Business Accounts - Roll out?

Hey all,

Has there been a recent update on the roll out of business accounts? I am in desperate need for a Business account and I really don’t fancy using alternatives like Anna, Tide etc

Thanks

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No news since the big slowdown earlier in the year, but they are still giving them out. You’ll just need to be patient and hopefully you’ll get one before long.

FWIW I like Tide and it’s really easy to open. I used them at first but then got a NatWest account as it was fee free for a couple of years.

Thanks for the message. I have actually opened a Tide account but I’ve read some posts online that are not so great.

The bonus with Monzo is that it’s a real bank too.

I’ll see if I can wait until then. Thanks :slight_smile:

The only real option is Starling right now but they have payment issues with their provider GPS (which monzo used to use before going in house) where it would mean the cards might not work occasionally.

From my experience, GPS has no longer been an issue for over a year.

Nah they had issues in the summer and September I believe and that’s before you get to the maintenance that means the card won’t work on early Sunday morning for a few hours.
It has got better though but it’s still a concern for a business when it may be your sole card.

Unfortunately I had a personal Starling account that I closed at the start of the year. I’ve now been told I have to wait a year before I can apply again :thinking: Otherwise I would have!

Oh yeah I’ve seen the maintenance things but regarding the card issues I’ve never been affected by them even if I saw the warning message.

For a business account I don’t think it’s a big deal - at least for me it’s mainly a way to get FPS in and out of the account. If the card fails I can always pay with my personal one and then rebalance the accounts.

I’m pretty sure the business side is separate and you can still go for a business account? I opened mine just fine while still being “banned” after closing my personal account.

Business applications were now separate if I recall so you don’t need a personal account to get a business account.
I would email and ask but hopefully monzo will restart next year now the business accounts are testing the new interface.

You would be surprised how many times my business card is used in those windows, those windows are bad for my business but most wouldn’t hopefully be too badly affected. This is before we count in the times aren’t the worst for the uk but I travel to the USA for work and meals etc are paid at their local time and the maintenance would have be a big problem.
Also I have a lot of stuff that comes off the card at weird times and I wouldn’t want to deal with even only my card bouncing before we get to other employees.
There were some serious issues the summer and September/October if I recall with GPS as well but I am not sure of how damaging it was for starling but a lot of companies who used them were out of action for parts of days.

Once starling goes in house (if they do) it will hopefully be fine but I remember the issues monzo had with gps at times as well and I don’t want to put my business through that.

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Ok thanks - I’ll give it ago then :slight_smile:

The issues Monzo had are because Monzo itself was so successful it was taking GPS down. :joy: Once they went in-house the outages became much less frequent.

Yeah these were the outages I saw:

https://starlingbank.statuspage.io/history?page=2

Then there was all the maintance as well which is a problem but it seems to be better now at least. It was enough of a concern to put me off getting an account when they had that string of outages as well as maintance all the time.

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If you are a sole trader then you need a personal account 1st, I tried to open one last month but declined, also had to call them to “scrub” my number to be able to reapply.

If a corporation then yes you should be fine to open a business account but again you may need to get ur number “scrubbed” to allow you to register again

So once they scrambled your number did it then work on personal? Or did you go business?

Thanks

Yes it allowed me to reapply for a personal account again as I was declined previously, you need a PA for a sole trader account, but not a corporate account you can just apply, not sure if number needs scrubbed for that as maybe different systems

They won’t scramble the number I have to wait 12 months. I’m pretty sure it will be different speaking to others!

Guess I’ll wait for Monzo or look somewhere else.

Thanks

If you had an account then yes apparently you have to wait 12 months, I applied for an account t and declined twice so that is why able/offered to scramble account to reapply.

I use Coconut for my business as a sole trader until Monzo release theirs to me :wink:

Take a look a METTLE (from Nat West

I’ve just started using them and so far everything is going fine, you can send unlimited invoices, deposit cash at the PO etc and at the moment they are completely free for everything. Very helpful too (I certainly wouldn’t recommend Tide to anyone, shocking customer service)