Whether you are someone promising themselves a world tour, or an international student worried about the slow process of getting money from your parents in India, fintech startups have transformed the way of international fund transfers drastically.
Fintech startups have reshaped the forex landscape in India by providing the best currency conversion rates at one place, reducing the tedious bank paperwork, same day international wire transfers, introducing apps with features to load or unload money into zero-markup forex cards that can lock real-time currency rates.
The days of queuing at airport exchanges, local shops, ATMs, and even banks for currency conversion before your international trip are long gone. Fintech startups have brought favourable exchange rates and a bunch of forex products right to your fingertips – literally.
If you were to exchange foreign currency traditionally, it would require you to go to your bank or a moneychanger’s local shop. They generally add a high margin of 2-5% that goes directly into their pockets as currency exchange fees.
Paying 10-15% currency conversion fees at airport kiosks and hotels isn’t a far-fetched scenario either.
The rates offered by banks and local money exchange shops, moreover, aren’t completely transparent.
When they are buying currency from you, they are paying less, and when they are selling currency to you, they are charging more.
Buying foreign currency from the banks was the typical way, but it definitely wasn’t giving the customers the best exchange rates. Not to mention how filling out forms and visiting a branch that actually had a forex desk there, was a tedious process.
Different banks offered different exchange rates. Or even different branches of the same bank or company offered different exchange rates. You would have to haggle between several banks and money changers, and their different branches, before identifying the one that was going to save you the most amount of money.
For someone whose family was abroad, like parents whose children were studying abroad, regular money transfers were important since international students might require occasional small amounts of payments for tuition fees, other education-related payments, and living expenses.
But the transfer charges levied by banks can easily exceed hundreds to thousands of rupees, burdening even the small payments. Sending money internationally, including the inconvenient methods of bank wire transfers and demand drafts, naturally becomes expensive, time-consuming, and quite an uncomfortable experience.
Even if you were planning an international trip, this forex currency conversion would weigh down your travel budget, no matter how you paid, including home currency cash or a debit, or a credit card.
You would also have to plan your trip right down to the minute details and expenditures so that you could carry a sufficient amount abroad. Furthermore, it wasn’t viable to carry a lot of currency notes to a foreign country.
Then came online forex marketplaces like Bookmyforex that diminished the complex processes associated with foreign currency transfers and conversions. Offering a wide range of services like prepaid travel cards, wire transfers, and international demand drafts, for both regular money senders as well as travelers, they enabled people to transfer or convert money in the fastest and the cheapest possible way.
The best part? There are no hidden markup charges.
When Bookmyforex was launched in 2011, showcasing live exchange rates, there was no service of that sort in India at all.
Since then, the fintech market has been growing at a rapid pace, with over 500 fintech startups in India that have collectively attracted over $1.4 billion in funding since 2012, according to YourStory. This, of course, benefits travelers looking to save money on foreign exchange rates. The enormous market and great technological integration, as well as the advancement of online transactions and digital banking have pushed the fintech startups.
The innovation behind these online forex marketplaces lies in the idea that while everything related to e-commerce and the stock market was easily available online, there was nothing for foreign exchange.
The idea of Bookmyforex emerged as the world’s first and largest online foreign exchange marketplace. Aspiring to create a trustworthy and reliable online platform for the forex requirements of people, it appeared as a retail forex marketplace that showcases live exchange rates with several forex services offered.
Fintech forex platforms have solved multiple problems of foreign travelers and other consumers.
You don’t have to wait in long lines or complete endless paperwork at banks. Fintech brings you currency transfers that can be done 24/7, with money transfers taking place within a day. Documents can be uploaded online and orders can be placed from the comfort of your home.
Everything has become faster, more handy, comfortable and easier.
Online fintech platforms showcase real-time currency exchange rates, unlike fixed rates of banks.
These platforms greatly enhance an individual’s savings with no hidden charges. You can actually see and compare live rates before you book your order. They also, of course, cut off the high margins charged by airports and local money changers and offer zero markup rates.
For instance, the Bookmyforex interbank rate multi-currency forex card, for example, is a zero-markup travel card that can be loaded with multiple currencies. Interbank rates mean the rates different banks use to deal with each other. This is considered the true foreign exchange rate.
Furthermore, the rates at which you get currencies loaded in a forex card will be locked to protect you from future currency rate fluctuations.
There are also options to freeze the current rates or notify the customer when the rates drop even lower. These features add functionality and ease-of-service that wasn’t available before.
Advancement of fintech further enhances the user experience by reducing distress in case of emergencies. In an unforeseen event where you run out of funds while abroad, you can easily add money to your forex card. You can also convert one currency to another through a mobile app.
The reverse can be done as well: you can get the money you haven’t spent from your forex card back into your account. Now you do not have to worry too much about planning your trips.
All these features, like exchanging currency online 24/7 and almost instantly adding currency to your card, add a layer of comfort to your international travel that wasn’t available before.
Relying on the traditional ways, long lines of banks or their high-interest credit cards are now unnecessary trouble when fintech has arrived with better, faster and more affordable alternatives.
Inclusion of AI in fintech can enhance this landscape even further. Imagine an AI model keeping track of real-time currency exchange rates and suggesting to you the best time to convert instantly.
An AI model, acting as your personal currency exchange assistant, can potentially analyse your purchases for any suspicious activities and warn you about them. The future of managing not just one, but multiple foreign currencies would be even more secure, quick and convenient.
