Credit Card for San Vincent and the Grenadines company or UAE freelancer

[karishi]

Hi,

I am resident in the UAE with a freelancer visa, soon to be changed to Remote Working Visa and have a SVATG LLC company. I'm trying to get a credit card, which I only need for one specific reason: renting cars and scooters around the world as I live as a digital nommad. I have a UAE bank account, but they don't give me a credit card as I don't have a fixed salary and I have been using the bank only for 8 months so I am a new client. So I was wondering if it's possible to get a credit card for the company, which has existed for 4 years and has had a yearly turnaround on average of 120k USD ( with basically no expenses as it's just me ) in the last three years. I have Wise as the only bank account for the company. I don't need a high credit plafond on the card 1500 EUR is enough, I've never seen excess above 1200 EUR.
Is there any easy way to get this?

 

[maxmoney]

What the problem with a debit card? Have used my in many countries inside and outside of the EU and even made cash withdrawals?

 

[karishi]

What the problem with a debit card? Have used my in many countries inside and outside of the EU and even made cash withdrawals?

You can't rent a car. most companies want either a credit card or you have to get full insurance with a debit card

 

[maxmoney]

okay I did not know that.

 

[karishi]

okay I did not know that.

Yeah I think it's the only use case left for having a Credit Card.

 

[myshufflemix]

I have rented a car with a debit card many times both in Germany, Gran Canarias and many other places. The card is from Wise.

 

[Sols]

Some car rental companies accept debit cards, while some do not.

Getting secured credit cards for offshore companies used to be quite easy, but nowadays it's a very different story. With offshore banking dying a pathetic and painful death, Visa and Mastercard have pulled most credit card programs from the few banks that do remain and left them with prepaid cards only (which are worse than debit cards for things like renting cars).

Heritage Bank in Belize, Bank of Nevis International, or Cayman National might be able to give you a credit card. But SVG is seen as a low-tier jurisdiction, so you'll have to make a very attractive application.

You'd probably have a much better time setting up a company in UAE and getting a work permit and visa that way. Then you can quite easily obtain local banking.

 

[karishi]

Some car rental companies accept debit cards, while some do not.

Getting secured credit cards for offshore companies used to be quite easy, but nowadays it's a very different story. With offshore banking dying a pathetic and painful death, Visa and Mastercard have pulled most credit card programs from the few banks that do remain and left them with prepaid cards only (which are worse than debit cards for things like renting cars).

Heritage Bank in Belize, Bank of Nevis International, or Cayman National might be able to give you a credit card. But SVG is seen as a low-tier jurisdiction, so you'll have to make a very attractive application.

You'd probably have a much better time setting up a company in UAE and getting a work permit and visa that way. Then you can quite easily obtain local banking.

I have a freelancer visa in the UAE, but since I only work with US and EU companies, even if I have a monthly turnaround which is 5 times the required for the better card, I can't get a credit card unless I prove I have a fixed salary. It's possible that if I do a fixed deposit some banks will give me a credit card based on that, but emiratse NBD told me that they don't disclose such information through mail. On a facebook group someone told me that the same applies for one branch of Citibank. I guess that's the only option. This is a common problem for people in the UAE with remote working visas or freelancer visas, I guess that the governement will do something to solve this in the future. Having a compnay in the UAE is expensive, compared to a LLC in SVG, as you have accounting too.