Has anyone else been caught out by the fee for withdrawing cash overseas.
I am on a 5 week trip to Cambodia and Indonesia where pretty much everything is cash. So I had budgeted to take £200 cash in cambodia at end of trip to pay for lodgings. This was on 24 June and I thought, incorrectly as I now know, that the cash free limit would refresh at the beginning of July when the monthly spending summary arrived.
So I was very annoyed when I saw it hadn’t. I contacted monzo and was told that it refreshes 30 days after the first withdrawal. If I had known this I could have withdrawn a small amount at the beginning of the trip to start the countdown.
This is doubly annoying as my husband also has a monzo card so we will be doubly hit by fees now.
Their explanation of fees is not, in my opinion, clear enough and I can’t be the only one caught out, can I?
For me it was clearly stated within the app for account limits, and international currency atm withdrawals refreshes every 30 days from the day you start withdrawing money abroad - which does make sense than every calendar month
This wouldn’t have worked - the time window is rolling, as stated in the app. So if you take out £1 on the 1st June, then £199 on the 30th June, you are only able to take out another £1 fee-free on 1st July, not the full £200.
Thanks Stephen. So if I understand - what you are saying is that I would have to have withdrawn £200 on 1 June for it to refresh to £200 by 1 July?
I’m not sure the explanation in the app is clear enough for the likes of me! Perhaps they need an example like you have given me to make it crystal clear.
I recently travelled and did know it was a rolling 30 days from first withdrawal, but I can definitely see your point that it isn’t the in app help isn’t clear enough for everyone. You have to click into the right Help article for that to be spelled out about the rolling period - it doesn’t specify in Fees and charges abroad but if you then click the related article about Fees it’s more clear.
I actually opened an account with Starling as well, which I only wanted for being able to withdraw cash abroad without that charge - just transferring money from Monzo to Starling to withdraw as I wanted. Although I appreciate that doesn’t help you as you’re already out travelling.
You can also check your remaining allowance anytime by clicking the settings wheel next to your card on the account tab, then clicking ‘limits’
I suppose it would be nice to be able to click on it to see what date your withdrawals were made in the last 30 days, to help know when they reset, but then it’s only once a year or so that I’m abroad twice within 30 days of each other
Had forgotten about that. Thanks for the reminder.