The main reason I never took up Plus is the lack of joint account support, in the end I tried a switch service and never came back. I changed from being ‘full Monzo’, to doing my main banking elsewhere, now 6 months later, I rarely use Monzo’, never planned but just fell out of usefulness. I was a big fan and singing their praises. Just came back to check the community pages out of interest, but still no really change/update for over a year, glad I didn’t wait tbh. Monzo lost it’s USP of being the challenger: responsive to customers, sticking their neck out, trying new things, innovating.
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Nah. They are still the only bank communicating in emoji.
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Being a challenger isn’t a USP.
There’s still lots of innovation, maybe you’ve just missed it. Flex & Trends, for a start.
JA are a different story, but it’s still better than most.
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The big thing for me is the spend commitments and predictability. Being able to move money in to pots and have bills come straight from there is a huge win. My HSBC account isn’t capable of anything like that so I see it as a Monzo USP. (I don’t have loads of different accounts open).
I don’t have a joint account so the lack of parity there hasn’t bothered me personally.
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Whilst a brave attempt at doing something different, it clearly wasn’t working. Monzo was making ever–increasing losses, and helming that ship was sending the CEO over the edge in his mental health. The initial plans; to be radically transparent, to be a low–deposit high–transaction ‘hub’, to simultaneously be a marketplace but not encourage a high–churn, race–to–the–bottom price war (cf. energy switching) aren’t compatible with the huge regulation which comes with being awarded a banking licence.
For me, there were signs the initial approach wasn’t working: The bandwagon–jumping in launching joint accounts; the forest fire in locking accounts and not getting a grip on money–laundering risk; the half–assed application for business banking funding and product launching; the weird approach to lending initially (low limits and odd acceptance criteria); the lack of a functioning marketplace. Even being unable to write coherent Terms and Conditions which made any sense.
Ultimately, in my view, the original staff at Monzo (most of whom have gone now) we’re all pretty much living in a bubble. Overreaching “innovation” launched features which only just about worked, then were never upgraded. A difficulty pulling itself out of the reputation for being just a pre-paid spending card. The final, lamentable, horrific sign of being completely away with the banking fairies was the launch of Original Plus, a product so far removed from reality, which failed to deliver even its most basic features of discounts and “swag”, which made no sense, which was laughably derided in the (usually) adoring press and which ricocheted from launch to relaunch to collapse within weeks, demonstrated that Monzo needed to become just another boring bank if it wanted to survive. If Original Plus was the culmination of “challenging, being responsive to customers, sticking their neck out, trying new things, innovating” then that approach was utter crap.
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I guess the main unique selling point for Monzo is having your account open at home, (cue cringey I want a Monzo account videos) and being able to use it instantly for transfers of course, picking your pin before your card comes eliminating useless paper online banking setup at home. Of course there may be other banks that do similar things that I’ve not experienced myself or looked into but I agree Plus/Premium are pretty subpar but I guess £15 for phone insurance travel insurance, 1.5% interest and a few subjective discounts pay for themselves really but could be better
The only other bank that I believe are challenging Monzo currently is Metro as they open the account there and then, print the card set the pin setup online banking also free EU transactions but don’t have free Non EU fees
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I was with a high street bank for 10 years and was always in debt , moved to monzo and I can see where my money goes , for e.g.my wife shopped in b&m 15 times in the last 4 months 
,
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I’m a big fan of Metro (I stay as customer service is excellent) and it’s where all my banking is done from now, it’s a challenger in set up and speed and ease to open; however the tech side is quite lacking.
App wise it’s VERY basic and tech that’s unsupported includes, roundups, cheque imaging, payment notifications (bar card spend), confirmation of payee and you can’t even add your card to Google Pay in app. I’ve also found “insights” to be very poor and update for the last month.
Nobody inside Monzo cares enough to make this happen. It’s a tragedy because the joint account is pretty crippled without some of the features - especially custom categories. And the upcoming amalgamation of summary budgets and trends will IMHO be pretty uselessness without custom categories on the joint account.
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There’s not even a joint overdraft, which for an account where you’d expect bills to be paid from is really weird.
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Not overly, safety net yes, to just pay bills, no, falls more to money management than relying on borrowing.
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Relying on your overdraft to pay your bills shouldn’t be the way to manage your finances.
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Using an overdraft as a safety net doesn’t mean you’re using it to pay your bills.
If you live in it to the max every month, I agree. But if you have a £1000 to cover your direct debits incase your salary didn’t appear, that’s sensible.
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I definitely rely on my overdraft to pick up the slack if an unexpected bill meant my mortgage repayment wouldn’t get paid without it.
I take your point, but relying on debt to pay bills as standard is a separate conversation.
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I still find the app easier to navigate than my Barclays and Santander and others, in fact recently using Revolut, which I think has great offerings, it shows the simplicity and ease of use of Monzo.
Very glad though they’re also focussing on becoming a profitable business so they stick around, forever.
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If they had Joint Monzo Plus, I’d sign up in a heartbeat. But they don’t.
But when it comes to Monzo Premium, it’s honestly rubbish for what they’re offering.
Nationwide Flexplus is the best option on the market.
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Bill splits, shared tabs, pay people nearby are really the only “features” that I’ve ever used. Still think they’re brilliant features, tbf.
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Completely disagree about it being easier than Santander. Find Santander one of the most straightforward apps out there, likely due to it not having as many features. I don’t really like using the Monzo app as I just find things a bit all over the place.
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Some users report not being able to use the account at all until the card has arrived and been activated, presumably some kind of address double check.
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Good advice.
Anyone remember when the Co-Founder, CEO, President stated that overdrafts could be used to buy shares? Whoopsie.
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