Managing your student loan and finances is one of the toughest parts of student life, especially as it can be the first-time you’re budgeting for larger expenses such as rent and bills. With the ability to combine your bank accounts into one using a unique card, Curve’s new app might just be a game changer for students looking to control their finances.
How the Curve app works
Curve is different to anything you’ve ever seen before. Curve allows you to streamline your finances by connecting multiple bank cards into one. They can then be controlled from an app on your phone. You can connect Curve with any MasterCard or Visa account, including student accounts. But that’s just where the magic starts…
Perks and benefits for students
You choose from one of three Curve cards that all offer access to different perks and benefits. The Curve Blue is a free card that offers a 3-month introductory offer of 1% cashback on 3 retailers of your choice, as well as killer FX rates when you spend abroad.
Curve Cashback is a big one for students. It’s really easy to use. When you sign up to Curve you’ll be asked to select your favourite retailers from the list. Then all you need to do is use your Curve card when shopping at those places and you instantly get 1% cashback onto your Curve account. So, if you use the Tube every day or like to indulge in a late-night Uber or Deliveroo, you can now earn a little something back. If you do your weekly shop in Tesco, Sainsburys or Lidl for example, you can also be rewarded!
Whilst the Curve Blue card might be a good place to start, and you can always upgrade to another card later to gain even more perks. The Curve Black card has a £9.99 monthly fee, provides unlimited 1% cashback on 3 retailers, and unlocks benefits such as gadget insurance and worldwide travel insurance, so this is can be seen as an obvious choice for those who were already wanting to cover themselves. Not to mention, Curve Black comes with a £15,000 a year limit for killer FX rates, which is perfect if you’re an international student, planning to study abroad or just love travelling!
How can Curve be used to help students with budgeting?
Traditionally internet banking can be a bit confusing and time-consuming. Curve have created an app that is actually enjoyable and easy to use, so you can enjoy life and its experiences more than trying to log in to your bank online. That’s why when you connect Curve to your banks they become super easy to use.
You can categorise your spending into 11 different categories. Then you can view your history in days, weeks or months to get a really good view of exactly what is going out of your account. What’s helpful is that you see all your spending from multiple banks in one place, so you don’t need to switch between apps to know what you are truly spending in one month, saving you precious time and effort that you can put back into your studies.
Go back in time
We asked Curve about their most innovative feature, the totally unique Go Back In Time feature – they claim to have ‘literally invented time travel for money!’ So how does it work? Let’s say you bought something on your Curve via your Santander card but you realise you wanted it to come out of your HSBC card. You simply find the transaction on your app and click “Go Back In Time” – that’s it! The payment will move from one card to the other and you don’t have to do anything else. This is really useful for moving money around between your own accounts. You get up to 14 days after you’ve made a payment to do this, and the payment can be up to £1,000. This is an incredible feature that can help you stay in control of your budget and keep money in the right accounts.
Bringing your bank into the 21st century
Curve have created all their features for you to use on top of your current back. This means that if you’re using a traditional highstreet bank, you now avoid the foreign transaction rates they would normally have charged and can get instant notification on spending.
This can be particularly useful for international students or for those studying abroad, because you can now use your home bank account without any issues from the moment you land. It also means anyone sending money to your bank account will also avoid any extra charges.
Curve are currently working on integrating with Apple/Google and Samsung pay. You can watch out for announcements on this and find out more about why you should download Curve on their website.
Sign up using the code ‘TASKR’ to claim a FREE £5 card top up!
