Editing notes overwrites transaction reference field (bank transfer transactions)

[o99]

Issue: Bank transfers have a reference associated with them. For both incoming and outgoing bank transfers this is displayed on Monzo transaction pages within a ‘reference’ field in the Details section and also in greyed out text at the bottom of the page. Both these fields are not directly editable (which is totally appropriate). The reference also seems to get copied into the editable notes field and becomes the default text within the notes field.

When a user edits the notes field, the reference field and the greyed text at the bottom of the transaction details page also gets edited. The issue was raised several years ago in a feedback/ideas thread and within more general dicussion threads but nothing has been done about it.

I really think it needs to be logged as and considered a serious bug so am reposting in Bug Reports. The transaction reference should be an immutable record of the transaction as it happened, and not modified when a user edits the notes field.

Details to reproduce: Described in the above
OS: iOS
Device: iPhone SE 2nd gen
App Version: 3.67.0

Screenshots: For screenshots refer to the following post:

Core App: Better payments

Here’s an example of a transaction page showing notes field and reference field. Like you say, the reference is used as default text for the notes field. [image] But when you edit the notes field it also edits the reference as well as the grey text at the bottom of the transaction details page (as shown in images below). I’m not sure why anyone wouldn’t want these to be immutable records of the transaction that took place and so untouchable by edits in the notes field [image] [image] S…

[Peter_G]

I agree! This is super important, I think.

(Remember to vote for it!)

[PaulUK]

I just hit carriage return and enter my notes underneath, but I know what you mean.

[o99]

That workaround partially helps (reference field no longer modified) but the greyed out text at the bottom of the transaction page still gets added to. It’s also quite fragile (requires user to remember something that can be easily forgotten) and means the manually added note won’t be seen under the transaction in the transaction list (which puts it at odds with other transactions that have had notes added).

[PaulUK]

I see you’ve raised it on another forum too.

Will be interesting to monitor the feedback over there too

[awjdean]

This seems related to the lack of a ‘Transfer details section’ on Android:

Uneditable transfer details section on Android for bank transfers + adding notes on iOS bank transfers

Thought I’d create a separate topic for this now that voting has been enabled for stuff in the “Feedback & Ideas” section. It’s really frustrating to not be able to add notes to external transfers on iOS. However, I think the bank details section currently on iOS, but not on Android, is really useful. So this is my feature request: Have a “Notes” section for external transfers on iOS (incoming/outgoing Faster Payments & Monzo-to-Monzo). Have a “DETAILS” section in the transaction details…

It makes sense to fix these two things at the same time I think.

[o99]

Do you mean this on Emma’s community?

That’s a different issue (in my mind) related to how Emma search works, and can be solved entirely by Emma.

Even though editing notes in Monzo affects the reference as displayed in Monzo, I don’t think it affects what gets read by third party providers by the API. The underlyring “description field” (which Emma uses to extract payment reference details) does not seem to get edited when notes field is edited in Monzo.

[o99]

@awjdean

This seems related to the lack of a ‘Transfer details section’ on Android

So on Android is there still no Details section at all?

[awjdean]

That’s correct.

The reference just goes into the notes section of the transaction.

[andrew_fishy (Biggest horse fanatic in Leeds)]

@Dan5 - we need some admins to look at this really

[Paul8]

Don’t suppose anyone has heard anything further on this? Would love to see this fixed as I pay my credit card using the card number as reference then like to edit / add notes

[o99]

Unfortunately not.

I’ve never seen any recognition from Monzo staff that this is an issue (have also tried to highlight this issue on other threads created by or involving Monzo staff).

Have also highlighted the issue via in-app chat and didn’t receive anything beyond we’ll pass on your feedback type response.