How much does Sri Lanka Post charge to send a money order?

The commission is banded and cumulative: Rs 3 for every Rs 100 or part of it on the first Rs 2,000, then Rs 15 for every Rs 2,000 or part of the amount between Rs 2,000 and Rs 10,000, then Rs 75 on anything above Rs 10,000 up to Rs 50,000, then Rs 150 above that. An Rs 8,500 order costs Rs 120. The ceiling is Rs 345 on a Rs 100,000 order.

What is the maximum amount you can send by money order in Sri Lanka?

Rs 100,000 per transaction at a post office, and Rs 25,000 per transaction at a sub-post office. The money-orders index page on slpost.gov.lk still says Rs 50,000; that page is out of date. The tariff revision of 9 February 2026 and the Department's own Issue of Money Orders page both give Rs 100,000.

Can a sub-post office issue a Rs 50,000 money order?

No. A sub-post office is capped at Rs 25,000 per transaction, so an Rs 50,000 order has to be issued at a full post office. Check before you travel — the calculator above tells you which counter can take the amount you need.

How long is a Sri Lankan money order valid for?

Six months after the month it was issued in. The count runs from the month, not the day, so an order issued on 1 March and one issued on 31 March both expire on 30 September. After that the order is legally void until it is revalidated.

What happens if a money order expires before it is cashed?

For six months after it expires, the Department will still pay it on a second commission equal to the commission paid at issue. After that, claims are entertained only in exceptional circumstances during the second year of issue, on a commission of 5% of the face value (minimum 20 cents). No claim at all is accepted more than two years after the last day of the month of issue.

Is the electronic money order (PMT) cheaper than a paper one?

Yes, at every amount. The electronic scale charges Rs 2 per Rs 100 on the first Rs 2,000, then Rs 10, Rs 50 and Rs 100 in the bands above, so an Rs 8,500 transfer costs Rs 80 rather than Rs 120, and the Rs 100,000 ceiling costs Rs 230 rather than Rs 345. Not every counter offers it, and the payee collects differently.

Why does a Rs 500 money order cost the same commission as a Rs 100 one?

It does not. The first band charges Rs 3 for every Rs 100 or part of it, so Rs 100 costs Rs 3 and Rs 500 costs Rs 15. What catches people out is the 'or part thereof' rule: Rs 100.01 costs Rs 6, because a part of a unit is charged as a whole unit.

Does the commission come out of the money the payee receives?

No. The payee receives the full face value of the order. The commission is paid separately at the counter, on top of the amount, so for an Rs 8,500 order you hand over Rs 8,620 in cash and the payee collects Rs 8,500.

Can I send more than Rs 100,000 by splitting it across two money orders?

The ceiling is per transaction, so two orders of Rs 100,000 each are two transactions. You pay Rs 345 commission on each. Above roughly Rs 100,000 a bank transfer is usually cheaper and faster — money orders survive mainly because some government forms still require one.

When were these rates last checked?

The commission bands, office ceilings and validity rules were last cross-checked against the Department of Posts tariff revision effective 2026-02-09 and the two Sri Lanka Post money-order pages on 2026-09-27. The Department revises this tariff by gazette, so the page is re-checked whenever a new revision is published.

Sri Lanka · Finance

Money Order Fee Calculator Sri Lanka (2026 Rates)

Enter the amount and this works out the commission Sri Lanka Post charges, the total cash to carry to the counter, whether your post office may issue that amount at all, and the four dates that decide how long the payee has to cash it. Rates from the gazetted postal tariff, cited below.

By Induwara Ashinsana— Executive Director, Ryzera TechnologiesUpdated Sep 27, 2026

Price a money orderSri Lanka Post

Tariff of 9 February 2026

Money order amount (Rs)

One cent to Rs 100,000 per order.

Date of issue

Today for a new order, or the date stamped on one you already hold.

Where is it being issued?

Post officeLimit Rs 100,000 per orderSub-post officeLimit Rs 25,000 per order

Common amounts

Commission

Rs 120.00

1.41% of the face value

Cash at the counter

Rs 8,620.00

Rs 8,500.00 order + commission

This counter

Can issue it

Limit Rs 100,000

Valid until

31 March 2027

Still valid

A post office may issue this order — its per-transaction limit is Rs 100,000. A village sub-post office could issue it too.

Still valid

The same order as Electronic money order (PMT) would cost Rs 80.00 in commission.

How the commission is built

Band	Your slice	Units charged	Charge
Rs 0 – Rs 2,000Rs 3.00 per Rs 100 or part	Rs 2,000.00	20	Rs 60.00
Rs 2,000 – Rs 10,000Rs 15.00 per Rs 2,000 or part	Rs 6,500.00	4	Rs 60.00
Total commission			Rs 120.00

Validity timeline

TodayValid — cash it normally
Until 31 March 2027
No further charge
Expired — revalidation window
1 April 2027 – 30 September 2027
Second commission Rs 120.00
Second year — exceptional claims only
1 October 2027 – 30 September 2028
Rs 425.00 (5% of face value, minimum 20 cents)
Barred — no claim accepted
After 30 September 2028
The money must be reclaimed from the Department

The full commission schedule — ordinary money order (paper)

From (Rs)	To (Rs)	For every	Charge	Running total
0.01	2,000	100 or part	Rs 3.00	Rs 60
2,000.01	10,000	2,000 or part	Rs 15.00	Rs 120
10,000.01	50,000	40,000 or part	Rs 75.00	Rs 195
50,000.01	100,000	50,000 or part	Rs 150.00	Rs 345

“Running total” is the commission on an order of exactly that band's upper bound — the bands stack, they do not replace each other. The most a single paper order can cost in commission is Rs 345, on the Rs 100,000 ceiling.

Sources cited: the Department of Posts tariff revision effective 9 February 2026, and Sri Lanka Post's own “Issue of Money Orders” and “Payments of money orders” pages. Full links in Sources & references below.

How it works

A postal money order is still the payment instrument a long list of Sri Lankan state application forms demands — examination and certificate applications, licence renewals, court and registry fees, external-degree registrations. The Department of Posts charges a commission to issue one, caps how much a given counter may handle, and gives the payee a fixed window in which to collect. This page computes all three from the published schedule.

Step 1 — the commission

The commission is a marginal, cumulative scale, not a flat fee per band. Each band charges only the slice of the order that falls inside it, at so many rupees for every charging unit or part thereof, and the slices are added together. The Sinhala text of the tariff revision effective 2026-02-09makes this explicit: it charges a rate on “the first Rs 2,000” (පළමු), then a rate on “the increase” (වැඩිවන) in each band above, joined by “and” (ද). The English table on the Department's site carries the same structure in its “Part of (Rs.)” column.

Slice of the order	Charged per	Paper order	Electronic (PMT)
0.01 – 2,000	100 or part	Rs 3.00	Rs 2.00
2,000.01 – 10,000	2,000 or part	Rs 15.00	Rs 10.00
10,000.01 – 50,000	40,000 or part	Rs 75.00	Rs 50.00
50,000.01 – 100,000	50,000 or part	Rs 150.00	Rs 100.00

“Or part thereof” is the rule that surprises people: a part of a unit is charged as a whole unit. One cent past a band edge costs a full unit of the band above, which is why Rs 2,000.00 costs Rs 60 and Rs 2,000.01 costs Rs 75. The calculator runs every figure in integer cents so those boundaries land exactly where the schedule puts them.

Step 2 — the counter's limit

A full post office may issue an order of up to Rs 100,000 per transaction. A sub-post office — the village counter, often run out of a shop — is capped at Rs 25,000. Getting this wrong is a wasted bus trip, which is the main reason this page exists.

Step 3 — the validity dates

Validity is counted in months, not days. An order is void at the end of the sixth month after the month it was issued in, so every order issued in March 2026 expires on 30 September 2026 whatever day it was bought. Three windows follow:

Revalidation, six months.A claim made within six months of the day the order ceased to be valid is paid on a second commission “equivalent to that paid at the time of issue” — the same figure as Step 1, over again.
The exceptional second year. Claims in the second year of issue are entertained only in exceptional circumstances, on a commission of 5% of the face value or Rs 0.20, whichever is higher. On a large order that is a serious charge: Rs 3,000.00 on an Rs 60,000 order.
The absolute bar. No claim is entertained more than two years from the last day of the month of issue. After that the order is dead and the money has to be pursued with the Department directly.

How the arithmetic is checked

The commission is computed twice, by two routes that share no code. The first walks all four bands and sums the slices. The second jumps straight to the band the order sits in and adds that band's published running total to a single marginal charge. Both are then compared against figures worked out by hand from the tariff before any code was written — 15 of 15 cases agree, including every band boundary and the one-cent minimum order.

Worked examples

Rs 8,500 exam fee, posted from a head post office

14 March 2026 · paper money order

Band 1: the first Rs 2,000 → ceil(2,000 / 100) = 20 units × Rs 3 = Rs 60
Band 2: the next Rs 6,500 → ceil(6,500 / 2,000) = 4 units × Rs 15 = Rs 60
Commission: Rs 60 + Rs 60 = Rs 120.00
Cash at the counter: Rs 8,500.00 + Rs 120.00 = Rs 8,620.00
Counter check: Rs 8,500 ≤ Rs 25,000 — a sub-post office would do too
Issued March 2026 → valid until 30 September 2026
Revalidation: 1 Oct 2026 – 31 Mar 2027, on a second Rs 120.00
Second year: 1 Apr 2027 – 31 Mar 2028, at 5% × 8,500 = Rs 425.00
No claim accepted after 31 March 2028

Rs 60,000 attempted at a village sub-post office

28 November 2026 · paper money order · the wasted trip

Band 1: Rs 2,000 → 20 × Rs 3 = Rs 60
Band 2: Rs 8,000 → 4 × Rs 15 = Rs 60
Band 3: Rs 40,000 → ceil(40,000 / 40,000) = 1 × Rs 75 = Rs 75
Band 4: Rs 10,000 → ceil(10,000 / 50,000) = 1 × Rs 150 = Rs 150
Commission: Rs 345.00 · counter total Rs 60,345.00
Counter check: Rs 60,000 > Rs 25,000 — REFUSED at a sub-post office
Take it to a full post office, where the limit is Rs 100,000
Issued November 2026 → valid until 31 May 2027
Revalidation: 1 Jun 2027 – 30 Nov 2027, on a second Rs 345.00
Second year: 1 Dec 2027 – 30 Nov 2028, at 5% × 60,000 = Rs 3,000.00

Rs 100.01 — the edge case that costs double

Why one cent matters, and what a tiny order really costs

Rs 100.00 → ceil(100 / 100) = 1 unit × Rs 3 = Rs 3.00
Rs 100.01 → ceil(100.01 / 100) = 2 units × Rs 3 = Rs 6.00
One cent doubles the commission: a part of a unit is charged as a whole unit
Rs 0.50 (the smallest useful order) → 1 unit × Rs 3 = Rs 3.00
…which is six times the face value. Below about Rs 100 the commission
costs more than posting the money is worth.
Same rule at every boundary: Rs 10,000 → Rs 120, Rs 10,000.01 → Rs 195

Verification against the published schedule

Every band boundary, computed by hand from the tariff, then by the band walk, then by the cumulative ladder. All three must agree.

Order	Kind	Band walk	Ladder	Why this case
Rs 0.01	Paper	Rs 3.00	Rs 3.00	Minimum order — one cent still costs one Rs 100 unit.
Rs 100.00	Paper	Rs 3.00	Rs 3.00	Exactly one Rs 100 unit.
Rs 100.01	Paper	Rs 6.00	Rs 6.00	One cent over — a second unit is charged in full.
Rs 2,000.00	Paper	Rs 60.00	Rs 60.00	Top of band 1: 20 × Rs 3.
Rs 2,000.01	Paper	Rs 75.00	Rs 75.00	First cent of band 2 costs a whole Rs 15 unit.
Rs 8,500.00	Paper	Rs 120.00	Rs 120.00	Worked example A: Rs 60 + 4 × Rs 15.
Rs 10,000.00	Paper	Rs 120.00	Rs 120.00	Top of band 2: Rs 60 + 4 × Rs 15.
Rs 10,000.01	Paper	Rs 195.00	Rs 195.00	First cent of band 3 costs the whole Rs 75.
Rs 50,000.00	Paper	Rs 195.00	Rs 195.00	Top of band 3 — the unit equals the band width.
Rs 50,000.01	Paper	Rs 345.00	Rs 345.00	First cent of band 4 costs the whole Rs 150.
Rs 60,000.00	Paper	Rs 345.00	Rs 345.00	Worked example B.
Rs 100,000.00	Paper	Rs 345.00	Rs 345.00	The ceiling — the most a paper order can cost.
Rs 2,000.00	PMT	Rs 40.00	Rs 40.00	PMT band 1 in full: 20 × Rs 2.
Rs 8,500.00	PMT	Rs 80.00	Rs 80.00	PMT: Rs 40 + 4 × Rs 10.
Rs 100,000.00	PMT	Rs 230.00	Rs 230.00	PMT ceiling: 40 + 40 + 50 + 100.

Frequently asked questions

Sources & references

One source conflict is worth knowing about. The money-orders index page on slpost.gov.lk still states a Rs 50,000 domestic maximum. It is stale: both the 2026 tariff revision and the Department's own Issue of Money Orders page give Rs 100,000 at a post office and Rs 25,000 at a sub-post office, which is what this page uses. Last cross-checked on 2026-09-27.

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