Avoid ATM Fees in Macedonia

It’s Easy to Avoid ATM Fees in the Republic of North Macedonia

Travel

It’s easy to avoid paying ATM fees in Macedonia. When it comes to making cash withdrawals it’s a very tourist-friendly country.

I lived in Macedonia for a month and never once had an ATM machine try to hit me with any withdrawal fees. Having said that, I didn’t try ATMs from all the banks. I only used three:

  • NLB
  • Halkbank
  • Stopanska Banka AD Skopje

I have no idea if any of the other banks are likely to charge fees but if you use ATMs that belong to NLB, Halkbank, or Stopanska Banka AD Skopje you should be able to avoid paying cash withdrawal fees in Macedonia.

Another good thing I noticed with these banks was their machines don’t use dynamic currency conversion to try and trick people into accepting an unfavourable exchange rate. Macedonia is the first country I’ve been to where the ATMs never presented me this undesirable option.

UPDATE (September 2022): Unfortunately, NLB appears to charging ATM fees now. According to a comment posted by an anonymous site vistor, the feee is 300 MKD per withdrawal.