The Dutch fintech bank bunq offer an Emergency Cash advance with their Debit card.
They issue a Mastercard Debit card (they don’t offer Credit cards) and it comes with an Emergency Cash Advance, maybe this is something Monzo could consider?
“MasterCard offers a great service for when you’re in the awkward situation of losing your card: the Emergency Cash Advance service. You can contact this service 24/7 via a free phone number in order to get emergency cash, which you can pick up at the nearest cash station (often Western Union). To reach MasterCard Assistance Center, please call: 1-636-722-7111”
I wonder how much this would cost Monzo to implement and use. It sounds like a nice feature, however, it looks like you can’t pick this up from an ATM so I’m not sure exactly how useful this would be, as an ATM is open 24/7. However, it would be a nice option to have if Monzo could implement this for free.
Why would you have to pay per month for it? I’d say give it to everyone but only charge them when they actually use it. It doesn’t cost anything to Monzo up until your actually withdraw that cash advance.
I wonder if Monzo could make their own based on Western Union or MoneyGram. Those services are pretty ubiquitous and you can send money to pretty much anywhere via the internet, so what’s stopping a Monzo employee from doing this when you do request emergency cash? That way you only pay extra when you explicitly request it and Monzo has to spend support advisor’s time sending you the money via WU.