Transit refunds only work if you register

Right now

1. 1If you are only here for a short stay, you can stop reading here. Buy a Climate Card short-term pass. There is nothing to register.
2. 2If you are staying for months and already have your Alien Registration Card, get a Modu-ui Card transit card from a card company and register it on korea-pass.kr. An unregistered card earns nothing no matter how much you ride.
3. 3The 30-day Climate Card stopped running on 1 October. A physical Climate Card you still hold can take short-term passes. If you ride every day, register a Modu-ui Card as soon as you can.

What to have ready

• Alien Registration Card: Used for identity verification. If you do not have one yet, the short-term pass is the realistic option.
• Korean phone number: Needed to sign up and verify who you are.
• A Modu-ui Card transit card: Issued by 27 card companies as a credit, debit or prepaid card (physical or mobile). An older K-Pass or Altteul transit card works as it is. Only rides on the card you registered count.
• A Korean bank account: Where the refund lands. Some cards return it as a discount on your statement instead.

Phrases you can copy and paste

Step by step

1. 1

   Start by deciding how long you are staying

   For a few days to a few weeks, the Climate Card short-term pass fits: 5,000 won for one day, 8,000 for two, 10,000 for three, 15,000 for five, 20,000 for seven, unlimited within Seoul. The 30-day version ended on 1 October, but the short passes are still on sale. If instead you are settling in for months and commuting daily, the refund scheme is the better fit.

2. 2

   Sign up for Modu-ui Card and register your card

   Where:

   korea-pass.kr, website or app

   Anyone aged 19 or over can join, foreign residents included. First get a Modu-ui Card from a card company; a K-Pass or Altteul card you already have also works. Then sign up on the website or app and register that card. That registration is the whole mechanism, and fares paid before you register are never backdated. If you live in Seoul and were already using Modu-ui Card or K-Pass, the Seoul benefits attached by themselves from 1 September and you do not need a new card.

3. 3

   Pass fifteen trips in the month

   You need 15 or more rides between the first and last day of the month for that month to pay out. A round-trip commute reaches it in eight working days. A month with a long trip away or a stretch of working from home can fall short, and that is the rule working as designed rather than a fault.

4. 4

   Two ways of paying you back, and the better one applies by itself

   Cost:

   Percentage type 20 to 53.3 percent, flat type threshold 62,000 won (55,000 for youth)

   The percentage type returns a share of what you spent: 20 percent for most people, 30 percent for youth, two-child households and seniors, 50 percent for households with three or more children, and 53.3 percent for low-income households. The flat type works from a threshold instead and pays off in months when you ride a lot. In Seoul that threshold is 62,000 won for the standard type and 55,000 won for the youth type, the same figures as the old 30-day Climate Card. You do not have to choose between them; whichever is better for you is applied automatically. A temporary measure funded by the supplementary budget halved these thresholds, and it covered rides up to September only. From October rides the normal threshold applies again, so the same amount of travel can bring back less than it did in September.

5. 5

   If you are in your thirties, check the youth range again

   The youth bracket widened from 19 to 34 into 19 to 39. Seoul asked for this, so Seoul residents aged 35 to 39 now qualify for the youth refund rate. It is worth rechecking rather than assuming you aged out.

6. 6

   Ride an hour either side of the rush and get more back until December

   Rides that begin between 5:30 and 6:30, 9:00 and 10:00, 16:00 and 17:00, or 19:00 and 20:00 get an extra 30 percentage points on the percentage rate, measured from when you board. That takes most people from 20 to 50 percent, and youth, seniors and two-child households from 30 to 60 percent. It was due to end on 30 September, but on 28 September the transport ministry extended it to December. There is nothing to apply for; it is worked out from your boarding times.

Watch it happen

Videos other people made, picked because they show a part of this guide that words cannot. They are not our sources: the rules and figures above come from the official pages listed at the end.

• 

  K-패스 이용방법 쉽게 알아보자!

  Channel: 한국교통안전공단 교통안전TV, Korean, no English subtitles. The value is the screen

  From the authority that runs K-pass. It covers registering and how the refund is worked out, which is the step this guide says people skip and then wonder why nothing came back.

  Open on YouTube

• 

  9월 1일 기후동행패스 전격 출시! K-패스·모두의카드와 다른 점, 기후동행카드 무료 교환 방법(서울시 확정 공지)

  Channel: 머니 레시피 Money recipe, Korean, with auto-generated English subtitles

  Made around the September changeover, it explains how the Climate Pass differs from K-Pass and how an existing card was exchanged. It predates the 1 October shutdown, so check anything date-bound against the official notice.

  Open on YouTube

The Korean words

환급hwan-geup, refund

Money paid back to you later, after you have spent it.

정액형jeong-aek-hyeong, flat-rate type

The calculation that works from a set threshold.

정률형jeong-nyul-hyeong, percentage type

The calculation that returns a share of what you spent.

단기권dan-gi-gwon, short-term pass

An unlimited pass bought by the day.

청년cheong-nyeon, youth

The age range differs from scheme to scheme.

카드 등록kadeu deung-nok, card registration

Putting your card number on the website.

시차출퇴근si-cha chul-toe-geun, off-peak commuting

Riding just before or after the busiest commuting hours.

Easy to miss

• ·Buying the card and never registering it. This is the most common and the most expensive mistake, because earlier fares are not backdated.
• ·Riding with a different card from the one you registered. If several transit cards live in your wallet, your trips get split between them.
• ·Going to a machine or a convenience store to load a 30-day Climate Card. The 30-day pass stopped running on 1 October, and a physical card you still hold can only take short-term passes.
• ·Remembering one single youth age. The Climate Card used 19 to 39 while the refund scheme used to stop at 34, and from September Seoul residents are on 19 to 39.
• ·Reading a month below 15 trips as a bug. The condition simply was not met.
• ·Commuting on the Shinbundang Line or an express bus and only looking at the standard flat threshold. Any single fare of 3,000 won or more drops out of the standard calculation. The plus type, which counts those routes too, has a Seoul threshold of 100,000 won (90,000 for youth), and whichever of the percentage, standard and plus types pays you most is applied automatically.

You can skip this if

• Visitors here for a few days do not need any of this. A short-term pass or a plain transit card is simpler.
• Without an Alien Registration Card you will be stopped at identity verification. Come back once you have it.
• Living outside Seoul means different thresholds and different local top-ups. The 62,000 and 55,000 won figures here are Seoul's.
• Under 19s cannot join. For teenagers, look at the Climate Card short-term passes instead.

Where this comes from

• Seoul Metropolitan Government, press release on the 1 September launch
• Seoul Metropolitan Government, Climate Card wind-down FAQ
• Seoul Metropolitan Government, Climate Card usage guide
• Modu-ui Card (K-Pass), eligibility
• Modu-ui Card (K-Pass), how refunds accrue
• Modu-ui Card, refund rates and off-peak hours
• Climate Pass (Seoul Modu-ui Card), eligibility and thresholds
• Modu-ui Card, getting a card issued
• Off-peak refund bonus extended to December, 28 September 2026 (Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, via Korea.kr)
• Seoul Metropolitan Government, Climate Card short-term passes