I disagree, I think they’re quite happy to wait until cheques aren’t a thing anymore.
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If it was going to be sooner, rather than later, it would already be on their priority list. As it isn’t, it’s clearly going to be later, rather than sooner, if ever.
You/we don’t know what’s on the list, what isn’t and where anything is ranked on that list.
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We also dont know the new CEO and board members stances, were going off a point made pre pandemic from a very different looking monzo. Its made up of a few more ex bankers who might from their own experience realise how stubborn the sector is to move on from things so reprioritize it higher 
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Yes, this is what I suspect will eventually end up happening.
I think the issue mostly is the sheer time it can take for a cheque to land in your Monzo account vs these other banks.
Plus the fact that a cheque can just be signed for by security and then lost by Monzo.
I rarely use cheques myself but whenever I did it was always far easier to do it via a high street bank. Even if it was time out of my day to go to the bank; it was safe in the knowledge I’d get the funds.
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Absolutely.
I used the Lloyds imaging feature recently and it was so easy. Not a chance I’d post to Monzo instead of just doing that.
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Yes I opened a Starling account for that reason too. The trouble is, I suspect that the majority of monzo users will either use another bank with imaging or branches to pay in cheques. Thus Monzo can say there’s little demand for it. Perhaps if everyone posted every cheque they receive to Monzo, it might persuade them to do something about it. That’s not going to happen, so…
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I know Covid has skewed everyone’s perceptions of time, it certainly has mine, but wasn’t this dead in the water long before Covid? If anything I’d say Covid has probably pushed it up the priority list for a lot of banks as it’s shown that if branches close there needs to be an easy alternative, and sending cheques in the post is definitely not easy as although it’s just an envelope and a postbox for the sender, there are too many variables to make it reliable and quick.
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And probably not a bad assessment.
If I owned a business that may get cheques for payment I would choose a bank that has cheque imaging.
If Monzo wants to make money from business accounts they need to make them appealing and fully featured.
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My take is that it’s one thing to not accept payment in of cheques full stop, at least then that is a defined position and people know where they stand.
It’s another thing entirely when you nominally accept cheques, but your implementation is terrible, and people are receiving funds days later than they could with the competition. That’s assuming the cheque is not lost between security and Monzo as some recent stories report!
Another way of saying this is that “I can’t trust my bank with cheques, therefore I use a competitor” is a much worse look than “My bank doesn’t take cheques, therefore I use a competitor”.
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Natwest appear to be adding Cheque Imaging in their next major app update, it’s marked as coming soon on their app now.
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Interesting - should mean it’s coming to RBS too hopefully. I find Starling’s solution works very well, HSBC’s is a bit more finicky!
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Just launched on Ulster so probably a phased rollout
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Which is interesting, considering they’re closing Ulster.
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As far as I’m aware there’s still not plans to develop this in the short to medium term. Long term I’m sure we’d still love to do it, but it’s not a priority right now.
(Just before y’all get too excited thinking we might have changed our minds!)
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Ulster is only closing in the Republic. They’re keeping the name for Northern Ireland.
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Yes, Ulster NI has just been organised into NatWest Group, it’s definitely being kept. Ulster ROI is closing.
Ireland only has three retail banks now. It’s ripe for disruption, and I can see why Starling is pushing forward with its plans to launch there.
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Yes, the reorganisation of Ulster Bank NI is basically just to reduce complexity and the legal / admin fees of duplicate operations, now that ROI Ulster is closing.
This will allow customers in Northern Ireland to get the same service for a much lower cost, so is basically a win-win.
Things are often tested in one or other of the group apps first, presumably as part of A/B testing and phasing the rollout. Testing with Ulster is sensible as they will have the smallest customer base.
Thanks for at least bringing some clarity to the situation @Dan5, it’s good to hear the “official line”.
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Thanks, I hadn’t realised. I started reading about that the other day but quickly got dragged away from my reading. Must go back to that article.
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