Foreign exchange brand Travelex says it has launched its online click-and-collect service in Hong Kong.
The new offering, announced Wednesday (April 3), lets customers purchase their travel cash in advance online, reserving more than 30 currencies, including the U.S. dollar, the British pound, the Japanese Yen and Thailand’s baht. From there, orders can be collected from five of Travelex’s bureaus in Hong Kong.
“With online ordering having proved to be hugely popular in many of our other markets across our international footprint, we are really excited to introduce the service to Hong Kong,” Dragon Wan, Travelex’s managing director for Asia, said in a news release provided to PYMNTS.
“Online ordering offers so many benefits: the best possible Travelex exchange rates with no hidden fees; the convenience factor of being able to collect currency from one of our airport or city bureaux; and with one less thing to worry about on your day of travel. Ultimately, the service offers better value, convenience, and peace-of-mind than ever before.”
PYMNTS spoke last month with Travelex CEO Richard Wazacz, who said that despite the rise of digital payments methods, the ongoing use of cash during cross-border trips is fueling the increase in travel industry revenue.
“Cash is seen as a trusted mode of payment when you travel across borders,” Wazacz said. “A lot of payment methods are still very domestic or national-based, and consumers who rely on cash have the confidence that it will always work wherever they are in the world.”
Aside from the confidence it gives travelers, Wazacz said cash offers a tangible means to track expenses, particularly valued by budget-conscious travelers wrestling with cost-of-living challenges around the world.
“If you’ve got $100 in your pocket, you know how much money you’ve got left,” he said, noting that it’s a clarity not often found with electronic payment methods.
Elsewhere in the travel payments space, PYMNTS spoke earlier this week with Edwin Poot, global chief technology officer at Thredd, on how recent innovations in the way businesses handle travel expenditures.
As that report pointed out, traditional and more manual, paper-based methods are being replaced by digital solutions that can automatically capture and categorize expenses. This both speeds up reimbursement times and reduces the risk of human error, ensuring more accuracy and allowing for real-time expense tracking and management.
“As with every technology company, we’re at the forefront of using tech ourselves and are using more solutions like automated expense applications, automated receipt scanning and categorization, etc.,” said Poot, noting that in spite of the advent of mobile-centric tools for effortless receipt scanning and categorization, there are still some challenges surrounding things like compliance and cost control.
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