šŸ‡§šŸ‡¬ Monzo in Bulgaria [Wiki]

Monzo Chat Travelling with Monzo
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This is a wiki crowdsourced by the Monzo Community to help you travel with Monzo.

Just like Wikipedia, anyone can edit it to help out others. If you have any tips or feedback for visiting Bulgaria with Monzo, please feel free to edit this guide. You can also add a comment or question below ā€” someone will then incorporate your comment into the main text below and then delete your comment. To create your own ā€œMonzo in ā€¦ā€ guide if one doesnā€™t already exist, just copy this template into a new post and write away!

Safe travels! :wave: :airplane:

Currency

Bulgaria uses the LEV (BGN), made up of 100 Stotinki denominations

Monzo users pay the Mastercard exchange rate with no added fees.

Card usage

Monzo will not work at any merchants where Unicredit Bulbank (Bulgarian United Bank) or Raiffeisen Bank terminals are used. Most shops had their tills connected to either of those two banks. Users receive a ā€˜Card number invalidā€™ error message.

The card works on about 50% of the POS in Sofia.

ATMs

The card works perfectly fine at most ATMā€™s with the notification popping up on my phone at the same time as the receipt from the ATM. The exchange rate was much better than most bankā€™s official exchange rate.

Fiibank cash machines allow maximum of 400 euro at a time, around 800 lev

Payment and withdrawal limits

All Monzo cards have some payment and withdrawal limits. To check yours before you leave, tap on the manage card icon and then tap on Spending and card limits.

Crowdsourced merchant data

The Monzo merchant data is often incorrect (eg. the map shows the wrong location or the name of the place is not correct). Please submit improvements to this data so it can get better for future visitors

Miscellaneous

To edit this guide, just tap the pencil icon below. Alternatively, add a reply with your comments and someone from the community will incorporate your suggestions into the guide and then delete your comment.

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I just made a payment in a book shop and they operate with unicredit and it worked. So may be that info is updated.

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Currently traveling in Bulgaria, Monzo has been accepted at Unicredit Bulbank terminal.

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I often buy things in Bulgaria, all problems were resolved more than a year ago. Worth updating this wiki considering the app now links to here as soon as you land in Bulgaria.

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In Bulgaria at present. I donā€™t think the issues are resolved. My card has been declined four or five times. Transaction isnā€™t getting to Monzo as no decline message showing on account.

This has been going on for two years. Mastercard should have fixed this with Acquirer and bank by now.

Dented by confidence in Monzo, started carrying another card.

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This is very intersting. Iā€™m not an expert at all - would wait for a Monzoer ot respond - but do you remember what merchants it happend with?

Iā€™ve not had my Monzo card decined in any country in the last year, and Iā€™ve been to a lot (Bulgaria many times, Iceland, Thailand, Germany, etc.)

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Most times I used my card in BG it comes back declined. TransferWise have the same problem but that works more than monzo.

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I am due to travel in August to Bulgaria (Obzor area) has anyone had any issues with Monzo in this area?

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Hi all just wanted to let you know the Monzo team told me there should no longer be any issues on Bulgaria. Also I paid for an excursion through TUI in BGN on a Unicredit Bulbank card machine and it worked instantly giving me all the information and great exchange rate as standard. Hope this helps! (edit: I am in the Golden Sands resort Varna)

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Had my Monzo card rejected at Action Aquapark in Sunny Beech. The cashier said she expected it to be rejected and said it was specifically Monzo cards that donā€™t work (not a MasterCard/ visa issue).

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There definitely still seem to be issues in Sunny Beach area. Seems to decline at most shops. Also had this issue at the Action Aquapark, where the cashier was less than friendly when she saw my Monzo card.

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Had the same issue when we were there. Also seemed to decline at most of the big supermarkets.

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Iā€™ve posted here before that I didnā€™t experience any issues. Iā€™ve now started experiencing issues again. My card was declined 2 out of 7 attempts in the last 10 days - at an ATM and a POS, both were operated by DSK bank.

Quite surprising and disappointing - I wouldnā€™t have expected success rates to start declining.

@Monzo team - do you have people internally looking into those issues? Iā€™m open to being contacted directly in case I can help whilst still here.

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I often travel to Bulgaria - FI (First investment) bank, express bank and post bank seem to work fine with Monzo.
Septā€™19 Update - CCB ( Central co-op bank) and UniCredit also work fine. DSK is the only Iā€™m still experiencing issues with.

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April 23, working fine in local supermarketsā€¦e.g Janet