T-money refund in Busan: at a store, not a subway counter

Flying out of Busan with money left on a T-money card, one convenience-store refund is the most you can get back in cash. At a CU or an emart24 that is 30,000 won, written 3만원 on T-money’s table . Unless you have a Korean bank account, that is the whole of it. The counters that refund part of a balance, which is how a bigger balance gets out, are in the Seoul area on T-money’s own list.

That list is on T-money’s Korean refund page. Its English guide for foreigners has no list of refund points. It says a refund is made at the places that sell and top up T-money cards, and leaves the reader to assume that means anywhere.

Can you refund a T-money card in Busan?

Yes, at a convenience store, up to the chain’s ceiling. T-money’s Korean table writes the ceilings as 2만원 and 3만원, which is 20,000 won and 30,000 won . The table lists national chains and has no city column, so it should read the same in Busan, though no line on the page names Busan:

Every row pays the whole balance minus the fee, in cash, and keeps the card price. None of them refunds part of a balance. A card holding more than 30,000 won is over every store’s ceiling, and since no store may take part of it, no store in Busan can cash it out. The same is true in Seoul; the difference is what Seoul has as a fallback.

Why a Busan subway station is not on the list

T-money’s Korean page names the places that take refunds, and the first one is 수도권 지하철 역사 내 고객안내소: customer service centres inside subway stations in the capital area, meaning Seoul and the cities around it. The same note then says partial refunds happen only at T-money’s head office and at subway station customer service centres. That line does not repeat the region, but the only subway centres the note lists are the capital-area ones. Busan is not in the capital area.

The English guide says a refund is made at “Tmoney card sales/Top-up locations” and that partial refunds are available “at Tmoney Town and Tmoney service center in subway station”, which matches the Korean partial-refund line. What the English guide does not carry is the list of refund points. That list is the only place T-money says where its subway counters are, and it is the whole difference for somebody leaving from Busan.

None of the sources here makes a Busan statement either way, and the Korean list ends in 등 (“and so on”), so it is not a promise that nothing else exists. But T-money is the operator that sets its own refund rules, and the only subway counters it names are in the capital area. Treat a Busan Metro station as not a refund point, and phone T-money on 1644-0088 (weekdays 09:00 to 18:00) if you want it confirmed for a particular station.

T-money refund at Busan (Gimhae) airport

Gimhae International Airport is run by Korea Airports Corporation. Its shop search for the airport is drawn by script and returns no list as text. Its static facility phone directory covers pharmacies on the second floor of each terminal, a BNK Busan Bank branch and a postal counter on the international first floor, roaming desks and tourist information, and names no convenience store at all.

So this page cannot tell you which chains are at Gimhae or whether they sit before or after security. Treat the airport as a maybe, not a plan:

• Under 20,000 won: whichever store you find will do, if it does refunds at all.
• 20,000 to 30,000 won: you need a CU or an emart24 specifically, and nothing published says there is one landside.
• Over 30,000 won: no airport store can take it.

The airport operator’s customer centre on 1661-2626 runs 06:00 to 23:00 every day, so ask it which stores are in the terminal you are leaving from. Safer still, cash out at a CU in the city the day before.

Once through security on an international flight, where you can sit and wait depends on your ticket and card; the four airside lounges and who gets into each are on the Gimhae airport lounge page.

Over 30,000 won and flying out of Busan

This is where the missing list costs money. In Seoul, a balance over a CU’s ceiling goes to a subway customer service centre, comes back in steps of 10,000 won until what is left fits under the ceiling, and a CU takes the rest. In Busan, T-money’s list names no counter to send it to, and whether one exists anyway is in the unconfirmed list at the end. T-money’s Korean page says a balance over 50,000 won goes to the head office in Seoul or to a bank ATM. Neither is a Busan counter.

What is left:

• Spend it down on fares. Once the card is at or under 30,000 won it fits a CU’s ceiling.
• Move it into a Korean bank account by ATM. Shinhan, Woori, Hana, KB Kookmin, Shinhyup, Jeju Bank and the post office are on T-money’s list, up to 500,000 won a month per resident registration number, into an account in your own name at that bank; KB and Shinhyup take only cards they issued, and basic (보급형) cards cannot be refunded at an ATM at all. Since it needs a Korean account in your name, in practice this is for residents rather than visitors. BNK Busan Bank, the bank the airport lists in Gimhae’s international terminal, is not on T-money’s list.
• Keep it for a return trip. The card price is gone either way.

If your trip runs Seoul first and Busan last, the problem can be solved before it starts. Take the partial refund in Seoul before the train south: 10,000 to 50,000 won per request, in steps of 10,000, at a capital-area subway centre or at T-money’s head office (the English guide calls it Tmoney Town), after a 500 won fee. Leave on the card only what the Busan days will use. The English guide limits partial refunds to plate cards, the plain card-shaped kind, so a character or mini T-money may not qualify. The rest of the Seoul end, including the T-money Town hours that close at weekends, is on the Incheon refund page.

T-money’s English guide caps a single top-up at 90,000 won. Topping up in smaller amounts near the end of a trip is the cheapest way to avoid all of this.

The Busan cards are a different company

Busan’s own transit cards, Hanaro and mybi, appear on the refund pages of EZL, the company that also runs Cashbee: its damaged-card table lists mybi and Busan Hanaro, and its list of counters includes mybi’s head office in Busan. EZL’s refund guide offers in-person refunds at branches in Seoul and Busan. T-money’s page offers no Busan counter at all. Same city, opposite answers, and the difference is which logo is on the card in your pocket.

EZL’s store table is not T-money’s either, and the Cashbee refund page sets the two side by side. For EZL and Cashbee cards, GS25 and emart24 take 20,000 won or less and CU takes 30,000 won or less, but EZL’s other refund page gives a lower store limit, and neither says whether the table covers Hanaro or mybi. If the card says Cashbee, Hanaro or mybi rather than T-money, ask EZL’s customer centre on 1644-0006 rather than using this page.

What I would do before flying out of Busan

Check the balance on a top-up machine or at a store counter the evening before.

Under 20,000 won, refund it at any store in the city. Between 20,000 and 30,000 won, find a CU or an emart24 in the city rather than counting on the airport. Over 30,000 won, ride it down to the ceiling over the last days, or keep it for the next trip. And if you are still in Seoul reading this, do the partial refund there.

For which card to buy in the first place, see the T-money card page.

What is not checked here yet

The store ceilings, the partial-refund band and the list of refund points are read off T-money’s Korean refund page and its English guide on 1 October 2026. The Korean page carries no date of its own; the newest date in its notes is November 2018. So treat the ceilings as T-money’s standing rule rather than a notice issued this year.

Four things below are unconfirmed, and here is what each one changes:

• Whether the store table works the same in Busan. T-money’s table lists national chains with no city attached and never names Busan. If a Busan branch refuses, the airport is no better, so try a second chain in the city.

• Whether any Busan Metro or Busan-Gimhae Light Rail counter refunds T-money. T-money does not list one, and no Busan Metro page in the sources here says either way. If one does, the 30,000 won ceiling stops being the end of the road in Busan.

• Which convenience stores are at Gimhae airport, and where. The shop list is script-drawn. If there is a landside CU, the 20,000 to 30,000 won band can be done at the airport.

• Whether every store branch performs refunds. T-money’s table lists chains, not branches. Ask at the till and have a second store in mind.

If you have cashed out a T-money card in Busan or at Gimhae recently, tell me where and what happened, and this page will carry the answer with its date.