Standard Bank Shyft App

[gboy]

Morning,

I see that Standard bank is advertising a forex and virtual card system called Shfyt ? from what I can understand you can create USD/GBP/Euro physical and virtual cards and exchange between them. If I am understanding it right, you can put USD into a USD virtual card and then use it for things like AMAZON and Google Cloud Platfrom purchases. (GCP always gives me issues with SA cards)

I signed up to see how it works, but has anyone had any experience on this ?

 

[MirageF1]

Yes and no need to be a Std Bank customer or become one.

Signup is pretty straightfoward, and I believe you can now do it within the app.
Intuitive, easy to use GUI. reasonable xchg rates and flat £10 charge for sending money to offshore account ( USD/GBP/Euro and AUS too I recall ), within annual Discretionary Allowance, all linked to SARB.
Online purchases are free.
Cash withdrawals overseas are also poss, not sure about cost ( have my own UK account anyway)

Been using it for a while, no complaints to date.
Funds received by an overseas bank in 1-2 days max.
Payments made to individuals/companies reflect within 1-2 hours.

 

[WAslayer]

Stupid question, if I may..

No SARS implications in any why whatsoever in doing all of this..?

 

[Lukcydog]

Morning,

I see that Standard bank is advertising a forex and virtual card system called Shfyt ? from what I can understand you can create USD/GBP/Euro physical and virtual cards and exchange between them. If I am understanding it right, you can put USD into a USD virtual card and then use it for things like AMAZON and Google Cloud Platfrom purchases. (GCP always gives me issues with SA cards)

I signed up to see how it works, but has anyone had any experience on this ?

Yes, I've had mine for 4 years now (since it started in Beta).

- Physical card can take a combination of any of the currencies that they offer. I've used it in Europe (worked flawlessly), and the USA (couldn't draw money at ATM's, but it worked at all paypoints ironically)
- Virtual Cards are specific currency per virtual card. I use one for my international purchases (Amazon, netflix etc) and another for the larger purchases ($100+ security reasons)
- Spread on the USD/ZAR = 7 or 8 cents
- I use it every month to take money offshore (flat rate of $14 irrespective of amount) to my investment account in the USA.

Very happy with Shyft. The team are also incredibly helpful!.

 

[gboy]

Looks interesting, can someone in the USA pay into the USD card / account or does it work only with outbound. Ie have to pay into SA account first then shift it back to USD card.

 

[Lukcydog]

Looks interesting, can someone in the USA pay into the USD card / account or does it work only with outbound. Ie have to pay into SA account first then shift it back to USD card.

Yeah unfortunately they dont allow payments into the USD cards yet. I've requested that feature with them already.

 

[gboy]

Yeah unfortunately they dont allow payments into the USD cards yet. I've requested that feature with them already.

Yea it would work well, will have to see

 

[PhreakBoy]

Simon Brown from The Fat Wallet show has often mentioned that he also uses the Shyft app and he seems impressed. So I think you're save to use it.

Stupid question, if I may..

No SARS implications in any why whatsoever in doing all of this..?

Normal SARS implications apply. Do you have a specific question?

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

Normal SARS implications apply. Do you have a specific question?

whats the limit before one gets flagged, and the hawks GTI's arrive outside your door

but an intelligent question from me might be,
is this card similar to the Bidvest cards one gets in USD?

 

[Lukcydog]

whats the limit before one gets flagged, and the hawks GTI's arrive outside your door

but an intelligent question from me might be,
is this card similar to the Bidvest cards one gets in USD?

-R1m discretionary allowance limited by the app.
- Not sure about Bidvest cards

 

[PhreakBoy]

whats the limit before one gets flagged, and the hawks GTI's arrive outside your door

but an intelligent question from me might be,
is this card similar to the Bidvest cards one gets in USD?

If you have enough money to be flagged by the hawks, then you won't be using the app as you'll have access to better means. NEXT!



- don't know the BidVest cards either.

 

[Jet-Fighter7700]

- don't know the BidVest cards either.

https://www.bidvestbank.co.za/personal/travel-foreign-exchange/world-currency-card

these ones I heard the adverts for a few times.

 

[Praemon]

Just thought I'd add that Shyft now allows buying of shares using your USD balance. The fees are 0.4% per transaction (min $5), and a monthly custodian fee of 20bps (0.2%) per annum. They offer a basket of the most popular shares and ETFs. Pity they charge a monthly fee, otherwise it could've competed with Easy Equities on some level.

 

[Alton Turner Blackwood]

Just thought I'd add that Shyft now allows buying of shares using your USD balance. The fees are 0.4% per transaction (min $5), and a monthly custodian fee of 20bps (0.2%) per annum. They offer a basket of the most popular shares and ETFs. Pity they charge a monthly fee, otherwise it could've competed with Easy Equities on some level.

Shares via which broker? OST?

 

[Praemon]

Shares via which broker? OST?

Not too sure about that one.

 

[Lukcydog]

I'd take a guess that its via their webtrader application.

 

[deweyzeph]

Just thought I'd add that Shyft now allows buying of shares using your USD balance. The fees are 0.4% per transaction (min $5), and a monthly custodian fee of 20bps (0.2%) per annum. They offer a basket of the most popular shares and ETFs. Pity they charge a monthly fee, otherwise it could've competed with Easy Equities on some level.

It's nowhere near as slick as Easy Equities. The other downside is that you can only use Shyft via the smartphone app, there is no website like Easy Equities has.