Monzo user #30148 since July 2016 and just trying Monzo Plus.
I had a £1000 overdraft wich I have been using and paying off every month and had just done a simulation to confirm that my limit would remain at £1000. I turned off the feature and back again and now the overdraft is not there.
Ofelia had a post telling this so I don’t know what happened.
We won’t take away or change an overdraft you’re using if your score changes.
If you already have an overdraft with us and your credit score changes, we won’t take the overdraft away, and we won’t reduce your limit. But if you reduce your overdraft limit or turn your overdraft off, then you may not be able to increase your limit again if you’re not eligible any more.
I imagine you’re correct. The wording isn’t too great though, as it isn’t clear that turning off your feature means you may lose eligibility altogether, as it only explicitly states that you may not be able to increase your limit.
It’s weird, but something to bear in mind, is that turning off the overdraft is essentially lowering your limit to £0, and as stated, it’s not guaranteed you’ll be able to increase it again. I imagine by turning it off, you expected that your overdraft was still £1000, just inactive.
They need to explain this better. Whilst I understand it, I can clearly see how it may confuse some people.
If you’re not eligible for one, it doesn’t really matter regardless. Your credit score amongst other things change all the time so you’ve clearly dipped below the threshold now.
How long you’ve had your Monzo account and your user number have no relevance.
Then if is scored based I don’t understand why the simulation gives me an overdraft of £1000 and then literally the minute after I’m not entitled to an overdraft at all. Is the simulation not correct?
What do you mean by simulation? Monzo do not offer overdrafts of £1000 anymore to people that don’t have an overdraft already, the maximum they offer is £500.
I was under the impression it was flexible a while back, had it at £1000 and reduced it to £200 as I didn’t envisage needing it a lot for a while, then I kept getting notifications saying I wasn’t eligible for an overdraft when I already had one… I then found out they’d be doing hard searches when switching to AER so I closed it and have never looked into it again.
Clearly one of many shortcomings with Monzo’s overdraft service. I have been a Monzo Current account user since Beta, with salary paid in since 2017. I have an excellent credit rating by every measure and a salary that is more than sufficient, yet not entitled to an overdraft.
My girlfriend has a worse credit rating, literally no utilised credit, lower salary and only ever used Monzo for casual spending (salary paid elsewhere), yet she was offered a £1k o/d upon application.
The most frustrating thing is I can’t even get an explanation from Monzo as to why this might be. I don’t even need an o/d, I just want to know that the facility is there should the requirement arise.
I think based on the flow, people are thinking they’re just deactivating it to use later If/when they need it, rather than disabling it completely. I personally wouldn’t mind that being an actual feature of it either, as it’s one I would use. I have zero intention of ever needing to use mine, so I’d like to keep it deactivated on the off chance something would take me into it with no immediate way to get out of it. And then being able to reactivate it in the event of an emergency.
Also when turning it off it actually does ask if you’re sure as you may not be able to get the same amount back again although yes I’ll admit it could be more clear as it would seem in some cases even if your credit file hasn’t changed 1 bit that the last section isn’t always correct. As always though we’ve no idea what the background lending criteria is.
The help article is much clearer in that if you turn it off you may not be able to turn it back on, and should probably be adopted into the are you sure? screen.
