Colombia’s 4x1000 Tax: How It Works and How to Mark an Account Exempt

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The 4x1000 is one of the first Colombian taxes a foreigner meets in person, usually on a bank statement. It is small on any single purchase and easy to ignore, which is why it tends to surprise people on the one transaction where it isn’t small. The fix for everyday spending is administrative. The large-payment case just needs budgeting.

What the 4x1000 is

The GMF (gravamen a los movimientos financieros, the financial transactions levy) is a national tax collected by banks and other financial institutions on DIAN’s behalf. Its everyday name says the rate: four pesos for every thousand moved, or 0.4%. On a COP 1,000,000 card payment that is COP 4,000.

The bank withholds it at the moment money moves, and it usually appears on your statement as its own small debit beside the transaction.

Which movements trigger it

In everyday banking the tax shows up when money leaves an account: a cash withdrawal, a transfer out, a debit-card purchase. That is also how the main exemption is written — it is framed around withdrawals (retiros) from the account (DIAN, Concepto 3242 of 2024).

Two points about moving money between your own accounts, as DIAN describes them in the same opinion:

• Transfers between accounts you hold at different institutions fall within the same monthly exemption — they count against your cap.
• Transfers between your own accounts at the same institution are handled under a different numeral of Article 879.

The practical reading: everyday spending from one well-chosen account can be largely sheltered; spreading money around doesn’t create extra exempt room.

The exempt account: one product, one owner, a monthly cap

Article 879 of the Estatuto Tributario lists the movements exempt from the GMF. The one that matters for individuals is numeral 1. As DIAN summarises it (Concepto 3242 of 2024, checked October 2026):

• It covers withdrawals from a savings account, an electronic deposit, or a prepaid card at a supervised financial entity or financial cooperative.
• Withdrawals are exempt up to 350 UVT per month.
• It applies to one product per holder, and only if that product has a single owner. A joint account doesn’t qualify.
• The holder must tell the institution which product should carry the benefit. Someone with several eligible products chooses one.

Because the cap is set in UVT, it changes every year. The 2026 UVT was fixed at COP 52,374 by DIAN’s Resolución 000238 of 15 December 2025, which puts the 2026 cap at COP 18,330,900 of withdrawals a month. A new UVT normally arrives at year-end, so the January statement is the moment to recheck the peso figure.

How to mark an account exempt

Banks run the process their own way — a form at the branch, an option in the app, or a request through customer service — but the substance is the same everywhere:

1. Choose the account. A savings account (not a checking account) in your sole name, used for everyday spending.
2. Ask the bank to mark it as exempt from the GMF (marcar la cuenta como exenta del 4x1000), and keep the confirmation.
3. If you hold accounts at other banks, make sure only one is marked. Under the original rule the benefit belongs to a single product per person across the whole system.
4. Check the next statement. GMF debits should stop on spending below the cap and resume only on the excess.

The rule is changing: Article 881-1

A later reform added Article 881-1 to the Estatuto Tributario. Its aim, as DIAN describes it, is to apply the 350 UVT limit across all of a holder’s accounts, electronic deposits and prepaid cards together, so a single marked account is no longer needed. That depends on financial institutions running a shared information system to track each person’s total, and the rule came with a two-year transition.

The transition has been uneven. In an opinion dated 24 September 2026 (Oficio 016885), DIAN answered a question premised on some institutions not yet having implemented the system. Its answer: the lack of a system does not cancel the exemption, and GMF withheld in excess or improperly can be recovered through the refund (reintegro) mechanism in Article 1.6.1.25.3 of Decree 1625 of 2016, on the affected person’s written request. DIAN did not confirm a date from which the consolidated system works everywhere.

Sources here don’t give a single clean answer, so we won’t pretend to. The practical step is to ask your bank directly whether it still requires a marked account or applies the holder-wide cap, and to keep statements if you think tax was withheld on movements that should have been exempt.

Why it still bites on a property payment

The exemption is a monthly allowance, not an exclusion for any category of purchase. A large payment out of a Colombian account is taxed on whatever exceeds the cap left that month. The figures below are hypothetical, chosen to show the arithmetic; they are not prices or a typical purchase.

Hypothetical amounts. Cap uses the 2026 UVT of COP 52,374 (DIAN Resolución 000238 of 2025). Your bank’s treatment of a specific payment instrument may differ; ask before closing.

For a property purchase, put the GMF in the closing budget beside notary and registration costs, and ask the bank and notary in advance how the payment will be made and taxed. Splitting a payment across months to reuse the cap is the kind of idea to run past a contador before trying, not after.

Money coming in from abroad

Because the tax is framed around money leaving an account, a transfer arriving from abroad is not where it bites. It bites when you spend or pay out the funds. That shapes two decisions:

• Where funds land. Landing everyday money in the marked account keeps routine spending under the exemption. Landing a large sum there doesn’t make paying it out exempt.
• How funds arrive. Inbound costs are mostly the exchange spread and transfer fees. If you use a service such as Wise, check on its site that it currently supports your currency route into Colombian pesos and the amount you plan to send.

Whatever the method, investment-sized transfers — for a property or a company — still need to be registered as foreign investment with the Banco de la República. A transfer service doesn’t change that.

Mark one account, watch the cap, and budget for the rest. For anything beyond everyday banking, confirm the treatment with a licensed Colombian contador.