Help us understand what features you'd like to see in a Monzo business account!

Monzo Chat Business Banking
42

1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?
Limited Company - Software Consultancy specialising in Software Testing and Test Automation.

2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)
a. Ease of access to the account. I can view my account from my phone but the app is terrible. It doesn’t let me pay new contacts from the app so I have to use the website. The website needs you to use a “Bib” which is a code generator. I don’t want to carry this around with me at all times. I want to be able to check my account and pay people on the move.
b. My bank doesn’t work with Crunch (my Accountants) via BankBolt so I have to download my transactions and import them. The trouble is the list of transactions is in two different formats depending on what view you use therefore I have to do a lot of editing before uploading.
c. I have to check my account every day to see if there are any new transactions. I’d like to be notified when a payment is made so I can action it. This would save me around 10 minutes a day.

3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
Crunch - Accounting Software

4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?
Dislike - Mobile is an afterthought. It often feels like the mobile app is a selling feature but not something they actually value. It doesn’t allow me to do business on the move. I need to be able to bank from anywhere. I’ve had times where I’ve needed to pay a client but didn’t have my Bib with me so had to get my partner to read a code out over the phone.

5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?
Integration with other accounting platforms like Crunch so I’m able to reconcile without faffing with Excel.

Hope this helps.

1 Like
43

1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?

Co-director limited company.

2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)

Integration with Kashflow and/or Xero

3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
Kashflow and migrating to Xero.

4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?

My income is mainly USD, wired from the US, and Barclays is reasonably quick in processing incoming international payments and charges 2% spread, which is not too bad. They also offer USD accounts.

5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?

Multicurrency, with an UK-based IBAN which can BOTH be used for incoming EUR payments and USD payments from the US. Good forex rates with a spread of 0-1%, rather than the 2% at Barclays and even higher elsewhere.

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44

1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?

Director of two limited companies providing publishing and fashion photography services.

2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)

Xero takes care of all that quite efficiently.

3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?

Xero, Bank website/app, TransferWise, Excel.

4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?

Very slow and expensive in handling multiple currencies (cut of times, bank fees, hidden FX charges). Their banking app sucks so does their security scheme (password token :face_vomiting:)

5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?

Multicurrency and a Monzo-level banking app please. FSCS protection and integration with Xero are essential.

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45

Hey, I would be up for a phone call or DM conversation. I’m a Business Analyst contractor running via a limited company.

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46

Hi Jordan,

  1. limited company
  2. Expenses classification
  3. Quickbooks
  4. I like that Santander pay interest over the money in my current account I dislike their internet bank.
  5. As commented above interest paid on money hold in the account and expenses classification.
47

Whilst I’m not going to use a business account as I don’t have a business. I could imagine dedicated business support in terms of COps etc would probably help.

EDIT: Have this in-place before you launch and have suitable scaling capabilities

2 Likes
48

Can you guys not just hook up with the guys over at coconut.

Simples… :slight_smile:

2 Likes
49

Would need to integrate/provide banking feed with FreeAgent and be able to make very large transactions without limit both in the UK and overseas.

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50

Some amount of scalability seems like it could be essential – the needs of a Sole Trader/Freelancer will be quite different to those of someone trying to run a larger company’s finances through a Monzo account.

Both obviously important, but it seems that the Sole Trader end of the market is that which could most benefit from a Monzo approach to business banking, on a personal level, as it can be a complex and intimidating process, so anything which can serve to simplify and streamline the process for those who are not financially/technologically savvy would be wonderful.

Points which are likely to have put smaller traders off business banking are things such as:
• high fees (if my business is on the side of a day-job, I’d likely balk at a sizeable monthly fee if my next invoice might not be until the next half of the year. If I had that cash to spare, I’d rather spend it on an accountant to do everything for me).
• Complexity (what may put users off current solutions in this sector are the depth of advanced features there which aren’t relevant to their business, but serve to muddy the water. The ability to tailor the app to different kinds of business (sole trader, multiple director, managing employees) would be useful. If I see fields and features in business software that I’m not using/don’t understand, I get worried I’ve missed something important and the tax man will hunt me down.

Things like real-time cashflow management – automatically sweeping X% of an invoice into a ‘tax-payment’ pot, deducting transactions tagged as expenses, integration of receipt-capturing and OCR of the contents etc. Straightforward and low-cost international transactions. Full FSCS protection etc of course.

Very excited to hear you’re looking at this – current solutions haven’t appealed to me for one reason or another (though I had not heard of Coconut before, which looks interesting).

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51

Jordan, I am a Monzo investor and own a very small Ltd company, happy to chat with you on the phone to discuss this great topic!

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52
  1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?

We are a startup limited company called The RANt Group based in Guildford, Surrey. We specialise in managed Cybersecurity services for small-medium companies.

  1. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)

Biggest pain points for us is staying on top of managing and responding to our accounts needs. I.e. they need us to constantly be on top of our expenses, payroll, VAT, CT, etc, etc! Which is fine, but it can sometimes get in the way of actually conducting the business of business!

  1. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?

We use FreeAgent (recently acquired by Nat West), to manage finances online via a mobile app and a browser-based application. We use Metro Bank (who have no mobile for our type of account!??!). They think their ‘unique’ approach of having to go into a branch to conduct any non-‘standard’ type of banking is a plus-point. It isn’t!

  1. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?

There’s no mobile App - in this day and age, we find this ridiculous! And pretty much any change to any element of the account is still conducted by filling out ‘paper’ forms… crazy.

  1. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?

We wished we had a fully integrated banking / invoicing / tax application. Rather than having to log in and out of the bank to perform payments, then having to wait 24 hours (or more!) for those transactions to be imported into FreeAgent, where we then have to individually explain each transaction - and only then do we know what dividends we can allocate / what our tax position is.

1 Like
53
  • What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?

Software development consultancy. Joint owner of a limited company with one other director.

  • What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)

Payroll, taxes, spending categorisation (into account codes), understanding cashflow/obligations

  • What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?

Xero

  • What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?

We use Metro Bank. The one positive is their integration with Xero is good (although it was a pain in the arse to get it setup right).

Negatives:

The website is a pain to login to
They’re getting rid of Google Pay support soon (for some inexplicable reason)
The fees for foreign currency transactions aren’t great
Opening our account took 3.5 hours in-branch and even then it wasn’t completed
Transactions take 2-3 days to appear in our account

  • If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?

We’d just love to get the features of the Monzo personal account, we don’t need much more.

Having pots for your business would be incredible, especially if you could set specific direct debits, etc. to come out of them.

54

  1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?
    Limited Company, Contractor, Sole Employee/Director

  2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)
    Most of the above. Filing expenses is very manual, payroll isn’t too transparant, reliant on accountants to sort out taxes

  3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
    Rely on accountants to look after everything (I email expenses, and the bank are connected directly to my business bank account to reconcile these)
    I currently bank with cashplus (recommended by accountants)

  4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?
    Dislikes: No mobile app (web only), different bank to my current account (I’d ideally like to have my business account with the same bank as my personal account), monthly fee and a fee on transfers
    Likes: Connects directly with accountants system thus gives them immediate updates in regards to income/spend.

  5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?
    - free transfers or no monthly fee (of course some kind of charge is necessary but I think one or the other makes sense)
    - reduce the need for an accountant (has tax calculations if possible and built for dummies)

As mentioned by some of the others on the post, I’m not necessarily looking for the optimal tax set up but more a convenient and easy to understand bank account that removes the need for black box accountants.

Happy to chat on the phone also :slight_smile:

55

FreeAgent has integration with HSBC built in, no? Although it’s via logging in as you and screen scraping, not API, so wouldn’t be surprised if you didn’t want to use it.

56

That and the fact that my accountant (who supplies and controls my FreeAgent) wants to charge me extra to use it :slight_smile:

57
  1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?
    Small limited company
  2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)
    Nothing really
  3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
    HSBC bank account, Quickfile for accounts, Spreadsheet, DropBox
  4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?
    Only dislike the monthly charges
  5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?
    Must be able to download transactions in a format readable by Quickfile. Would be great if it was “free forever” for very low volume electronic only banking (say 20 transactions per month). I very rarely get paid by cheque and don’t handle cash. A no-fee credit card would also be good. Other than that - same as personal Monzo account is fine.
58

the fact that my accountant (who supplies and controls my FreeAgent) wants to charge me extra to use it :slight_smile:

That’s mean. You should dump them and find a better accountant.

1 Like
59

  • What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?
    We are a small accountancy practice. A limited company

  • What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)
    App navigation and ease of use, poor customer service (feeling unloved)

  • What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
    Mobile banking app, Banking website, Intuit QuickBooks online

  • What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?
    Removing services in branch (so whats the point) Slow cheque clearing, Charges, lack of communication, feeling of the big bank syndrome

  • If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?
    Easy payment history visibility per payee, Photo cheque clearing

60

1. What do you do? Are you a sole proprietor, contractor, limited company?
Ltd

2. What are the big pain points in managing your business finances? (think about things like invoices, expenses, payroll, taxes, etc.)
Poor integration of Xero with accounts we need for various reasons (Lloyd’s corp for volume currency trades in the major currencies through Arena, a Revolut or Monzo account for each employee so they can travel and expense without crazy charges, credit cards for most employees so they can hire cars in the US etc, Barclays Online so we don’t have to deal with the awful Lloyd’s Corp interface so often)

3. What tools do you currently use to manage your business finances?
Xero, Float, Reciptbank, Google Sheets (those first three sadly fall short)

4. What do you like / dislike about your current business bank account?

Dislike:
There are too many required
Lloyd’s Corp doesn’t offer yodlee feeds and neither do Revolut or Monzo(?)
They expect you to go to the bank, post things, deal with 10 page paper forms.
Getting Letters of Credit sorted out is complicated (Lloyd’s) or expensive (Barclays)
Barclays business app links my personal CC into the same account on iPhone!?!
Barclays allows either convenience or security options: for multi-user auth for large transactions you lose most functionality. For functionality you lose security.
No interest in any of the above without fixed term accounts or bonds etc

Like:
Lloyd’s Arena for FX. It’s rapid, information rich and cheap
Yodlee feeds into Xero from Barclays
Barclays having an iPhone app
Barclays txt message alerts for movements over a threshold - it’s not Monzo, but it’s a start
Lloyd’s corp will deal with crazy one off things like letters requesting security from the President of India (he must have a lot of time on his hands to write all these), checks [sic] in silly currencies / paper formats.

5. If you could request one key feature for your business current account, what would it be? Are there any other features you look for in a BCA?

The key feature: A comprehensive app which doesn’t make you want to eat your phone.

Others: Remedies to the above whinging :slight_smile: to summarise:

  1. Yodlee feeds
  2. Credit cards (for hire cars / hotels)
  3. Sensible rates abroad for cards for employees with limits
  4. An FX solution
  5. A decent interface on the phone (Easy to use, broad functionality, clever security/auth, multiuser auth)
  6. Ability to deal with exceptions using a human brain

Access to peer to peer or other funding directly in the marketplace? E.g. funding circle? Perhaps a savings account in funding circle / similar too? So lend to businesses and get lended to; you know, how banks should work!

1 Like
61

I’m a sole trader/freelancer. My business is so simple at the moment that I don’t need any fancy accounting software/invoicing platform. I’m still just using Excel!

And I did away with the separate business account I had because I wasn’t using any of the things HSBC were charging a monthly fee for.

I’d be delighted if you invented a free business bank account for us lone operators, preferably one which was integrated with my current account on the app and looked just like another pot… an earnings in-pot, so to speak.

I’d also like to be able to accept payments from abroad without fees decimating my earnings.

And, I think I said it on another thread elsewhere, I’d love to have that Coconut function that automatically works out how much tax I need to put aside from each incoming payment and moves it to a tax pot.