Hi guys,
Just been charged in GBP in Spain. It was definitely euro when he showed me the machine but once paid I got the receipt in GBP and it came through on Monzo in GBP. Is there anything that can be done retrospectively?
So cheeky!
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Looks like there was a lot of people who had similar happen last year …
"Who’s responsible?
If you ask to pay in euros and are charged in pounds, it’s often hard to pin down what went wrong unless you immediately query it with the store.
If a shop or restaurant offers dynamic currency conversion, it has responsibility for making sure you’re offered a choice of currency. Guidance from the UK Cards Association states that “the retailer or ATM should ask you before using dynamic currency conversion”. Yet often this appears not to happen.
A Mastercard spokesperson told us it was an issue they were aware of and added: “Quite often smaller merchants who aren’t used to dynamic currency conversion just go through the motions on the point of sale as quickly as possible to get the payment done.”
We attempted to contact some of the shops and restaurants that had charged MoneySavers in pounds, but none was willing to comment.
Experts we asked about this weren’t able to comment on the specific cases in this article but said it’s likely to be an error (or a deliberate ploy) by the shop or restaurant. Yet we’re still not convinced what the cause is – so we’re investigating further and wanted to put this story out now to find out the extent of the problem."
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You could try disputing the transaction. I think @anon44204028 pointed out somewhere that there was a special dispute reason for these kind of currency mismatches/DCC scams. Maybe someone from 
could confirm?
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I second this suggestion. By charging you in a currency other than the one you intended to pay in, you have essentially been defrauded. I understand that on many machines after you’ve entered your PIN and handed the machine back then there’s an option to select Direct Currency Conversion at that point, which is how this thing occurs.
Best advice when paying abroad and offered DCC is to not let the card machine out of your sight until the transaction is entirely completed so you can react to any such option screens yourself. And if anything does go wrong, raise a dispute. Even if it feels trivial, or it feels easier to write the loss off, ignore the doubts and file the dispute.
Direct Currency Conversion should be outright banned. It’s anti-competitive and never ever in the interests of the consumer. It’s implemented in such a way that it borders on dishonest as has been mentioned.
The EU will probably get round to banning it some day. After we leave.
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It’s really dodgy that this is actually allowed to happen. You’re essentially being charged whatever the merchant wants, up to a certain percentage right? 
So dispute wise… Do I dispute this through Monzo? Obviously the ship has sailed to go back to the restaurant. Would Monzo have any way of knowing what I should’ve paid in Euro and what I actually got charged in GBP? Don’t think I kept the bill so this might just have to be a lesson learned…
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There was some interesting discussion about DCC here a year ago, including a link to an article about customers get ripped off by it.
In answer to your question, the advice from MoneySavingExpert via that link says:
If the retailer refuses [to void the transaction when you discover you’ve been charged in GBP against your wishes] or you only discover you’ve been wrongly charged later, contact your bank or card issuer. It will then take it up with the retailer’s bank overseas, and may start a chargeback.
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There’s nothing you can do directly, but Monzo can file a chargeback claim.
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