Guide to prepaid currency cards in the UK and abroad

Prepaid currency cards are the best way to control and manage spending while abroad. Here’s a little help picking the right option.

Guide to prepaid currency cards in the UK and abroad
 

Trust employees to spend company money with prepaid cards that keep you in control

 

Separate budgets, custom limits and real-time visibility help prevent overspending

 

Save hours on admin and speed up month-end with automated tracking and reporting

25,000+ businesses trust Europe’s leading prepaid currency cards platform

Get complete oversight of company spend

Get complete oversight of company spend

With Soldo company cards, you control who spends company money, how much, on what, and which budget they use.
Set custom rules and limits for each card in a few clicks to prevent overspending , without micromanaging every transaction.

Free up time for higher impact work

Free up time for higher impact work

How much time do you spend working through expense reimbursements? Querying mistakes, or chasing missing receipts? Probably more than you’d like to.
Soldo company cards make spending less complex. No out-of-pocket spending means no more reimbursements – saving finance teams hours on expense processing.

Easy expenses, controlled company spend

Easy expenses, controlled company spend

When you switch to Soldo, you make expenses easy and fair for everyone involved.
Soldo company cards give the right people controlled access to company money, so no one has to spend time on expense claims or reimbursements. Our expense management platform and mobile app are user-friendly and intuitive. They reduce manual effort in a variety of ways, from automating finance processes for finance teams to allowing employees to capture receipts at point of purchase.

Soldo integrates with your accounting software

Soldo integrates with your accounting software

Copying data between multiple systems isn’t just annoying – it wastes time and increases the likelihood of manual input errors. Soldo connects with your accounting software so you can track, manage, and report on employee expenses and company spending. All in one place.
Reconcile in a single click, manage month-end faster. Rely on real-time, accurate spend and expense data.

Trust in the highest levels of card protection

Trust in the highest levels of card protection

Soldo is accredited as a Level 1 Service Provider by the PCI Council, which means we comply with the highest data security standards. We’re regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Central Bank of Ireland.
Soldo company cards are issued by Mastercard® and can be frozen or cancelled in seconds from out web or mobile app. Our support team is on hand to answer questions, resolve any issues, and set up your Soldo account for your specific need.

Create a free Soldo account to get started

The best ratings across the web

Get started

Apply online in minutes and start spending in as little as one working day.

No credit checks, no hidden fees, no fixed contracts. Cancel anytime.

Complete registration

We need to confirm your identity and address. Upload a few documents and you’ll be done.

Add funds

Load money to your account to order your Soldo card. Receive it in 2 working days.

Start spending

Shop online or instore safely with your contactless card.

What our clients think about us

“Since we started using Soldo, it’s been such a relief not to have to regularly email or phone the banks to ask for our credit card limits to be raised. I love Soldo’s flexibility – it’s so easy to maintain and everything is in real-time.”

Dennis Koehler, Get Your Guide
Head of Payments and Fraud

“Petty cash and reconciling credit cards took a total of 6 days a month. Now it takes me half a day. It’s saving us time! It’s got great flexibility and it makes my life a lot easier”

Sandra Curran, Making Space
Purchase Ledger Coordinator

All Soldo plans include

Everything you need to get started

Soldo Mastercard® cards

Get as many cards as you need for employees and departments. Our contactless cards are accepted by millions of merchants worldwide.

Web console and mobile app

See spending in real time on the web console. View balances, capture receipts and manage cards on the employee app.

Accounting integration

Export transaction data to every major accounting software, in two clicks. Connect expenses to Xero and QuickBooks.

Free & unlimited transactions

Soldo Mastercard® cards have no fees for domestic transactions and our foreign exchange fee is fixed at just 1%.

No charge for deposits

It’s free to add funds, and money is available to spend instantly. Allocate funds to cards when your team needs it.

Dedicated support

Need a hand? Our friendly customer success team is at your service, providing support whenever you need it.

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Create a free account and get started now

Get the benefits of a Soldo account now

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Frequently asked questions

What is an FX fee?

A foreign exchange transaction fee, or an FX fee, is the extra cost of making a transaction in a different currency. It might also be incurred when a purchase goes through a foreign bank.

Most cards, even FX business cards, incur some level of a fee because of costs incurred to the provider. For credit and debit cards, this can be particularly high, but even for most FX cards, it is usually around 3% of the value of the transaction.

What is the difference between credit/debit cards and a business FX card?

With a business debit card, the balance on the card is directly linked to the account itself. So there’s no way to limit a cardholder’s spending: in theory, they’re able to use the card until the account is empty.

Business credit cards are even less prohibitive. Team members can essentially spend what they like (up to the credit limit), and you’ll need to pay off the debt at the end of the month. If you don’t, you risk having to pay lots of interest and damaging your business credit score.

Both come with high FX fees, though these vary depending on which provider issues the card. This makes them impractical for business trips. But forex business cards are made for overseas travel, and provide a much smarter alternative or addition to credit and debit cards.

A Soldo card gives you the best of both worlds, and with none of the drawbacks. Not only can you use it abroad with a lower fee than most FX cards (1%), and not only can you use it on home soil, you also have significantly more control over how much cardholders can spend

Is an FX business card right for my business?

An FX business card is well worth having if your team travels for business a lot. Otherwise, fees will start to add up.

They’re particularly useful for startups and SMEs because there’s no need to establish a strong credit score before you apply. And they’re particularly useful for large businesses because you can also have lots of cards in circulation at once without giving up any control, which means you can hand them out to individual departments, contractors and freelancers.

Do FX business cards work with accounting software?

Most forex cards don’t have the data management capabilities needed to integrate with popular accounting software.

But Soldo isn’t strictly speaking an FX business card, which means it has more extensive functionality – including accounting integration. In practice, this means you can export and import transaction data to Quickbooks and other accounting apps. Soldo’s payment console also seamlessly integrates with Xero, including its automatic bank feed and accounting APIs.

Do I need a credit check with an FX business card?

No – FX business card providers will ask you for a few business details when you sign up, but not for your credit history.

So if you haven’t had a chance to establish one, or if you’ve had problems in the past, it won’t matter. Just remember that you also can’t improve on your existing credit score with an FX business card.

What are the alternatives to FX business cards?

Credit and debit cards
Credit and debit cards are a way for your team to buy what they need. But they come with substantial fees and charges for foreign payments, and because there’s no option to set rules and limits, they’re also difficult to manage.

Out-of-pocket payments
Traditionally, staff will cover their own expenses and claimed the money back at the end of the month. But this can be expensive in the short term, and problematic for those who can’t afford it. And when it comes to claiming back, it can be hard to make sure they’re getting recompensed for transaction fees, too.

Petty cash
You can use petty cash to cover small ticket items. But in reality, it won’t go very far on a business trip – and since you don’t know who’s spending what and where, you’ll likely lose track of it, too.

Are entertainment expenses VAT exempt?

Entertaining clients is not VAT refundable, but entertaining staff is. When you’re running events where both will be in attendance, you need to split costs spent on team members and clients to claim the right amount of VAT back.

Soldo entertainment expense cards make it easy for you to track what charges were spent on who and file your accounts accurately when tax time comes round. Simply organise your transactions quickly and easily in your account dashboard to optimise your VAT processes.

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Prepaid Cards