Bill splitting made simple 🎉

[Ordog]

@Chris_R

I do think it would be helpful for Monzo to have a newer blog post explaining where they are at with dev cycles and linking to this every time then release a feature. It’s important that we all are told/reminded in my view.

They mentioned recently that they are working on this. They said that they’re going to consolidate all their update “outlets” such as Twitter (makingmonzo), Trello etc into a newer and better system to keep everyone well informed and kept in the loop. Currently it is too fragmented and for example Trello hasn’t been updated in a while.

[nathanthomson8 (Nathan)]

Whilst I agree that nothing will ever be finished I tend to think that if something has an obvious improvement thats missing it should be added.

I keep going back to Summary here because I honestly think it was Monzo’s biggest dare I say it flop so far, i think the vast majority of people have come out and said without flexible dates it was pointless yet it was released anyway.

@anon64260023

Honestly It feels like stuff is getting released so you can blog about it and say HEY LOOK WHAT WE DID but really it should’ve had another few weeks work on it and it’d be in a much better position and then you really have something to shout about.

I agree with Martin’s point here I think theres a pressure almost that the need to release something every now and again especially after quite a slow month so they decided just to get it out there when I think another week or two could have been used to polish it off (renaming non-monzo friends for one)

[anon64260023]

@anon50039658

I’d highly recommend you read the section entitled “What’s an Alpha?” in this blog post from October 2015: https://monzo.com/blog/2015/10/30/we-are-ready/ I don’t think our approach to product development has changed since then Maybe we should write a whole blog post about it to make it really clear.

Perhaps it’s time for change then?

I think there’s a huge difference between having a few thousand people using your prepaid card and people who understand that it is an Alpha or Beta product and over a million people using your current account as a product they rely on for day to day use.

I’m not sure it’s great pushing out half done features as if they are fully fledged releases. Why not keep them in labs until they are ready?

[anon92973941]

After the debacle that was the initial release of the Summary screen (it was completely useless for people getting paid weekly, removed budgeting features, etc), I expressed my hope that this would not be the standard for Monzo going forward.

When I first signed up, it seemed like every feature added or changed was strictly better, and felt polished and ready for release. I feel like these days, there’s certainly a lack of polish, and sometimes just a straight up lack of “better”.

I now have to put forward the same sentiment again; I hope that Monzo will consider holding off on taking features out of Labs for a little bit longer until necessary polish can be added.

Inviting us to test the newly added feature with a big button, but finding myself unable to cancel the split I added as a test, and unable to add new people to see how it would work… It means I will probably forget about this feature by the time it has the polish I would expect and want.

[Feathers (MikeF)]

@nathanthomson8

if something has an obvious improvement thats missing it should be added.

Again, that’s such a subjective assessment that it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny too heavily. Who gets to decide what’s ‘obvious’ for example?

[gordonjb]

@Feathers

Again, that’s such a subjective assessment that it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny too heavily

As is deciding that something is worthy of release from labs…

[Anarchist (Press ‘Help’ search ‘Contact us’ or email help@monzo.com or call 0800 802 1281)]

@anon64260023

Another example of something that’s missing that should be CORE functionality of this feature.

Yup. Like international transfers.

[Feathers (MikeF)]

@gordonjb

@Feathers

Again, that’s such a subjective assessment that it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny too heavily

As is deciding that something is worthy of release from labs…

Absolutely. Monzo surely have the right to manage their own product based on their own assessment?

[gordonjb]

Sure

But if customers are telling you otherwise repeatedly it’s probably worth considering. See the Big List for instance.

[Feathers (MikeF)]

@gordonjb

Sure

But if customers are telling you otherwise repeatedly it’s probably worth considering. See the Big List for instance.

I don’t think I can comment on what they did or didn’t consider but having said they’d read through all of the comments, I’d have to assume that consideration had happened.

[anon64818402]

Are there plans to be able to merge an incoming payment with an outgoing payment? Some people transfer me money for a split payment without using a split bill link. I’d like to merge these incoming payments with the bill that was split to better track how much I actually spent at a location.

For example, I was transferred this £22 before paying for pizza. I want to merge that payment with the Dominos payment so it displays how much I really spent at Dominos.

[garete (Gareth)]

Tried this as it splashed across my screen looking ready for me to split a payment with myself to fix the summary.

Firstly, it wasn’t clear how to add a non-monzo user - they weren’t nearby and the list of monzo users had no other or search prompt. Fine, randomly clicked next (which makes no sense) and then get the prompt. Add a friend, pay the due, and it shows as incomplete. At first I thought this was a bug from the original payment having a note, but seems to just be rolled out early. Please warn people better if a feature has issues!

Edit: at least fixed the summary calculation issue by manually changing the category of the payment received, but still

[awjdean]

@garete

Firstly, it wasn’t clear how to add a non-monzo user - they weren’t nearby and the list of monzo users had no other or search prompt. Fine, randomly clicked next (which makes no sense) and then get the prompt.

100% agree that the “split with someone on monzo” and “Split with someone not on monzo” options should be on the same page.

[Topden]

Me too, and that the original transaction would have a sign that it has been split after the payment is received. For example a little red dot on the transaction, and by opening the transaction being able to look at who’s it been split with.

This would be helpful as no everyone pays at the same time, and in with big group or multiple transactions it’s easy to forget who’s paid for what

[Topden]

Totally, 100% agree.

[WildlyWaving]

Bill splitting is polarising because:

• The Bill Splitting UI is clunky and non-intuitive if:
  — You’re the only person with Monzo
  — Most of your friends use Monzo, but one person in your group doesn’t
• The Bill Splitting UI is slick if:
  — All your friends/family use Monzo (i.e. Monzo employees)

So internally at Monzo, this feature probably seems ready to ship. Giving it to everyone makes sense, because why not?

But to users who advocate Monzo, this feature feels half-baked. The non-intuitiveness is just so not Monzo.

I hope you guys double-down on this feature. There’s so much good feedback in this thread, and this has humongous potential to:

• drive sign-ups by letting non-Monzo people easily pay and signup with a unique Monzo.me+signup link
• simplify the timeline by adding bill-splitting payments into the transaction that was split
• split multiple transactions in one-go

[Topden]

@anon64818402

Are there plans to be able to merge an incoming payment with an outgoing payment? Some people transfer me money for a split payment without using a split bill link. I’d like to merge these incoming payments with the bill that was split to better track how much I actually spent at a location.

For example, I was transferred this £22 before paying for pizza. I want to merge that payment with the Dominos payment so it displays how much I really spent at Dominos.

I’ve been thinking this for a while, It’s the one thing that stops me from being able to look at my payment history and understanding my spending at a glance, without trying to remember who’s paid me for what and how much I have actually spent.

I don’t know how it easy a feature this is to implement, but it seems it would be a easy and it would make a huge difference.

Also when splitting the bill with someone, specially Monzo - Monzo, why can’t the transactions be merged automatically and the original transaction updated to reflect the change/ or that a payment towards it has been made.

[Topden]

100% agree, it doesn’t feel at the usual Monzo standard.

I don’t understand why the old bill splitting screen wasn’t kept, and after choosing how many people to split the bill with, add the new screen with all the options, Monzo contacts, option non-monzo and nearby friends on one screen.

[Ordog]

Wow there is so much negativity in this topic

I’m glad it has been released and I am happy with it so far.

I understand the argument that they should wait and add XYZ to make it more “complete” but if you look at any feature that has been released regardless of age there are always people suggesting improvements. So with this things would never leave labs and would forever be a work in progress.

I’ve used this feature plenty of times and it’s great, thank you Monzo

[enmasser]

The thing for me is that it went into Labs, users liked it but complained that it didn’t include non-Monzo. Monzo listened which is great and then boom launch it out of Labs without getting any feedback on the non-Monzo part.

Why wouldn’t you update it in Labs and let the users who complained give some feedback first?

Glad you’re liking it though!