Upcoming trip? Here's why you should use a prepaid Mastercard for travel purchases

Whether you’re planning on sipping drinks by the beach in the Caribbean, or you’re looking to visit one of Europe’s charming old cities, there’s nothing better than a globetrotting adventure. But all that travel planning? Now that’s a different story. From booking plane tickets to finding the perfect place to stay, going on vacation isn’t as easy as it may seem.

With your KOHO account, however, you already have the perfect travel planning companion right in your pocket: your prepaid Mastercard.

In fact, your KOHO prepaid card is perfect for nearly all of your travel-related expenses. Here are six reasons why you should go prepaid for your next vacation.

1. Easier budgeting

One of the hardest parts about travel is sticking to a budget. Fortunately, the KOHO app comes with plenty of budgeting features, including Goals that can help you automate a pool of savings to fund that trip!

Your KOHO prepaid Mastercard can help continue your budgeting efforts as you plan your next getaway. Since you have full control over how much you load onto your card, you can easily manage how much you spend while organizing your travels.

Not only can you use your KOHO app and prepaid card to track your spending before you leave home, but you can even use it during your getaway. By loading your card at the start of your trip with a predetermined amount of money, you can prevent overzealous spending during your travels. That way, you can enjoy your vacation without blowing your budget in the process.

2. Lower risk while booking online

When booking travel online, there’s always a risk of fraud and identity theft.

This is especially true when working with smaller merchants overseas who may not have robust payment security systems. As a result, your booking for that super cute vacation rental or that once-in-a-lifetime guided tour may not be as secure as you think.

Thankfully with your KOHO prepaid Mastercard, you get free access to a virtual card for all your online purchases. Virtual cards allow you to make travel bookings online with ease, all without exposing your payment information to the world.

Whenever you want to book something online, you can access your virtual card in the KOHO app and then use it to make secure payments to any online merchant that accepts Mastercard (which is most of them, by the way). With your virtual card, you get a one-time card number that can’t be traced back to your account. That means quick, secure, seamless payments for your vacation expenses that don’t expose you to fraudsters. Sounds great to us.

3. Lower foreign transaction fees

Travelling abroad is a fantastic experience, but the foreign transaction fees that come with these overseas adventures aren’t exactly fun for anyone except your credit card company.

That’s why KOHO works with Mastercard to ensure that the foreign transaction fee on your prepaid card is as low as possible (by the way, you can skip the fees all together with KOHO Extra).

KOHO doesn’t make money by charging you excessive fees. That means that using your prepaid card is a great way to save big on hefty foreign transaction fees, which can be up to 3% with major credit card companies. That 3% may not sound like much, but if your travel expenses in another country cost $1,000, you’ll spend $30 just on fees!

Using your KOHO prepaid card while abroad can help you save money on every purchase so you can focus more on enjoying your vacation.

4. Globally accepted payment method

Your KOHO prepaid Mastercard is a global payment method, which is accepted by tens of millions of merchants in over 200 countries around the world. Pretty much anywhere that accepts credit cards will be able to process a payment using your prepaid Mastercard, so you don’t have to worry about having local cash on hand while you travel.

Plus, your KOHO prepaid card is contactless-compatible, allowing you to make quick and easy payments while you travel. Contactless is quickly revolutionizing how we make payments, especially in popular travel destinations, like Europe, where you can often use it to pay for bus, train, and metro tickets with the tap of a card.

5. Theft protection

Prepaid cards have a major advantage over traditional credit cards and debit cards when it comes to fraud protection since there’s a hard limit on how much you can spend.

While traditional credit cards also have spending limits, they’re generally much higher than what you might load onto your prepaid card. Additionally, many debit cards have overdraft features that allow you to spend more money than you actually have—for an added fee, of course.

When you travel using a prepaid card, however, you can further protect yourself financially if your card gets stolen by limiting the amount of money that’s available.

With your KOHO prepaid card, you have even more fraud protection tools at your disposal. You can instantly lock your card and stop any future payments just by logging into the app. That way, if you’ve lost your card, you can prevent someone from just picking it up and spending your money with just the push of a button.

Once your card is locked, you can contact the support team who will help you determine if there are any fraudulent charges on your account. You can also rest assured that your card is protected under Mastercard's Zero Liability Policy should your card get stolen, even when you’re abroad.

6. Instant cash back

Here’s the most fun part: When you use your prepaid KOHO card for travelling, you can rack up at least 1% cash back on essentials, and even more if you shop with our cash back partners. Then there’s the Extra plan, which pays you 2% cash back on transportation, groceries, and eating & drinking expenses!

Even when you’re far from home, KOHO’s always got your back with the greatest savings features—savings that can help fund your next adventure. What could be better?