Does the Monzo or Starling card work in South Korea?

Atom10

Looking for a card to use in South Korea, has anyone had experience of using Monzo or Starling cards successfully?

DullGreyGuy

Visa and Mastercard are widely accepted so any reason you believe they wouldnt work? Are you talking about paying in shops/hotels/restaurants or using ATMs?

Bicycleman22

I have had trouble using my Starling card at ATMs in Asia. It  has been refused on multiple occasions, no idea why as I just used a different card  in the same ATM. Not been to South Korea though.

tightauldgit

Bicycleman22 said:

I have had trouble using my Starling card at ATMs in Asia. It  has been refused on multiple occasions, no idea why as I just used a different card  in the same ATM. Not been to South Korea though.

From my experience of travelling in Asia especially SK (and China) you need to use the RIGHT ATM - it may not be obvious if you don't read Hangeul but Korean banks typically have only some ATMs which take foreign cards at all. So in a bank of 3 or 4 there will be just 1 maybe that will take a foreign card. 

If there's just the one ATM then often it won't take any foreign card at all.

It's been a while since I've lived in Korea so things may be changing but generally trying to use a foreign bank card meant traipsing around trying to find an ATM that would take it. Often I found a credit card would work but a debit card wouldn't. 

heatherw_01

And old post that has been recently updated on the Monzo forum says yes, Monzo works in South Korea.

https://community.monzo.com/t/can-you-use-a-monzo-card-in-south-korea/67598/17

You might want to check there for Monzo specifically.