How to Pay in Colombia?

It is not easy to decide how you bring your money to another country. Changing pesos in Hungary is impossible, just like forints in Colombia. The US dollar and EUR are the best options if you want to bring some cash. Finally I decided to bring just a little bit of Euros, and the rest was entrusted to my bank cards. One is a usual card from a Hungarian bank and the other two were from online banks, Revolut and Transferwise.

Changing cash

We always have to avoid changing cash on Airports. Usually you gat the worst exchange rates there. El Dorado Airport at Bogotá was the same. Or at least the first window where I stopped. They offered me 2950 Peso for one EUR. I left them immediately and it turned out to be a good decision, because 50 metres later, the next exchange office had a fairly good rate with 3550 Peso for one Euro. I didn’t find any better later in the city either.

Using my hungarian Debit card

Card is in general the best option, but you have to be careful. Sometimes the terminal offers you to pay in Euro, which is wrong because in that case you pay the changing fee twice. If it's possible you have to choose to pay in the local currency. I tried both.

Bought an adapter for 25900 Peso. This time the terminal changed to EUR and then my bank to HUF so I paid 2467,9 HUF at the exchange rate of 10,49. On the same day I bought a sim card as well for 25000 Peso. This time it changed directly to HUF. The result was 2314,6 HUF at an exchange rate of 10,8.

On the same day I bought a sim card as well for 25000 Peso. This time it changed directly to HUF. The result was 2314,6 HUF at an exchange rate of 10,8.

Revolut

Yesterday I used my Revolut card as well. I paid 46400 Peso at a restaurant. The exchange rate this time was 11,23 which means I paid from my HUF account 4130,66 HUF. Unfortunately we can't have a Colombian Peso account on my revolut, but it only means that the bank makes the exchange always at the moment of payment.

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