Revolut Announces Fee Changes for Cash Withdrawals & International Transfers: What You Need to Know

On February 16, 2021, Revolut began to roll out a string of announcements changing its pricing for cash withdrawals, international money transfers, as well as card shipping for its European customers before sending out emails to users and making the new fees official on their site. Revolut's new changes will go into effect on April 23rd, 2021. For now, the terms for customers in the United States, Canada, Australia, and Singapore remain unchanged.

This is the second pricing update for the neobanking giant. In June 2020, Revolut sent out a similar series of email announcements to users, announcing changes that went into effect in August of 2020.

What does this mean for you as a customer? Well, let’s see…

Cash Withdrawals

Currently, Revolut gives all users a monthly allowance of fee-free withdrawals — £/€200 for its Standard and Plus plans, 400 for Revolut Premium and 800 for the Revolut Metal plan — and charges a 2% fee on any withdrawal beyond this limit. From the 23rd of April onwards, Standard customers will see an additional monthly limit of only five withdrawals apply on top of the £/€200 limit, with the fee kicking in after either of the two limits is reached. 

While paying subscribers won’t see this new limit apply to their withdrawals, one thing will however affect all of the plans: the 2% withdrawal fee will cost a minimum of £/€1, which means that paying for withdrawals of less than £/€50 will become more expensive. Something to keep in mind once you’ve reached the end of your withdrawal allowance, especially if you like to withdraw very small amounts!

International Transfers

Until the 23rd of April, Revolut makes a distinction between “cross-border transfers,” which covers transfers sent to a country outside SEPA in the currency of that country, and SWIFT transfers, which are generally used to send money to a country in a currency other than its national one — for example, sending US dollars to India instead of Indian rupees. Cross-border payments currently cost £/€0.50 each, while with SWIFT they cost £/€3 for US dollar transfers, and £/€5 otherwise. At the moment, Standard and Plus accounts get one cross-border transfer a month for free, while Premium and Metal accounts get unlimited free cross-border transfers, and one free SWIFT transfer a month.

The new system merges cross-border transfers and SWIFT transfers, calling them both “international payments,” although there is still a distinction between them:

• Sending money to a non-SEPA country in its own national currency will incur a fee of 0.3% of the sum transferred, with a minimum fee of £/€0.3, and with a cap of £/€5.
• Sending money in a different currency than that of the recipient’s country will still have two different fees: it will cost £/€3 to send USD as well as GBP, EUR or CHF while sending any other currency will cost £/€5.

The merger of the two categories thus mostly affects Revolut Premium and Revolut Metal users, who will no longer get any kind of unlimited international transfers. Instead, Premium accounts will get one free international transfer a month, while Metal accounts will get three. Standard and Plus accounts will no longer get any for free and will have to pay from their first international payment.

All in all, this is tough news for Revolut users who make frequent transfers abroad. Transfers that would have been classified as cross-border will get a fee hike by up to 1000% – in fact, any international transfer of more than £/€1666 to a country’s home currency will now be charged the maximum fee of £/€5! Combined with the end of unlimited free cross-border transfers for Premium and Metal users, this might become very expensive very quickly, especially for users who were relying on the more expensive plans’ unlimited fee-free currency exchanges. The only silver lining is for SWIFT transfers, which either stay the same price or get slightly cheaper if made in GBP, EUR or CHF: if you were relying on a Revolut Metal account to mostly send money via SWIFT, then the two additional free international transfers might be a nice feature.

Note that other types of transfers remain unaffected by this change: local and SEPA payments, as well as transfers to other Revolut users, will remain free for all users.

Card Delivery Fee

The card delivery fees are not actually changing, but Revolut is finally making things a bit clearer. Standard delivery will still be priced at £/€4.99, and express delivery at £/€19.99, with free express shipping for paying customers’ main cards. Since the cards ship globally, however, shipping to some destinations is actually more expensive. At the moment, this is not calculated when ordering the card, and customers might get stung by an unexpectedly higher fee. From the 23rd of April onwards, Revolut will display the actual shipping fee before you order the card instead, in order to avoid such unpleasant surprises.

What Does Revolut's Pricing Update Mean for Revolut Users? 

Monitor Usage

While the fee changes announced are not very significant ones, they will change the way you use your Revolut account. As of the 23rd of April, it will be more important to monitor your cash withdrawals and keep track both of how much and how frequently you withdraw, taking care not to withdraw amounts lesser than £/€50 at a time but also not to withdraw more than five times or £/€200 total if wishing to avoid unnecessary fees. 

Users will also need to pay more attention to their international transfers. We recommend that instead of using Revolut by default when it comes to your international transfers, you use Monito’s real-time comparison engine to see where you can find the best rate for your transfer. 

Consider Upgrading to Revolut Premium or Revolut Metal

If it wasn't the case for you before, it may now be worth considering that Revolut’s new fee changes make its paying accounts even more appealing than before. Paying customers through Revolut Premium, and Revolut Metal are less severely affected by the updates, and the advantages of the accounts are much greater than those with the free Revolut Standard account and now even the paying Revolut Plus account. Monito especially recommends Revolut Premium over similar accounts from competitors and recommends Revolut Metal for now having more benefits in its court than before. 

Consider Alternatives to Revolut

Lucky for you, Revolut is not the only neobank who offers competitive pricing and fees for foreign currency transactions. Monito is here to help you find the best money transfer providers for you and your needs, as well as the best neobanks on the market.