Romania transactions · Transactions in Romania
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Transactions in Romania
Transactions in Romania
Romanian transactions generally take place in cash. Although some places will accept Euro or USD you will generally be charged an additional 20% paying by this method and it is not advisable, although this is changing. The best method is to pay using local currency - lei (RON). Most Romanians have either a charge card or a credit card - however, they are generally used at ATM machines - on-line payments are still somewhat new, and many companies and people still look at them with suspicion - so much so, that even on-line shops will make you pay on delivery. You can however pay by card in many shops and in most supermarkets. Accepted credit/debit cards are: Mastercard, Visa , American Express (in some places - although this is rapidly expanding because of a very aggressive campaign by American Express) and Diners Club (usually only in hotels, and even then expect stares and incredulity that such a card even exists). Almost all transactions at POS machines (supermarkets, shops etc.) will ask you to enter your PIN code as well.
Most small towns have at least one or two ATMs and a bank office, with large cities having hundreds of ATMs and bank offices. (It is not uncommon to see three bank agencies one next to another in residential neighborhoods of Bucharest). ATMs are also available in many villages (at the post-office or the local bank-office). Romanian for ATM is bancomat. Credit cards are accepted in large cities, in most hotels, restaurants, hypermarkets, malls. Do not expect to use a credit card at any railway station or at the subway (the subway and RATB of Bucharest, for example, are cash-only because they consider that card transactions would slow down the queues at the ticket booths). Gas stations and a great number of other stores accept Visa and Mastercard. It is advisable to always have a small sum of money in cash (about 50 RON or even more), even in large cities.
Romanian businesses are not mandated to provide you with full change for every transaction, and frequently their tills are short of coins in particular. Fortunately many prices are in round multiples of 1 RON, and they are almost always in multiples of 10 bani. Even if a store can change, say a 100 RON note, they will ask you for smaller change first. For very small amounts (say 20 or 50 bani) they will sometimes insist on you buying something of that worth instead of giving you change.
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Romania Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.