Add Disabled Railcards to Perks/Max

It’s a bit weird to me it’s not already added, and at this point it’s the only thing keeping me from upgrading!

It’s not weird, it’s because they can’t. They are only available here

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Can you please explain why this would prevent them from offering it? /gen

Basically, due to the additional verification steps required, currently only Railcard UK offer the disabled card. Trainline (the company through which Monzo does the whole railcard thing) currently don’t offer the disabled card because of this.

It is definitely a limitation, but it is not Monzo’s fault in this case. It’s something you’d have to take up with Trainline.

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Could they not just partner with Railcard UK for the disabled ones?

It’s also the supplier that needs to partner not just the bank unfortunately.

I think it’s more than just partnering with Railcard to get the railcard. Monzo gives you a code to use at checkout with Trainline, that then unlocks the free railcard (or something along these lines, I don’t actually have a Monzo plan myself). The way the official Railcard supplier works is different, and so they would have to re-do the whole thing.

Basically, Monzo picked a supplier that would work the easiest, and has the biggest offering.

Whilst yes it is annoying, this is an issue with how trainline handles their Railcards. Unfortunately Monzo has no influence on this, Monzo simply partnered with Trainline, nothing more.

Have they asked if they would partner to begin with?

I still feel like this doesn’t adequately explain why they couldn’t offer this. Sometimes disabled accommodations cost more money, that’s part of equity. It sucks if it’s not as easy for them as Trainline, but they should still offer it.

Possibly, or Trainline reached out.

Sorry to clarify, I mean Railcard UK. We don’t know how easy/difficult it would be to partner with them for the disabled railcard unless they’ve already asked.

They will have asked.

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I think that’s a pretty big assumption to make.

It’s not their fault they can’t offer a Disabled Railcard, that’s something nobody can offer.

It is their choice they don’t offer an alternative option in place of a railcard for those who are not eligible for one (and wouldn’t benefit at all from Two Together).

That’s not really how it works. Historically the only place you could buy a railcard was from a ticket office (i.e. from the railway). They would check your eligibility there and issue you with a ‘card’ (which was two pieces of paper with a layer of sticky back plastic over the photo part).

Then in the 00s Railcards UK launched their online sales flows, you could still buy in person or online but only on those websites.

In the 10s Railcards UK liberalised the process and allowed the products available to all (Family, Network and TwoTogether) and the products where only age needs to be validated (16-25, 26-30 and Senior) to be sold by trusted second parties. The Trainline got in with this.

Disabled Persons and Veterans railcards have never been included due to the need for a manual validation process. For the same reason those railcards have been removed from sale anywhere other than the official Railcards UK outlet (i.e. they can no longer be purchased from ticket offices).

The Trainline are selling what they are allowed to sell.

EDIT - Trainline themselves:

Please note that the Disabled Persons Railcard and Veterans Railcard are not available to buy with us. We are currently working on the ability to verify eligibility.

So maybe there is a dialogue there and something will eventually happen. But it won’t be Monzo who make it happen.

You’ll need to ask Monzo yourself if you want an accurate explanation. Anything else is just speculation.

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Thanks for the feedback. As others have noted it’s not something we’re currently able to offer, but we will continue to explore solutions :pray:

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It’s a shame because you could credit the fee against our Monzo cards. Is this another example of Monzo not looking at what is possible Vs puter sez no approach?!

Such a shame, I have just bought a disabled railcard and then remembered I had perks so I looked into that.
Can’t have it through Monzo anyway and I’m not eligible with the other railcards.