I am Monzo user #243 and have used Monzo as my primary account since December 2015.
After witnessing how Monzo has treated someone else in a dire situation, I can see clearly what Monzo was back then, and what it has slowly declined into now; and what that means in terms of Monzo vs any traditional bank.
My friend, a minimum wage sandwich shop worker who lost their job when corona hit, and hasnât had any income since. He got a job in a bar 2 weeks ago, they yesterday paid him a cheque for ÂŁ200. This money is for his rent for which he is behind on payments. His landlord has been understanding and said that if the rent is not paid by Friday, he will have to move out, itâs a PIN number entry so the door will just stop working.
Monzoâs support website indicates cheques can be posted to their address in Broadgate. He went to hand deliver the cheque today (Tuesday) in the hope it would clear by Friday. Monzo refused to accept the cheque insisting it would need to be posted (clearing it 7-14 days later).
Despite explaining the circumstances, Monzo refused to accommodate to the situation.
This is something Monzo would have done years ago, and now theyâre totally inflexible, like a traditional bank. And not just inflexible, but totally unwilling to even listen. The irony, is that if my friend were a customer of a traditional bank, say NatWest, they could have paid in that cheque today with no hassle as some of their branches are still open, or use one of their ATMs to do it.
This has been a frustrating and disappointing experience. There is so little support for the lowest earners who suffer the most in these situations.
You & your friend know when you joined that Monzo do not have branches,
so its unreasonable to expect them to accept to take any sort of deposit at a privet office.
Whatâs the difference between a postal worker handing over post, and an individual handing over an item of post. In emergency, what would you do? How it arrived at the office is kind of irrelevant. Itâs an address. Should I get a same day courier to take it thereâŚ?
Which seems to be a bit of a problem. What if the person sent it through something other than Royal Mail like UPS or a courier for example, will they also refuse that?
It should not matter how the cheque arrives there; the shipping of it is just about getting the cheque at the proper address. Whether itâs Royal Mail, a competitor, a courier or the customer acting as their own courier, they should accept it.
OP get them to open a starling account immediately.
Use cheque imaging and the money will be available tomorrow for them.
Sorry they are in this situation, for the future I would definitely suggest another account as proven many times monzo donât want to handle cash or cheques and this is another situation proving this.
Put it in an envelope and just drop it in the front desk, take a picture for proof of delivery as if youâre some courier and for your own records , I donât see why they shouldnât put it in the royal mail pile.
Edit;
Found this.
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tbutz
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That tweet is from January 2019. Also, theyâve moved since, which may have an impact on their reception arrangements.
If only people clearly working for RM are allowed to hand over post then it should be made clear, I used to work full time for a courier and wouldnât wear anything branded due to high value items.
Wondering if they arenât setup to handle cheques at the new location, as in, there is no way to offer a formal (identifiable) receipt (Iâm pretty sure a scribbled post-it wouldnât do!).
Also, Iâm sorry your friend went through all of this but I donât think Monzo are singling them out here (a good and bad thing I acknowledge).
Sure, the long wind of it is, a few years ago Monzo would help the customer succeeded, the flexibility and down to earth nature was the what was new about Monzo. The essence of being treated like a person as opposed to meaningless interactions with the other banks.
You can indeed normally drop off cheques to that address, however Iâve since been told this is ânot operational at this timeâ, and their support page is not updated to reflect this. I suspect Monzo themselves are operating as a skeleton staff and perhaps the office is unmanned, which doesnât help.
The issue, not specific to my friend, is the response from support which is essentially âpost the cheque to us, eventually weâll deal with it, hereâs a Citizens Advice article on homelessnessâ.
Iâll loan my friend the value of the cheque, but I feel that Monzo really had the power to pull the finger out and just accept a hand delivered cheque given that my low income friend has been hit hard by these trying times. Especially since they tweet so much âhow can Monzo support you during corona timesâ. I got involved because I want to help my friend be independent, get support, and give him hope in a situation that is quite critical.
Thanks for the recommendation with Starling (they arrived much later than Monzo but have more featuresâŚ, go figure)
I do wonder if itâs about the cheque arriving in a sealed condition.
Maybe now they have a formal post room so cannot take an unenveloped cheque. (In the same way we wouldnât be expected to take an unenveloped Monzo card) - i.e. the first post interaction isnât Monzo staff.
Cheques are a pain anyway even if you have a branched bank. Before I moved to Monzo, there was never a branch near me that I could actually get to in itâs opening hours if I needed to. So while this is frustrating, I donât think itâs neccesarily a bad thing that Monzoâs corporate office doesnât have these facilities, much like if you did the same at other banks Corporate reception.
What did your friend expect to find when he turned up at that address? Someone sat behind a counter waiting for the postman so they could do their work for that day?
Even if this negated the postal part, then what? Itâs still a wait to cash a cheque.
Could someone lend him ÂŁ200 and get the money back when the cheque clears?
Why arenât you blaming the new employer for not âlooking after the lowest earnersâ? Why are they paying him in such an out-dated way? Why couldnât he ask them for this pay in a quicker method?
His landlord will not evict him for the sake of a few days.
It may be worth contacting Monzo to see if they will temporarily add an overdraft to the account to cover this period, they may be able to support due to Covid.
This could be for many reasons, some listed above. They may have a Royal Mail redirection in place or maybe post can only currently be accepted into the post room.