How to change my $NZ to $Aus within Wise

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Forums › Finance and wealth management › How to change my $NZ to $Aus within Wise

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#3361753 7-Apr-2025 15:24

I thought that's what the included anti fraud covers. (And ability to turn on/off cards or transactions at will within app if needed)

CYaBro

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#3361755 7-Apr-2025 15:36

Oblivian:

I thought that's what the included anti fraud covers. (And ability to turn on/off cards or transactions at will within app if needed)

Probably but if you have to turn your main bank account card off for any reason then what?
How do you access your money?

With the Wise app you can just create a new card and start using it straight away.

Opinions are my own and not the views of my employer.

wellygary

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#3361765 7-Apr-2025 16:06

Oblivian:

No extra fee on most plat style card types bar current exchange (or 1.3% which is hardly noticeable). And banks have ditched own machine withdrawal fees. 10c to the dollar easy to work out if its a deal and not a huge surprise after the fact.

Am I missing some form of mass saving or security avoidance?

Bank's rates are not as great as you think

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/anz-australias-new-zealand-dollar-to-australian-dollar-exchange-rate-shocks-kiwi-family/2IFBWIQBIFDJDN4OAL2RCCK5F4/

Eva888

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#3361768 7-Apr-2025 16:20

Oblivian:

I thought that's what the included anti fraud covers. (And ability to turn on/off cards or transactions at will within app if needed)

Your normal bank account doesn’t give you a blow by blow notification every time your card is used, so it could be hours or too late before you know something bad has happened. With Wise, each transaction made with any of your three cards pops up on your phone with the name you have given it so you know instantly and can take action, plus cancel and issue yourself with a new card. Imagine in the middle of New York realising your bank card has been lost or skimmed. How would you manage without the card if you cancelled it.

My purse was stolen once and it was the afternoon of the next day before I realised my bank credit card had been used all over the city after I called the bank.

We share the one Wise account so Mr E has a virtual card on his phone and I have the other virtual card on mine. I keep the physical card for cash withdrawals from ATMs or where phone doesn’t work.

I also use Wise if buying from Temu or a website I am unsure about. Mainly got it for sending funds easily overseas. But now would not travel without it. My bank is only used to feed Wise or for back up when away.

Oblivian

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#3361785 7-Apr-2025 17:26

wellygary:

Bank's rates are not as great as you think

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/anz-australias-new-zealand-dollar-to-australian-dollar-exchange-rate-shocks-kiwi-family/2IFBWIQBIFDJDN4OAL2RCCK5F4/

Not exactly gonna be transferring 780k anytime soon. :) But $30 at a supermarket now and then. I didn't seem to notice too much punishment. I didn't check at the month end bIt was almost instantly on the anz app as $xxau in the comments and the nz charged amount.

SpartanVXL

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#3361792 7-Apr-2025 18:43

The rate is not as good here compared to our aussie counterparts. Plus the 1.6%~ fee and you can see why Wise is popular here.

Fair warning about the auto conversion, if you have other currency balances there is an undisclosed hierarchy on what it will use if you don’t have enough to cover a purchase. I had some USD at a good rate a while back but made the mistake of purchasing something large in AUD and expected my main NZD balance to cover the rest, it took all the AUD, USD and then a tiny amount of NZD and I got hit with the extra fees.

Scotdownunder

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#3361808 7-Apr-2025 21:41

The only catch with Wise if you are paying someone or a business from your say aussie account it goes through an intermediary bank which might block the transfer. This happened to me last week in Australia where the intermediary blocked the payment due to query on the reference field. An identical payment which had nothing in that field went through in 5 minutes but the original is still blocked.

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Eva888

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#3361818 7-Apr-2025 23:01

Scotdownunder:

The only catch with Wise if you are paying someone or a business from your say aussie account it goes through an intermediary bank which might block the transfer. This happened to me last week in Australia where the intermediary blocked the payment due to query on the reference field. An identical payment which had nothing in that field went through in 5 minutes but the original is still blocked.

This has made me panic a bit. Did this happen because you shifted NZ funds into the Aus acct and they blocked the Aus funds? Would leaving it in NZ funds be safer?

I was planning to use the Wise card on the cruise. You have to give them a card as it’s cashless and now worried if that gets blocked.

scuwp

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#3361826 8-Apr-2025 07:31

Have used Wise all over the place without any problems. Had a couple of transactions that were blocked due to 'suspicious activity', some algorithm detection system I guess, but so easy to confirm within the app that all is OK and within a minute you are away again. Always have a backup plan though, some other cc or method of payment. Wise is just so easy and gives you total control. I wouldn't travel without it now.

Remember to let your bank or cc company know you are travelling, so they don't lock those down when sudden overseas use is identified.

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Scotdownunder

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#3361829 8-Apr-2025 08:25

Yes, a blocked payment has only occurred to me once (just last week) and it was not using the card but a direct payment into an Australian account. I suspect some algorithm did not like my reference.

Handsomedan

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#3361831 8-Apr-2025 09:03

Eva888:

Scotdownunder:

The only catch with Wise if you are paying someone or a business from your say aussie account it goes through an intermediary bank which might block the transfer. This happened to me last week in Australia where the intermediary blocked the payment due to query on the reference field. An identical payment which had nothing in that field went through in 5 minutes but the original is still blocked.

This has made me panic a bit. Did this happen because you shifted NZ funds into the Aus acct and they blocked the Aus funds? Would leaving it in NZ funds be safer?

I was planning to use the Wise card on the cruise. You have to give them a card as it’s cashless and now worried if that gets blocked.

We used our Wise card as the main source of cruise funds and it was flawless.
As long as there's enough funds in there, you're good.
The blocking of transactions has nothing to do with which currency you're holding it in.

I helped Wise set up their NZ operation and their system (while sophisticated) sits on a pretty simple premise - they hold accounts in every country that they have currencies for.
When you convert, you effectively open a virtual account in that country with the bank that they are partnered with (in NZ it was BNZ, but unsure these days as it's been quite a while)
basically, when you pay using AUD from your AUD account, it's a domestic payment - hence their incredibly low fees.

Suspicious transactions are usually picked up due to things like "unusual activity" - i.e. you've never made a transaction in that country before, or it's a high fraud territory and the various anti-fraud systems/processes of the card issuer will flag them as possible fraud. It's an easy fix and repeated use overseas "conditions" the responses and you get less flagged transactions.

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Eva888

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#3361958 8-Apr-2025 12:01

Thanks for that. Feel a little calmer. On to other problems. AirTag wouldn’t pair, battery dead, had to race down to supermarket which didn’t have any, gadget man didn’t have any, thank goodness for JB H. Travel has become much more stressful so many things to take care of, makes me anxious.

Handsomedan

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#3361985 8-Apr-2025 13:38

Eva888:

Thanks for that. Feel a little calmer. On to other problems. AirTag wouldn’t pair, battery dead, had to race down to supermarket which didn’t have any, gadget man didn’t have any, thank goodness for JB H. Travel has become much more stressful so many things to take care of, makes me anxious.

A cruise is a great way to relieve anxiety, in my experience

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Dochart

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#3361989 8-Apr-2025 13:54

SpartanVXL:

The rate is not as good here compared to our aussie counterparts. Plus the 1.6%~ fee and you can see why Wise is popular here.

Fair warning about the auto conversion, if you have other currency balances there is an undisclosed hierarchy on what it will use if you don’t have enough to cover a purchase. I had some USD at a good rate a while back but made the mistake of purchasing something large in AUD and expected my main NZD balance to cover the rest, it took all the AUD, USD and then a tiny amount of NZD and I got hit with the extra fees.

When I know that I don’t need to use any other currency other than NZD anytime soon I put the other currency amounts such as AUD or USA in the “Open a Jar” option in the app so it doesn’t use any other currency to pay things except for NZD.

OP should use this option.

Eva888

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#3361997 8-Apr-2025 14:22

Thanks @Dochart. Didn’t really know how the jars worked.

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