This conversation started in the two new fees topic:
We're adding two new fees, which only affect a minority of customers.
Let’s continue the chat about financial vulnerability here.
Interesting idea though the FCA estimate that approximately 50% of adults are vulnerable at any particular time according to their definition and this was pre-Covid which will have caused the number to increase.
I’m not sure Monzo would be resourced for this and I suspect relying on customers to self declare might also not be taken kindly by regulators.
3 Likes
I understand your concerns around this and, of course, the exact way they implement it will be up to Monzo.
I was really just thinking about how Monzo might be able to reduce the feeling of being “on the spot” with a customer service agent on chat, and a form (as it’s depersonalised) may help in this area.
Another possibility is for their processes to still go through a form, as I suggested, but to have to initiate a chat first to get the link to it. In this way, the chat would act as an initial filter on the customer’s eligibility and only if it was thought appropriate would the form be offered.
I recognise the difficulty, of course, around this: make it too easy to self-certify, and the process would be open to abuse; make it too difficult and some genuinely vulnerable customers would be put off or missed. This is why I think it would be fair for the specialist team to make a final adjudication based on a list of internal criteria.
I also think a more form-based approach could save on resources for Monzo as it would mean that chats wouldn’t be long winded and full of detail; the detail would be put into the form in the customer’s time.
I wonder what others might think?
I think this was around something like “at risk of financial vulnerability” rather than meaning that they actually were vulnerable? This is just from memory, but I do doubt that it would be 50% of Monzo’s customers.
What is their definition of it?
That just says a lot without saying much.
It’s not very clear about their definitions or anything. It just seems like them trying to say something for the sake of saying it.
But that’s exactly it, someone above was saying Monzo shouldn’t have to ask people, but how can they possibly know?
Those criteria are so vague. You could suffer from them all and you’re fine and don’t need Monzo to categorise you as anything or suffer from one and it be too much for you.
But what’s what I mean, all of that is obvious to a bank that has all the data.
My mental health isn’t, the death of a family member, stress at work, looming redundancy.
Re your Aspergers, is that something you openly declared during sign up/another point? As to help you with future comms?
The FCA are currently consulting on their updated guidance on vulnerable customers
It includes quite a few things to do on appropriate communication channels and having more then one way to contact a firm for instance - as customers may find one method difficult.
Not all vulnerable customers see the chat option
3 Likes
This example is one which seems obvious on the face of it but might not be. You may have just changed the account your income is paid into to another, or you may be paid irregularly as normal. For example, one scenario I can think of is work for small local authorities like parish councils. They pay everybody who has done work for them after the expense has been approved at the next meeting - so you might get paid at odd-seeming and difficult to predict intervals. I imagine many self-employed people would be similar, particularly if their legal setup is to have a limited company. They might time payments to themselves from the company differently depending on their needs, as they might want to keep large amounts of the money “in the company”. Income also could be erratic but “normal” for people on zero-hours contracts.
It just goes to show that this sort of thing is extremely difficult. It does generally come back to discussion with a customer, usually, and training staff to be looking out for warning signs that a customer may have particular needs. It helps if the customer is open and self-declares at the beginning, but it’s totally understandable that not all customers will want to do that (or even realise they can do that).
There are some good points being made in the thread so far, thanks to all who have contributed.
I also agree with @Peter_G that it makes sense to discuss this aspect of Monzo’s support in a dedicated thread.
5 Likes
This is a good point from the FCA and one I feel that many financial institutions, not just Monzo, should look at compliance for.
All traditional banks require a branch visit for certain more-complicated activities, and this discriminates against people who have difficulty accessing transport. Monzo uses chat and, I believe, this is the only way to sort out some things - the phone service is not completely full service, if I’m correct.
So it would be good for banks to consider the needs of customers in their contact options a bit more completely. Traditional banks really ought to look at allowing further interaction digitally to promote inclusiveness, and fintechs need to consider the needs of those who may have difficulties using technology.
The question may come up of “why would you use Monzo if you find technology difficult” but this doesn’t excuse the need to cater to these customers if they have opened an account and given the service a try.
1 Like
Absolutely, I couldn’t agree with you more!
I think Monzo’s efforts in this area have been positive, so I hope they do update us in a bit more detail too.
Thanks for the polite comments, I have appreciated your contributions too!
1 Like
Yes, I feel the same.
I suggested the text box, but the way I was thinking about it was more of a quiz-type flow of questions (not sure what they might ask, but basically tailored towards identifying if you need support so I imagine the Monzo team would think carefully about what to ask and how to phrase it) with a section at the end along the lines of “anything else you want to tell us which may be affecting your finances”, or something to that effect.
This way, the quiz flow would help make it easy but if you felt vulnerable and there was nowhere obvious in the flow that identified that you would be given the opportunity to explain your specific circumstances at the end.
1 Like
This works both ways - when I was off on long term sick several years ago (due to mental health) and struggling with money I absolutely hated filling out questionnaires about my situation with anybody, whether financial institutions or otherwise. The thoughts of answering lots of questions still sends my anxiety into overdrive.
All I wanted was to be able to copy and paste from a document I’d written with a mental health professional that clearly articulated what I was going through and the impact it was having on me. I ended up resorting to writing letters to my various creditors and they all just continued to send standard template responses.
It was a horrific situation and it’s one of the reasons I’m still paying the debts off four years later. Nobody actually listened or paid attention to what I was saying and they still don’t now. I’m currently struggling with a high street bank and my mortgage because I had a payment holiday from them and their debt management team are now chasing me for the arrears, even though the bank agreed the payment holiday 
8 Likes
Sorry to hear that @Dan5 and thanks for sharing your experience.
I understand what you mean here completely, and really I think this is why you want to (ideally) have both options open to people at any one time so they can do what would work best for them.
For anybody struggling to articulate their problems, checkboxes or formulaic diagnostic questions could help; equally if you have already taken the time to articulate your situation in a thought-out letter it’s understandable that you would want a way to simply send this in to a number of organisations and not be forced to “jump through hoops” (especially at a time when you might not have the energy or motivation to do this, long-winded forms get on everybody’s nerves so I can imagine how it would only be even worse if you were already finding it daunting).
1 Like
Absolutely - I think the important thing is making it as easy as possible in as many different ways to make it easy to people to make any organisation aware of any vulnerabilities they might have.
As a society we’re getting better at accepting and supporting those who need it, but we’re still a long way off getting it right, all of the time.
6 Likes