How do forex card rate along with debit cards for international travel

External question — Personal Finance Stack Exchange Author: shirish Original post: https://money.stackexchange.com/questions/76364 License: CC BY-SA 3.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. I had asked this question yesterday, today while browsing came across this article . In it it talks about taking a forex card and hints about thomascook travel card. Now from what little I have read, they also typically charge the 3% forex transaction fee alongwith flat rate whatever thomascook.in thinks is the exchange rate at the time of agreement. There doesn't seem to be much difference as far as expenses are concerned between the travel card and debit card except travel card may be limited as you have to charge it. On the other hand the debit card doesn't have any limitations. Can anybody care to share or/and elaborate if travel card has any benefits at all or not?

External answer — Personal Finance Stack Exchange Author: Spehro 'speff' Pefhany Original post: https://money.stackexchange.com/a/76376 License: CC BY-SA 3.0 — https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/ Adaptation: HTML converted to plain text; contact email addresses removed. You can load the card up with various currencies- if you don't incur a double conversion cost (all your spending is in the currency you buy) and the foreign currency appreciates relative to your home currency (perhaps likely in the case of INR) you could win. On the other hand, you could lose if the opposite happens. Personally, I see little reason for this product to exist. Perhaps in countries where foreign currency accounts/credit cards are not permitted there might be some application.