None of these things are particularly new, balance after bills has been around for a long time as has connected spending. And Monzo has released features at the same time.
It doesn’t mean it’s lost it’s USP though, IMHO. Just that everyone is innovating, but the innovation is smaller and much more easily copied than it might have a few years back.
I agree, none of these things are innovative at all.
It’s prioritisation not innovation.
Every single bank has things that other banks don’t have. They have different customer demographics, different team sizes and different priorities. In an ideal world they would all offer the same things but that would be unreasonable and a bit boring for us the consumer.
There are banking awards that try to assess all these things fairly. I think Monzo did pretty well this year and won in many categories so it’s good to see they’re on the right track at least.
Yes, of course they do but many have features that overlap.
In terms of whether they’re innovative, maybe I should be more careful about referring to it as innovation, but rather to highlight that it’s felt like the competitors have moved forward and Monzo has stood rather still.
Anyway I’m sure others will disagree, it’s just a personal feeling.
The innovation thing at 6m customers is hard, as you spend a lot of time maintaining and improving what you have, but we’re still to see the investment platform, Flex is innovative in how it’s handled within a current account.
What would count as innovation anyway?
You’re not aware of (or haven’t looked at) any features or improvements they’ve made recently you mean?
Innovation is overrated. There are so many non-innovative features that Monzo does better than any other bank, and also some that no one, not even Monzo, does right and could do a lot better.
Take the ‘balance after bills’. Great idea, who cares if someone else thought of it X years ago? Not even Monzo can get it fully right - a vast number of people use joint accounts and accounts at other banks (be it current or credit cards) for expenses; no ‘balance after bills’ can claim to be fully functional unless it can take into account direct debits and regular expenses from all connected accounts. If Monzo could manage that, it would just be amazing and way ahead of everyone else.
That is a very subjective statement depending on what you consider Monzo’s USP to be, or whether a USP is even required.
I find that Monzo still has the fastest, most responsive, most stable, most intuitive, most helpful and logical UX. Most legacy apps are still poor, and I dislike the UX of other challengers.
I felt this way before I joined the company (in fact, it’s why I applied way back in the day), I felt this way while I was at the company, and I still feel this way 2 years after leaving.
Is it perfect? No. Are there some things that other banks do better? Probably, and if those things are a priority to you then you’re free to use them. For my priorities, Monzo remains the champ.
I had to reverse a transaction through Barclays in recent months (stuck with them for a business account) and the whole process was absolutely diabolical - couldn’t do it on a PC, loses progress if you switch back to the app to check the details the web form asks for, no response within the stated ten days, no follow up at all. I had to march into branch and wait to be told that it had failed and it was manually started again. Then they sent me a letter
Changing my direct debit for HSBC credit card has two different systems dependent on whether you want to pay from HSBC current account or another bank and both send off an email to someone, though at least they managed to get it right and do it quickly! 
I genuinely don’t get what wonders folk are seeing back in the world outside Monzo (and Starling)
Seems to be about time that Monzo fired all their devs and just live with the status quo according to some people. Maybe we should go back to steam trains and 1920s cars too.
Here is one definition of ‘innovate’:
make changes in something established, especially by introducing new methods, ideas, or products
There is nothing wrong with wanting innovation. Innovation doesn’t have to even be a new product. Just find flaws in existing products and do them better (subjective I know) - like Flex. I guess some people didn’t want Flex developed because they don’t see a need to innovate.
Where have peoples imaginations gone? You really think everything is perfect and nothing can be improved? Dream big first then dream realistic.
Might generate a very short term profit, that some crave, though 
I feel like you just don’t get it.
The significant majority of people wouldn’t switch accounts because they can make a transfer 5 minutes from now or can pick their own PIN immediately. Most people would maybe think that’s neat when it comes to it, but not open an account because of it. Their existing bank account can change debit card PINs and make transfers already.
Plus the insurance - you can get the same insurance for the same amount of money from so many providers. It’s just not a good deal.
Nationwide’s deal is a good deal - heaps of insurances for a price less than you can reasonably get elsewhere.
The only thing I really like about Monzo now is that it’s UI is still the fastest, most responsive of any British banking app I’ve ever used. That’s not enough to make me come back though, and I doubt it’s enough to make people switch.
100pc the reason I still bank with Monzo.
It’s the subtle things too that you don’t even realise how easy it actually is until you go elsewhere. I went bank to Natwest for a while and it was crazy how much I missed transactions posting on the day they happened for example.
Plus closing, opening accounts, updating details. Still lightyears ahead in may areas.
This. But What I’d add is that the “gap” of innovation between firms is going to be smaller. Does that mean it’s a bad thing. No, and the fact that flex outstrips other BNPL offerings is for me an example of this. But it will get harder for any innovation, from any bank, to be truly world beating.
That’s not a USP and hasn’t been for a long time. Barclays, First Direct, TSB, Lloyds to name four others that will let you open an account from your phone, and use it there and then.
I’ve never had a over analytical mind when it comes to things in life. I’m a black or white type of guy (no grey).If I like something (bank, phone, broadband blah blah) I keep it, if I don’t … I complain if it’s worth it and then leave! Can’t be bothered wasting time on something I can’t change, makes no sense to me.Monzo suits me brilliantly and has done for the past 5yrs.just wondering if starling had its fair share of nitpicking on their community (hence why it shut down).
I’m mostly the same, but for me the bar is a bit (okay, maybe a lot) higher; I can’t settle for just liking something. And the consequence comes faster, and is greater; I leave to search for better as opposed to just complaining. My mindset is a bit of the opposite in that something must be worth my staying as opposed to be worth leaving.
Even when I’m settled on something I love, I’m always open to the potential of something better, and will at times even go search for it, even if what I have is already the best or closest to perfection that exists.
Less is more.
As people have said here, Monzo’s USP was simplicity by removing the cruft of pending transactions and other non-immediate things. It’s also, IMHO, underappreciated that when Monzo started you only used it to do discretionary spending, so all the charts were about that, and it implicity let you do “envelope budgeting” because whatever you transferred was all you wanted to spend. Splitting merchants by categories turbo-charged that by letting you see, for instance, if you were buying too much / eating out too much. All these simple parts worked together to give people more control.
I still believe that less is more.
The problem is that the Monzo app is complex in ways that it needn’t be. Trends and budgets and summary need to be unified. The joint account needs custom categories. Why on god’s green earth do we still have that stupid card carousell? Does the original designer have to quit before anyone will have the courage to excise it?
But more than the litany of irritating and confusing things in the app, it’s the lack of distance and perspective, the simplicity, that Monzo is lacking. That original simplicity - the ability to see the overall flow of where money is going and to be able to target things to reduce in order to save. Whenever I need to do this personally I end up exporting all my data and using a combination of Excel and writing code to be able to see the forest for the trees. Isn’t it mad that Monzo doesn’t help us to do that very well? That was the original simplicity, and there was more to be had from the same well. But nowadays Monzo’s app feels like a game of Tetris where you’ve made some poor historical decisions. I hope that they are able to clean things up, and make it simple again.
Personal opinion, but more often than not feels like it’s still classed as a spending card, nothing more to some.
How Monzo is going to break that mentality I really don’t know.
Is there a push needed to move away from “top up” to “adding funds” to their bank account, not spending card?
Do some not trust it because it doesn’t have a high street branch?
Everything present and upcoming is perfect for managing your finances in a way the older banks struggle to achieve.
Could it be more open about upcoming plans in form of roadmap? Probably.
Is there too many variables on outcomes and priorities? Absolutely.
Difficult to find that balance to meet both ends of the spectrum for customer and business needs.
This is already done in the app - it’s “Add money” - when you pull down the feed drawer.
I think demographic has a lot to play. I think (based on experience), that older people are less likely to switch bank, especially to one that’s fully online, and one that’s not a “high street bank”.
I think Monzo have saturated their target demographic at least for now - and expanding into younger generation/cards would be a huge market, and definitely increase the uptake + stickiness from younger generations.
I’d completely forgotten about this! When I still had an HSBC credit card it was such a faff to move the direct debit to my Monzo account I gave up. I just set up a standing order from Monzo to my HSBC current account for the day before the DD.
(The faff came 100% from HSBC as they wanted me to print out a form and post it to them. I don’t have a printer at home so I just went “nope”. 
)