The regulation came into force from 19 April 2021, and from 21 April 2021, all Personal Customers who use their permanent tsb Debit or Credit Card to complete non-Euro payment transactions (online, at point of sale terminals or ATM cash withdrawals) in any of the EEA currencies will be notified by SMS message of the total currency conversion charges that apply to the transaction. The charges will be calculated as a percentage mark-up over the latest available euro foreign exchange reference rate issued by the European Central Bank (ECB)*.
The EEA countries and currencies not using Euro currently are Bulgarian Lev, Croatian Kuna, Czech Koruna, Danish Krone, Hungarian Forint, Icelandic Krona, Norwegian Krone, Polish Zloty, Romanian Leu, Swedish Krona, and Liechtenstein Franc.
The SMS will be sent once every calendar month in which customer continues to transact in the same currency. For example, if transactions are made in Hungarian Forint (HUF) only for a period of 3 months, a message will be sent after the first transaction is completed and in each calendar month for a period of 3 months.
A separate SMS will be issued for transactions in multiple EEA currencies, for example, if transactions are made in 4 EEA currencies in one calendar month, a separate message will be sent after the first transaction in each currency is completed.
An SMS will be sent to the card holder completing the transaction, e.g. for joint accounts it will only be sent to the party making the payment or withdrawal. This SMS will be sent to the card holder’s registered mobile number held by permanent tsb and can be opted-out of by contacting Open24.
This notification will not be sent to Business Debit Customers.
*For the majority of transactions, the percentage mark-up sent to you in the SMS message will reflect the total currency conversion charges to be paid by you. However in a limited number of instances, due to the way some transactions are processed, the amount charged to your account may be slightly higher or lower than the initial pre-authorised amount.
In addition to the SMS you can use the permanent tsb currency calculator to calculate the mark up % prior to completing transactions.