Thanks for the insight! I also think that’s true, and probably would have been even without Covid. While there wouldn’t have been some of the pain that resulted from the pandemic, Monzo is in any case too large to operate like it did in the early years. I think Tom also talked about this aspect a bit in the recent podcast that was posted on the forum.
I miss some of the excitement and the fast pace, but there are also positive aspects. Work to fix and improve existing features is much appreciated and didn’t often happen in the past. Something would be built and then left as it was while the company moved onto the next thing.
Careful, you’re painting with some pretty broad brush strokes there. There were certainly some reservations about OG Plus. I can put my hand on heart and say that I raised many, and, as I always did, made sure LOTS of what was said on here was fed back. And I know I wasn’t the only one.
Anyone who was in the Coral Crew at that time can attest that concerns were raised. I’m sure you can go back and find posts where I promoted it - because that was my job. But that doesn’t tell the whole story
while it may be broad brush strokes to say that’s what every employee wanted, it’s still what the overall business decided to do though.
I do think part of the problem was the ‘Silicon Valley Maverick’ approach was often inappropriate for a bank. It’s fine for google to experiment with things and they mess up, but that’s not fine if you are expecting people to put their salaries in your hands.
I sometimes wonder whether, like revolut Monzo would have been better sticking with the prepaid / spending card model and making that work instead of becoming a main bank.
Me neither, but then that was Revolut’s main appeal in 2017. It’s a different customer base.
clearly it would have meant a different path for Monzo, maybe it’s not the way they should have gone. But I still think there is a point that being a main account and a licensed bank does leave you far less free to act like a fintech than being an ‘e-money’ provider.
Quite a lot of people are getting fed up with Google doing it too, yours truly included. Whatever product I’m being sold and made to rely on I expect not to drastically change for the worse overnight or to completely disappear just because the CEO got bored with that particular toy and wants a newer, shinier one
Have a look at a company called Habito (I nor anyone I know has a connection with them)
Does anyone know when/if Monzo will be offering mortgages soon? And if no,then why?
I mean, sure. But Monzo also burned an ocean of VC to acquire a ton of customers, and then when it became necessary to make a profit rather than run at a perpetual loss… the whole founding team followed the CEO out the door.
I honestly think that the move to the current account, combined with the change in mission from “Financial Control Center” to “Making Money Work for Everyone” (or whatever) was where things went wrong; the old card gave people clear edges to their discretionary spending, and the Financial Control Center mission aimed to expand that to people’s whole financial situation, but instead we got… Plus? And everyone quitting.
How many people actually cared about the old functionality though? Clearly we’ll never know but, for me, I’d never have bothered with it without the promise of a future “new” current account. Whether that promise has been fulfilled is a different question, of course, which will also influence the outcome.
I just don’t think you can separate the two, prepaid and CA because the second was always the destination that the first was leading towards. I can see that a change in direction to “we’re not doing a current account after all” could have killed the business completely in fairly short order as those like me simply walked away.
Completely agree, I would never have signed up if I thought it was always going to be prepay. And I don’t think Monzo would have reached 5 million customers either. The attraction for me has always been the app, the clear view of spending/income, and ease of transfers, bill splits etc (and managing my money in general). I’d say that this has only got better over the past several months, so I don’t agree with @duncang that “things went wrong.” Depends on what you’re looking for, I guess.
I had no problems getting a mortgage (6 months ago) and I’ve been full Monzo for years. I actually applied directly to the mortgage company I wanted. In different circumstances I would have used a broker.
Really easily to export the PDF statements from Monzo and email them off.
I need to challenge this, lest it become a “fact” or common knowledge. Because it’s just not the case.
The 11 or so (as I recall) founding members… The ones who left, left at varying points long before Tom did. And I don’t think any of their leaving was related to Monzo getting to a point where it needed to make a profit.
Paul left at least a year before Tom stepped down, and had reduced his involvement for the year prior to that - he took a long sabbatical and then returned part time before leaving. Jason left to found 11FS years before that, I’m fairly certain he had already left before I even started, which was in 2016. Simon VC left to found Fronted a good year before Tom left. Gary left in 2019. Leah left in 2018 or 2019 as I recall.