Comments on: STA Travel MasterCard – facts and figures

By: nep

nep — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 20:23:28 +0000

Do not get this card! They promise you that you save money but as someone mentioned above the exchange rate is sooo poor that your money is literally eaten up! The fact that you get charged by STA 2.25 every time you draw money and we got charged $4 from the country we took our money out in. Plus they charge you for getting money out in the uk! They put £10 on yourcar yes put you have to pay for the card inthe first place! Then £10 to close it! It is an absolute con and the account numbers aren’t raised so if you go to a third world country you are literally lost. Do not rely on this card!

By: David

David — Mon, 29 Aug 2011 04:38:34 +0000

Terrible card, terrible company, ive had nothing but problems with sta and their card. I wont be using them for anything ever again i recommend you not to either. The amount of times i had my card “locked” for doing nothing wrong but enter my password on the internet is unbelievable and the people on the “customer care” line are absolutely useless and when i was forced to call them from abroad at no fault of my own they managed to rack me up a 200 pound phone bill. Thanks for nothing sta.

By: FH

FH — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 14:14:20 +0000

Yes that £10 closure fee is a bit sneaky but they do give you £10 on the card when you first open it. Personally I didn’t have any problems using the card and used it all over SE Asia. It is a bit of a faff to transfer money and there ARE specific instructions for doing so which you’ll find on your account online (Top Up page then View Bank Transfer Details). I’ve read a lot from people who struggled/ couldn’t transfer money and it turned out they were using the wrong instructions (i.e. it’s NOT the numbers on the front of your card).

Besides that, its Mastercard/ banks who set all the exchange details and like every other card of its nature that’s available, there are going to be times when its the more/ less expensive option.

By: Katie Bridges

Katie Bridges — Thu, 19 Aug 2010 21:53:34 +0000

Hi,

I just bought one, before reading many many bad reviews. Out of interest, what is the exchange rate for STA, do you know?

Thanks, Katie

By: Alice

Alice — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 09:37:04 +0000

I have just got back from traveling and reviewed my statement. The exchange rate they provide is shocking! I am now trying to obtain the remainder of my money and have been told that i will be charged £10 to close account and between 50p to £1.50 to get the money from cashpoint which ofcourse only give you tens and twentys therefore i wil not be able to collect all my money.

There are far better cards to use and i wish i had researched more to find a better one. It is very unclear what there rates are when you purchase this card, and i found it very difficult to top up from my bank account to the sta card and had to use the top up at the post office to do it, where you can only do £250 at a time.

I honestly cannot recommend this card and strongly advise you to look into other cards, my money didn’t go as far as i had hoped and on my return to England i found out why, because the exchange rate was so terrible, worse than my uk bank debit card!

By: T1985

T1985 — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 20:28:25 +0000

As I’m going travelling this summer, I thought the STA cash card would be ideal. I received mine at the end of March and after activating it and receiving my PIN, I started to transfer any spare money onto the cash card to save for spending money during my trip. The possibility to manage the account online is really convenient. However, when I went to withdraw some money from the card last week, it didn’t work. i didn’t think much about it but when I went to check my account online later that day, it said the account has been deactivated. I have since then called customer service but all I ever get is that this issue has been passed on to the compliance team and I need to wait for them to get back to me….and I am still waiting now…. 4 days later! Therefore, I would recommend to spread your money out onto other cards as well and not to rely solely on the STA cash card as it can take a while if problems do occur.

By: FH

FH — Sun, 17 Jan 2010 20:45:56 +0000

I’ve just got myself an STA cash card and they seem to have very specific ways of topping up even though they make it seem very easy. I’ve added two debit cards to my account to top up from and so far, every time I’ve tried to do so, it tells me that this service has been disabled on my account and I should contact customer care. They in turn, do not seem to “care” and tell me they don’t see what the problem is. I try again to avail. At the moment it seems the only way you can top up for sure with no fees is through bank transfer and even then in a specific way, with specific details which are laid out on your account section on the website.

Varied worth as far as I can see so far…

By: sally lomax

sally lomax — Thu, 17 Dec 2009 18:18:08 +0000

Anyone else had trouble topping up their STA cash card?

By: MoneyhighStreet Staff

MoneyhighStreet Staff — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 10:57:18 +0000

Thanks, Peter.

You are correct and we have have updated the article to say “maximum load is £1,500.”

By: Peter Brooker

Peter Brooker — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 09:18:36 +0000

Don’t you mean MAXIMUM amount per load is £1,500?