Sending Money to Romania: Match the Currency, Rail, and Delivered Amount

Start with the Romanian obligation, not the sender’s account currency. If a lease or tuition invoice requires 10,000 RON, the payment succeeds only when the beneficiary receives the required RON amount with the correct reference. If it requires euros, use a euro-compatible beneficiary account and keep the euro obligation separate. Before sending, obtain the invoice and bank instructions in the same currency and confirm in writing whether the sender, transfer provider or recipient bank will convert.

Romania’s payment infrastructure explains what may happen after a payment enters the banking system, but it does not guarantee that a particular consumer account supports every service.

Separate the Romanian payment rails

Rail or framework	What it does	What the sender must still confirm
ReGIS	The National Bank of Romania’s real-time gross settlement system for high-value or urgent payments in lei	Whether the sending institution uses it for this payment, the cutoff, fee and beneficiary-bank details
SENT	Retail clearing services for RON and euro payments, plus instant services between participating institutions	The exact service, currency, limit and whether both institutions participate; not every bank, account or beneficiary is automatically instant-enabled
SEPA	Harmonised euro payments	SEPA moves euros; it does not convert a euro payment into the RON amount on a Romanian invoice

A Romanian IBAN may be linked to a RON account, a euro account or another supported currency. “Send to Romania” is therefore not enough. Ask the beneficiary to confirm the account currency, exact legal account name, IBAN, payment reference and required delivered amount.

Choose the currency route deliberately

For a RON obligation, compare routes only after both quotes target the same RON delivered amount:

EUR sent, recipient bank converts: obtain the euro debit, transfer fee, the receiving bank’s conversion method and any deduction. If the bank cannot confirm how many RON will be credited, the route does not yet prove that the invoice will be paid in full.
Direct RON delivery: obtain a quote that states the exact RON amount to be credited, total source-currency debit, exchange-rate margin, fees, quote expiry and refund terms.

For a euro obligation, confirm a euro-denominated invoice and a euro-compatible beneficiary account. EU rules cover pricing and disclosure for cross-border euro payments and currency conversion; the Your Europe payment guide does not turn a RON invoice into a euro obligation.

The National Bank’s reference exchange rates are a comparison context, not a guaranteed retail rate or proof of the recipient’s credited amount.

Worked rent example: compare like with like

Assume a signed lease requires 5,000 RON by Friday. These figures are illustrative quotes, not current market rates.

Route A proposes a €1,010 SEPA transfer to the landlord’s euro account. The receiving bank will convert, but neither party can confirm the credited RON amount. Even if the transfer is cheap, it is not yet a complete payment plan because the landlord may receive less than 5,000 RON.
Route B quotes a total debit of €1,025, including its fee, and guarantees delivery of 5,000 RON to the landlord’s confirmed RON account before the deadline.

Route B costs €15 more in the illustration, but it closes the delivered-amount requirement. Route A becomes comparable only when the recipient bank supplies the applicable conversion and deductions or the landlord agrees in writing to a euro amount. For tuition, run the same test and preserve the student or invoice reference.

Verify the beneficiary and payment file

Confirm the beneficiary through an official portal or a trusted contact method independent of the payment email. Match the legal name, currency, IBAN, institution, reference and refund terms to the signed obligation. If instructions changed, stop and re-verify. For a large new beneficiary, a small test can confirm ownership and reference routing, but it does not prove that a later payment will use the same rate or rail.

Keep the contract or invoice, currency-matched instructions, beneficiary verification, both quotes, transfer ID, statement, source-of-funds records and acknowledgment of receipt. If funds stall, ask the provider whether they are pending compliance, rejected, returned, held by an intermediary or unrecognized by the recipient. Do not duplicate the payment until its state is known. For a covered consumer dispute, preserve the provider’s final response and use the official ANPC complaint channel.

Stop before sending if the invoice omits the currency, the beneficiary account cannot receive that currency, no one will confirm who converts, the delivered amount is only assumed, or urgency prevents independent verification.

For the provider and rail decision outside the Romania-specific RON or euro workflow, use the Europe transfer comparison.