🇪🇸 Monzo in Spain [Wiki]

[hannng]

@urban

I learned my lesson. Withdraw cash before travelling to Spain.

@samueldhz

In the Canary Islands, just like anywhere else in Spain, there’s no problem in paying contactless or chip & pin in most places. However, the issue is with withdrawing money from most of the ATMs as they charge a fee, even to local banks if they are not their own. Any idea of a bank ATM that does not charge fees?

Having learnt the lesson in France, I thought I’d be well prepared this time by having €300 for Lanzarote.

Most retail and F&B services are cashless, even at a seafood restaurant in El Roque, one tapas bar in Playa Blanca imposes 5€ minimum. Just when I thought about spending up all the cash, I came across a boat rent company that insists bank transfer for the deposit and the rest can only be paid by cash on the day - absolutely no online or card payment system which means I needed more cash.

Charges at ATMs I’ve checked so far:

• Sabadell 8.95€
• Santander 7€
• Euronet 5.95€
• Cashzone 4.99€

Having Euros in Wise was no use in dodging ATM fees as the ATMs identity the cards’ issuing countries, nothing to do with IBAN.

PS: Not sure why we keep having 2 threads per country - [Wiki] vs [Discussion] when only the Wiki threads are linked to Monzo in-app “More travel tips from the Monzo community”.