When making a payment from January 1, 2026, consumers should be careful, because on the receipts the total amount will be written first in euros, and then in levs - the opposite of the current order. If they do not notice, they may be mistaken and be left with the impression that they owe almost half as much. This was warned about on Bulgaria ON AIR by the founder of the online platform “We, the Consumers” Gabriela Rumenova.
“If a merchant refuses to accept payment in levs in January, it would be a violation of the law, since both currencies will be legal tender on the territory of Bulgaria.”, she commented. And he explained that in such a situation, it is better for customers to try to resolve the issue in dialogue with the merchant. If they fail, they can file a report with the control authorities. “They will certainly have teams on duty, they will hardly be able to cover all places, but inspections will be carried out at the first opportunity. However, the idea is not to let it get to that point, but to resolve these cases on the fly in a constructive conversation.”, the expert pointed out.
In all commercial establishments - shops, places of accommodation, restaurants, etc., we will be able to pay in levs throughout the month of January. Then both currencies - lev and euro - will be legal tender. However, vending machines will only accept euros. When we withdraw from ATMs, from January 1st we will only receive euros, she also reminded.
„When we pay with a card, we can save ourselves headaches about calculating the amounts from leva to euros, if we do not incur others. Trusting that everything will be calculated automatically and there will be no errors in the currency conversion and rounding according to the formula specified in the law, we may not notice if the calculation is not correct.“, Rumenova drew attention.
To protect themselves from fraud, citizens can familiarize themselves with the euro banknotes and their security features on the official website of the Bulgarian National Bank and the website of the European Central Bank, Gabriela Rumenova also said. She warned the elderly and other more gullible people not to respond to offers from strangers to help them exchange saved leva for cash, because they might cheat them with counterfeit banknotes or rob them.
At the end of the conversation, she summarized that currently the signals from consumers are most often about incorrect currency conversion and misleading presentation of prices in both currencies on labels.