically cancel it
• In exceptional circumstances, Travel FX may allow you to cancel but you will need to pay a £25 fee

If you request more than £10,000, Travel FX will need to carry out additional identity checks. in those cases you will need to provide a copy of your passport, driving license or officially recognized photo I.D. You will also need to provide a copy of a utility bill (not mobile phone) or bank statement dated within the last three months that shows your home address.

You should also be aware of delivery options for your order:

• Individual or combined currency orders below £700 will have a handling fee of £5
• Individual currency orders below £300 will have a handling fee of £2
• You can request Saturday delivery for a fee of £10
• Your foreign currency order will be delivered via Royal Mail Special Delivery
• Deliveries will typically be made the next working day after 1 PM, provided Travel FX has received cleared funds for your currency exchange

Travel FX will buy back unused currency from customers with the following limitations:

• They must have sold you the currency originally
• They will only buy back notes, not coins
• They will not buy back 200 or 500 euro notes or 1,000 Swiss franc notes
• They will apply the buy back exchange rate on the day they receive your returned currencies

Travel FX will email you when you place your order, when they receive payment and when they send your order out. They also state that you will get better exchange rates the more that you exchange into foreign currency. 

Travel FX Interbank money transfers to foreign bank accounts

Travel FX allows you to make foreign money transfers to overseas bank accounts. This is their “Interbank” service. They provide this service through a partner company, “Overseas Money Transfers (OMT) Ltd.”

• The minimum order value for sending money to an overseas bank account is £500
• You can only pay for your order by bank transfer, internet or telephone banking, BACS, CHAPS or a U.K. debit card
• OMT does not accept cash, cheques or credit card payments
• If you pay by debit card, you can only make one order per 29 day period and there is a maximum value of £2,500 for any individual or multi-currency order
• You will need to pay no later than one business day after placing your order  

They also state that you will get better exchange rates the more that you send to a foreign bank account.

Services not provided by Travel FX

Travel FX does not provide the following services:

• Local currency pickup at a bureau de change
• Delivery to a local bureau de change
• Travel money currency cards, including prepaid currency cards

Travel FX Fees & Exchange Rate

Travel FX does charge fees for some specific services, but in most cases, they make their money on the difference between the “base,” interbank* exchange rate and the exchange rate that they charge to you. 

*The interbank rate is also known as the mid-market or standard exchange rate, which is the midpoint between the buying and the selling prices of the two currencies.

Travel FX / Overseas Money Transfers bank transfer fees

Overseas Money Transfers is a sister company to Travel FX that provides transfers to foreign bank accounts. They do charge fees for sending money to bank accounts in other countries as follows:

• Transfer £0 to  £500: £15
• Transfer £500.01 to £1,500: £7.50
• Transfer £1,500.01 to £5,000: £5
• Transfer £5,000.01 to £100,000: No fee

About fees levied by banks

Certain fees may be levied by banks when you are transferring money to another account. These fees are outside the control of Travel FX. Circumstances where banks may charge additional fees include:

• Wire transfers into or out of sender or beneficiary accounts
• Transfers that are sent via SWIFT or certain other banking protocols
• Beneficiary banks charging a fee to receive a transfer
• Intermediary banks charging fees to process money in transit

These fees could mean that the beneficiary receives less money than stated by Travel FX due to circumstances beyond Travel FX’s control. If you want to understand what these extra fees are likely to be, please contact your bank and the beneficiary's bank.

Travel FX exchange rates for online travel money

Travel FX makes most of their money on the difference between the exchange rate they offer to customers and the base exchange rate. For example, the base rate to convert U.K pounds into euros is 1.158 euros per pound. Travel FX offers an exchange rate of 1.145 euros per pound, a difference of 1.1 percent. That means if you’re exchanging 1,000 pounds into euros, you’ll pay an exchange rate fee of around £11.

Here are some other examples:

Exchanging 1,000 U.K. pounds into U.S. dollars

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,288 USD
• Travel FX online exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,272 USD
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1.2 percent more expensive, or around 12 GBP in exchange rate fees

Exchanging 1,000 U.K. pounds into Japanese yen

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 139,963 JPY
• Travel FX exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 137,677 JPY
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1.6 percent more expensive, or around 16 GBP in exchange rate fees

Exchanging 1,000 U.K. pounds into New Zealand dollars

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 2,007 NZD
• Travel FX exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,976 NZD
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1.5 percent more expensive, or around 15 GBP in exchange rate fees

These exchange rates are among the best we have seen for buying foreign travel money. 

If you’re purchasing currency online or you want to transfer money to an overseas account, you may be able to get better deals by comparing specialist currency exchange providers. Several money exchange services have overall fees of one percent or lower, even when taking into account differences in exchange rates. 

All of the Travel FX exchange rates quoted in this section are based on their online rates for converting money for home delivery. All rates correct as of late October 2019.

Travel FX exchange rates for international money transfers

Here are the rates Travel FX’s sister company, OMT, applies for sending money to foreign bank accounts.

Sending 1,000 U.K. pounds to a euro account

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,158 EUR
• Travel FX exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,146 EUR
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1.1 percent more expensive, or around 11 GBP in exchange rate fees

Sending 1,000 U.K. pounds to a Swedish kroner account

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 12,440 SEK
• Travel FX exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 12,316 SEK
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1 percent more expensive, or around 10 GBP in exchange rate fees

Sending 1,000 U.K. pounds to an Australian dollar account

• Base exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,882 AUD
• Travel FX exchange rate, 1,000 GBP converts to 1,862 AUD
• The Travel FX exchange rate is 1.1 percent more expensive, or around 11 GBP in exchange rate fees

Note that depending on how much you send, you may also need to pay an OMT international money transfer fee to send money to a foreign account. We have detailed these fees above. 

All of the Travel FX exchange rates quoted in this section are based on their online rates for sending money to an overseas bank account. All rates correct as of early October 2019.

Comparing Travel FX rates to other providers

You can easily compare many money transfer services directly using our comparison tool. There are some services that it’s worth comparing directly to Travel FX.

Specialist currency providers for other destinations

You may be able to get a better deal for money transfers when you’re sending money to certain countries. For example, if you’re sending 500 GBP to Switzerland, the beneficiary would get around 636 CHF with TransferWise compared to 623 CHF with Travel FX, a difference of around two percent or £10. 

How easy is it to send money with Travel FX

Travel FX does limit the ways you can pay for your foreign currency or bank account transfers which may make the service slightly harder to use.

Credibility security

Here’s what Travel FX says about their services.

“Travel FX Ltd is a specialist dealer in currency providing an alternative to banks, traditional bureaus de change and the Post Office for clients seeking competitive exchange rates. We have quickly grown into one of the leading providers of foreign currency to the public due to our expertise, technological structure and unwavering commitment to provide you with a level of service unrivaled in our industry.

For your safety and security Travel FX Ltd are:

• A Registered Money Business with H.M. Revenue & Customs under number: 12729401.
• A Limited company registered under number: 06965268.
• All client funds are held in segregated client nominated accounts with Metro Bank PLC.
• We will provide you with a fast, efficient and hassle-free process offering great rates and guaranteed delivery.”

Their sister company, Overseas Money Transfers, says the following.

“OMT - Overseas Money Transfers Ltd is a Limited Company registered under number: 7886401 and is a wholly-owned subsidiary company of Mortgage Fx Ltd which is a Limited Company registered under number: 6588495 and is authorised to carry out payment service activities as an Authorised Payment Institution under Ref number 610004 and HMRC registered as a Money Service Business under Ref number 12305659.”

Customer Satisfaction

Travel FX scored very highly for customer satisfaction on Trustpilot, achieving a score of 4.9 out of 5 across more than 5,000 reviews. Ninety-seven percent of reviews said that they were “excellent” or “great” compared to two percent of reviews that said they were “poor” or “bad.

Positive

There were a wide range of positive comments including praise for very fast service and excellent exchange rates. Here’s an example review, “I have used Travel FX on three or four occasions and always found them to have excellent rates and the process is quick and easy. I have once had to deal with customer service (I had used my account but ordered in my mum’s name, they flagged this as unusual activity) I was pleased that they were so vigilant and this was dealt with efficiently. I would not hesitate to recommend their service.”

Negative

There were only a handful of negative reviews, but customers mentioned problems like money arriving late and poor customer service. Here’s an example review, “Money came late even though their website states next day delivery and I ordered and paid 3 working days before I was due to go on holiday! Called the office and the customer service and attitude of the person who took the call was appalling.”

How Travel FX Works

If you want to order travel money for home delivery, you just need to visit Travel FX’s website and you can place an order online. You just need to enter your personal details, the amounts you’re exchanging, the currency you’re exchanging into and how you want to pay. Then, you can pay for your order and Travel FX will send you your travel money.

If you want to make a transfer to a foreign bank account through OMT, here’s what you need to do: 

1. Log into your profile
2. Choose who and where you’re sending money to
3. How much you’d like to send and how they’ll receive it
4. Pay using a debit card
5. Your money transfer is on its way

Here are the beneficiary details you’ll need:

• Your recipient’s first name and last name as displayed on their officially-issued ID
• Your recipient’s address and phone number
• A selected method for how your recipient will receive the money transfer. If you choose to deposit money directly into your recipient’s account, you’ll need their bank account and routing number (this might be called an IBAN or SWIFT number)
• If you would rather have your recipient pick up the money in person, you’ll need to select a local, preferred payout location

In some cases, when you’re dealing with larger amounts of money, you may need to provide additional identification. These can include:

• Passport
• Photocard Driving Licence
• EU member state National ID Photocard

You may also need to provide proof of address, using a utility bill dated in the last three months.