Canada International Student Banking Guide 2023

The following is Canada international student basic bank account/card knowledge that I personally summarized based on Trip Wine Go! & CanadianRewards and combined with personal experience. I am just a knowledge porter.

Basic literacy If you are a new international student Advanced techniques How to transfer money from domestic China to Canada Why use credit cards (Credit Card) instead of debit cards (Debit Card)? Beginner Basic References

Basic Literacy

Canada’s Big Five Banks: Royal Bank of Canada RBC, Toronto-Dominion Bank TD, Bank of Nova Scotia Scotiabank, Bank of Montreal BMO, Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce CIBC

Bank Account: Without considering investment-related accounts, mainly divided into Checking Account and Savings Account. Usually, money stored in savings accounts has interest, but directly using it for consumption will incur fees. Money in checking accounts can be used for direct consumption but has no interest. However, some online banks such as EQ Bank, Neo, and Wealthsimple combine the two accounts into one, providing interest without fees for consumption.

Bank Cards: Ignoring sub-types like charge cards, prepaid cards, and client cards, there are really only two buckets: Debit Card and Credit Card. Debit cards use money directly from the corresponding bank account for consumption, usually providing no or very little payment rewards. Credit card consumption uses the credit limit granted by the bank for the card. You need to manually or automatically repay before the bill due date. Therefore, this provides the possibility of advance consumption. For example, if you are a moonlight clan who spends all money by the end of each month, then if you use a debit card, you won’t have money to pay at the beginning of the month. Using a credit card only requires ensuring you receive money to repay the bill at the end of the month. I personally oppose any form of advance consumption unless you know what you are doing. If you don’t know what you are doing, then use the credit card as a debit card, ensuring you can repay the bill at any time. Only use it for the benefits that credit cards can bring to you. Specific benefits will be explained below.

CDIC: Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation, providing insurance up to C$100,000 for your money in the bank. If the bank goes bankrupt, they will compensate you. So don’t deposit money in non-CDIC member banks. Also, as long as it is a CDIC member, even small banks or online banks can be safely deposited. If deposits are higher than C$100,000, you can ensure all money is protected by depositing separately in multiple banks with CDIC insurance.

INTERAC e-Transfer: Also called EMT (Interac Email Money Transfer), the most commonly used form of small-amount transfers between individuals in Canada. You only need to know the other party’s email address.

INTERAC/Tap: A consumption method completed by tapping on the POS machine

Card Organizations: Including Visa, Mastercard, American Express (AmEx), UnionPay, etc. Card organizations manage and maintain payment networks, process transactions. Banks need to rely on card organizations to issue bank cards.

GIC: GIC (Guaranteed Investment Certificate) is a term investment in Canada. By depositing a certain amount of funds to a financial institution and obtaining a certain interest rate return within a certain period, the characteristics are principal and interest protection, fixed term, and fixed interest rate. Therefore, it is a low-interest conservative investment that is not afraid of losses.

SIN: Social Insurance Number represents your identity in Canada’s social insurance and tax system.

If You Are a New International Student

Find the most convenient location of Canada’s Big Five banks within your residence range, and open a bank account using your student status, convenient for daily withdrawals and transfers. Usually, everyone will open a student account. But if you have determined that your deposit is greater than the minimum deposit limit for premium accounts, for example, TD All Inclusive account with C$5,000 deposit can waive account fees & CIBC Smart Plus Account with C$6,000 deposit can waive account fees, then you can completely consider opening such an account directly. Of course, the decision should be based on actual circumstances, because banks will provide activities like account opening rewards. Student account opening rewards are usually tens of dollars, while premium accounts might be hundreds of dollars. But such activities may require you to complete some matters, such as several transfers/consumptions/Direct Deposit, etc. The requirements for premium account activities may not be friendly to new international students.

Student accounts usually have no monthly fees and provide unlimited transfers/ETF. All of Canada’s Big Five banks except TD and BMO are like this, therefore, it is not recommended to open TD and BMO student accounts. It is only recommended to open premium accounts that can waive monthly fees through deposits. Premium accounts usually provide other advantages. In addition to unlimited transfers/EMT, they may also have the function of waiving annual fees for one credit card.

In addition, note that the debit card provided when opening an account at RBC is special compared to other banks. It is called a Client Card, only supports Interac consumption. There is no card organization logo on the card, so online consumption is impossible. You need an additional RBC Virtual Visa Debit to complete online consumption.

Advanced Techniques

If you have Canadian permanent resident (PR) status, that’s best. If not, you can pretend. Because the benefits enjoyed by international students holding study permits (Study Permit) are significantly lower than those holding Canadian nationality/PR.

The key point is to provide as little information as possible to the bank, keeping mysterious:

SIN: International students’ SIN is easy to identify, fixed starting with 9. Letting the bank know will spoil things. Many cards won’t approve you once they see you are an international student. Fortunately, most times online form filling is optional. If you are offline, don’t reveal it. If your persona is that you haven’t had time to apply yet, say you have applied but it hasn’t come down yet. If your persona is that your income is very high, just say you don’t remember, want to go home to find it. Anyway, don’t give them the opportunity to fill it into the system.
ID: In most cases, identity verification requires 2 pieces of Photo ID. The standard configuration for international students is Study Permit + Passport. But this exposes that you are a pure international student. The trick is to apply for a local Provincial ID, such as BC ID in BC Province at ICBC. It is basically an ID card. Then you can use BCID instead of Study Permit, because PR retains original nationality. If you have a driver’s license (Driver’s license), even better is driver’s license + BCID. If opening a student account, then match with your university’s Enrollment Letter instead of Study Permit. But I haven’t tested the feasibility yet. If your university’s Enrollment Letter clearly marks you as an International Student, it will spoil things. Residential address can be faked by saying you returned to your hometown to visit, so fill in a China address or something like that to muddle through.
Communication: If you can’t speak English clearly or understand what the other party is saying, letting the other party believe your annual income is eighty thousand might also be somewhat difficult. So this needs to be flexible according to actual circumstances. For example, if your bragging level when speaking Chinese is far better than when speaking English, you can consider specially marking the need for a bank manager who can speak Chinese when making an appointment. If the other party asks where your income is, you can also explain using WeChat/Alipay. Each shows their special skill.

In addition, information between different Canadian banks is not interoperable (special cases除外, such as MBNA is a subsidiary of TD, Simplii Financial is a subsidiary of CIBC, subsidiary banks and parent banks may share the same set of systems in the background). So even if RBC knows you are an international student, it will not affect your pretending to be PR at TD.

The above techniques are also universal when applying for credit cards. For example, in the income section, most banks will not specifically check whether your income is true. It might just be a hard-regulated number in the system. In actual operation, if you chat happily with the customer manager, they will not make things difficult for you. So if you know the income requirement for a certain card in advance, you can directly fill in your income according to the requirement. As long as it’s not too excessive, it’s fine. Banks are not tax bureaus.

How to Transfer Money from Domestic China to Canada

When applying for a Canadian visa, you will be required to provide proof of deposit. In addition to traditional deposit certificates, the Canadian government also provides a method of using investment GIC as proof. Therefore, most international students’ GIC domestic handling at which bank will lead to you must open an account at the corresponding bank in Canada. This depends on your local bank situation. For example, China Everbright Bank & Xi’an Bank & Bank of Beijing cooperate with Scotiabank, Bank of China corresponds to Bank of China (Canada), Industrial and Commercial Bank of China corresponds to Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (Canada), HSBC and BMO all have businesses in China.

Domestic banks’ direct wire transfers to Canadian banks must charge a C$15 landing fee. According to different banks, there may be different other fees. If it is a situation like Bank of China corresponding to Bank of China (Canada), they will not charge additional fees beyond the C$15 landing fee.

The author comes from a small city without overseas bank branches. The GIC opened is with Bank of China (Canada). The biggest problem with this bank is that the system is old and does not support INTERAC e-Transfer. International students wanting to transfer funds to local bank accounts is also troublesome. Bank customer service managers usually suggest you make a trip to the branch to withdraw money. But from the fact that there are only two Bank of China (Canada) branches in Vancouver, you can see this is not convenient. A small trick is to look for ATMs marked with THE EXCHANGE® network to withdraw money, such as all Vancity Bank ATMs. But the ATM withdrawal limit is C$1000 per day. Therefore, a better method is to use Bill Payment supported by Bank of China (Canada) to directly repay credit cards detailed below, completing the transfer indirectly.

Why Use Credit Cards (Credit Card) Instead of Debit Cards (Debit Card)?

Credit Record

Credit record determines many things. Once you need it, you may regret not paying attention to it earlier, such as when buying a house or car. The longer your credit record, the greater the advantage. Credit record duration is calculated based on your first credit card. Therefore, opening a credit card as early as possible, even if not using it, simply retaining it to extend credit record duration also has positive significance. Canada’s credit records are provided by Equifax and TransUnion, two organizations. Different banks/phone card companies may query one of them or simultaneously query both scores. If you want to query your own credit score, you can through third-party company-provided services, such as Credit Karma and Borrowell. Directly querying from Equifax and TransUnion may be more troublesome.

Account Opening Rewards

Many credit cards provide super high card opening rewards to attract applications.

Additional Revolving Funds

In the previous text, I mentioned I do not encourage any form of advance consumption. But if you know what you are doing, the additional funds provided by the bank can help you do many things.

Preventing Fraudulent Transactions

Credit card consumption actually uses the bank’s money. Therefore, if you are defrauded, the one responsible for getting the money back is the bank. So as long as you report the fraudulent transaction, the credit card company will quickly cancel the transaction on your card. In fact, where the transferred money went is a problem for the bank to worry about. If your debit card was defrauded, then before the money is recovered, you can only wait for the result.

Consumption Rewards

The most important point. Credit card consumption has cashback or point returns. Depending on the credit card, cashback and point return rates will have huge differences. But what is unified is that you will get rewards for consumption. Accumulating little by little is also an income. If you enter the wool harvesting field and start doing fancy things, there is more discussion space.

Additional Benefits

Various insurances that credit cards come with will directly apply to goods purchased with the credit card. For example, goods purchased with a credit card with extended warranty will have their warranty period extended. In addition, there are various other insurances. Some credit cards come with free trailer services. Some come with hotel/travel group memberships. Some allow entering VIP rooms at airports, upgrading airplane seats, and even free WI-FI. Different cards have different benefits.

As a beginner’s guide, I will list below some credit cards I have already/applied for, divided into 【Beginner】 and 【Basic】 two categories.

【Beginner】 level credit cards are all no annual fee cards, suitable for new international students without any credit record to apply for. Because there is no annual fee, if they are no longer used in the future, they can be put in a drawer without affecting credit record duration. If they are chicken rib cards with annual fees, worrying about whether closing the card in the future will affect credit record duration.

【Basic】 level credit cards are those that break away from the beginner level, having some credit record and starting to pursue returns. At this stage, what is mainly valued is the return rate. So as long as the brought return can cover the annual fee expenditure, annual fee cards are also not a problem.

The reason there is no 【Advanced】 level is also because I have not broken away from the 【Basic】 level. I don’t travel, rarely take airplanes, usual consumption is not high. Therefore, the benefits brought by high-end credit cards have little advantage for me. I may not earn back the annual fee money. In order to not be retaliated against, also because my experience is insufficient, there is none.

When applying, in addition to all the content mentioned above, also pay attention to two points:

If providing card opening rewards, you can query whether it is the highest in history (black talk: Shigao/Shigao) before making a decision. Waiting party forever not slaves.
Sometimes applying for credit cards through rebate websites can additionally obtain a commission from the rebate website, such as GreatCanadianRebates.ca (GCR) type websites. Sometimes by entering other people’s referral codes, you can also bring additional commissions for both you and the other party. I have a referral code page of my own that placed some of my referral codes, marking the earnings for both of us. You can take a look: https://blog.davidweng.tk/article/my-referral-codes. In the following text, if the credit card name is a clickable hyperlink, it means I have attached the corresponding referral link.

All information updated to 2023.06.09

Beginner

Referral code: 2LZG

All consumption 1% Cashback, with bank account interest rate 2.25%

A network bank card applied for through the mobile APP. Also my first credit card in Canada. Neo provides multiple different Plans inside the App that can be switched. Different Plans will provide better cashback amounts than the basic Plan in different categories, but overall, it is quite chicken rib. This can be used as your first credit card in Canada. After having a better credit card in the future, you can directly replace it. Putting it in the wallet also doesn’t lose face, after all, the card surface design is simple and generous.

Buying groceries 1.5% CT Money Cashback, Canadian Tire subsidiary stores (Canadian Tire, Sport Chek, Mark’s/L’Équipeur, Atmosphere, Party City, Sports Rousseau, Hockey Experts, L’Entrepôt du Hockey, Pro Hockey Life, partial Sports Experts) 4% CT Money Cashback, other consumption 0.8% CT Money Cashback

Bill Payment 0.8% CT Money Cashback, single consumption over C$150 can have interest-free installment

This card is my second credit card in Canada. I originally applied for Triangle World Elite Mastercard, but they gave me one level lower than this, and only gave C$500 ultra-low limit (after using a few months, self-service upgrade in the App became C$4500). The possible reason is that early Neo Card MasterCard does not report to credit bureaus, so at that time, Triangle saw that I was a person without credit record, giving me a降级 approved C$500 also gave me face. Besides the transition period buying groceries 1.5% better than nothing, a big highlight is that you can complete Bill Payment on the website without using any third-party platform and also enjoy Cashback. For the payee, you are also not using a credit card to pay, so there will be no additional fees. I can have quite considerable earnings using this card to pay tuition (of course, also because international student tuition is too expensive, quantitative change produces qualitative change).

All consumption 0.5% Cashback, with bank account interest rate 2.50%

No foreign transaction fee

All ATM withdrawals in Canada are free. Single time highest C$500, single day highest C$500

This card is not for swiping, this card is unbelievably good that you withdraw money at any ATM, EQ will return the fees charged by ATM to you after a period. This means you completely don’t need to bring a pile of debit cards on your body to prevent not having corresponding ATM to withdraw cash. But note that because this card is essentially a Prepaid Card, therefore, it also cannot be used in those places that only accept debit cards. But you can take out cash to solve it. In addition, because not charging foreign transaction fees, you can use this card to shop online without fear of foreign currency. Foreign currency consumption will be converted according to the Mastercard standard exchange rate. A very practical card in specific scenarios.

Basic

Buying groceries, refueling, paying bills 3% Cashback, other consumption 1% Cashback

Holding TD All Inclusive account can waive main card annual fee. (TD All Inclusive account with C$5,000 deposit can waive account fee)

Warranty Extension Extended Warranty – 1 year
Purchase Protection – 90 days
Travel Emergency Medical – 15 days
Baggage Delay – C$1,000
Lost or Stolen Baggage – C$1,000
Rental Car Theft & Damage – included
TD Auto Club, with free Auto towing service in United States and Canada

This card starts having funding requirements. TD All Inclusive account only needs to guarantee balance not lower than C$5000 to waive account fees. And each TD All Inclusive Account can waive the annual fee of one Visa Infinite series credit card.

Scotiabank, TD, and CIBC all have cards with similar positioning. In the following text, only CIBC’s that one is included, because Scotiabank’s that one cannot use corresponding bank’s premium account to waive last year’s fee. In addition, my account opening reward when opening All Inclusive was C$400.

Buying groceries, refueling 4% Cashback, transportation, eating, paying bills 2% Cashback, other consumption 1% Cashback

Holding CIBC Smart Plus Account can waive main card annual fee. (CIBC Smart Plus Account with C$6,000 deposit can waive account fee)

Warranty Extension Extended Warranty – 1 year
Purchase Protection – 90 days
Travel Accident – C$500,000
Travel Emergency Medical – 15 days
Trip Interruption – C$2,000
Flight Delay – C$700
Baggage Delay – C$500
Lost or Stolen Baggage – C$500
Rental Car Theft & Damage – included

This card’s grocery cashback ratio is slightly higher than TD’s same-positioned Cash Back Visa Infinite, but the corresponding same-level premium account Smart Plus Account seems to have no activity recently. Wait until there is activity, then you can open it.

Buying groceries, eating, takeout, transportation, refueling, streaming media, subscriptions, video games 3x Avion Premium points, other consumption 1x Avion Premium points

Avion Premium needs to be transferred to Avion Elite to obtain higher returns. Details can refer to:

Otherwise, using it directly, the return rate is about 1.74-3.09%

Holding the following two accounts can waive monthly fees: Royal Bank of Canada Unlimited Account: RBC Signature No Limit Banking OR Royal Bank of Canada Premium Student Account: RBC Advantage Banking for students account

Warranty Extension Extended Warranty – 1 year
Purchase Protection – 90 days
Phone Protection – 1 year (C$1,000)

The advantage is that you can waive monthly fees using a student account. The disadvantage is that if you want to use the highest value of returned points, you also need another Avion card, which is quite troublesome. This card might be more friendly to UBC students, because RBC On Campus in the school can handle it.

Restaurants in Canada, buying groceries, takeout consumption 5x MR Select points (about 5%+, annual maximum $30000); refueling, travel, transportation consumption 2x MR Select points (about 2%+), any other consumption 1x MR Select points (about 1%+)

Monthly fee $12.99

Warranty Extension Extended Warranty – 1 year
Purchase Protection – 90 days
Phone Protection – C$1,000
Travel Accident – C$250,000
Travel Emergency Medical – 15 days
Flight Delay – C$500
Baggage Delay – C$500
Lost or Stolen Baggage – C$500
Hotel theft – C$500
Rental Car Theft & Damage – included

This card is Canada’s cashback divine card, also the only one in my 【Basic】 recommendation that cannot waive monthly fees. This card needs some operations to squeeze out the highest value. Specific details will not be expanded. The idea is to earn points by purchasing gift cards and Prepaid cards at the grocery store with the highest cashback ratio.

PayPower Prepaid Card charges 9.95 activation fee, maximum single denomination $500, can complete closed loop by using Bill Payment to repay credit card

This PrePaid card can choose denomination when purchasing. After purchasing, it is used as an ordinary card, consuming the balance in the card. The reason PayPower Prepaid Card is specially listed is that this card can initiate Bill Payment within the App, meaning it can be used to repay credit card bills. This way, you don’t need to worry about how to spend the balance in the card.

Ritual ordering meals can bypass restaurant restrictions and use Amex to make payments through Apple Pay

A big pain point of Amex is charging high handling fees from merchants, causing many merchants not to accept Amex payments. But by using ordering/takeout platforms as intermediaries, this pain point can be solved. This idea can be extended to other places.

Canadian Tire subsidiary stores (Canadian Tire, Sport Chek, Mark’s/L’Équipeur, Atmosphere, Party City, Sports Rousseau, Hockey Experts, L’Entrepôt du Hockey, Pro Hockey Life, partial Sports Experts) 4% CT Money Cashback
Buying groceries (except Costco & Walmart, annual maximum consumption is 1.2 ten thousand) 3% return
Gas+/Essence+, Premium grade oil 7¢ per litre, Regular grade oil 5¢ per litre
Other consumption 1% return

Bill Payment 1% CT Money Cashback, single consumption over C$150 can have interest-free installment

Free Roadside Assistance Gold Plan

Basically the same as Triangle Mastercard, just the return is higher, with additional free towing service. When I applied at the beginning, I actually chose this one instead of Triangle Mastercard. As a result, at that time, because Neo had not sorted out the problems on the credit organization side, their cards did not report to credit bureaus. When I applied for this card, Triangle Pull showed that I had no credit record. As a result, they gave me a降级 to Triangle Mastercard with C$500 limit. Fortunately, this card’s limit increase is very simple. Update your own work and income in the App to request a limit increase. Once every six months.