Making The Change to a Current Account

Hi I have been a Monzo user since the near beginning, and I must admit, I mainly have used it whilst travelling abroad, and occasionally at home.

I have been eagerly waiting for the upgrade to the full current account, and it has now arrived. My main bank that I currently use is Lloyds Bank, but I am wondering whether the change to the Monzo Current Account is troublesome and how people have found it so far?

I.e - moving over my salary, direct debits, etc

As I am only an apprentice and still living at home, I think the change might not be too bad for me, as I only have a few direct debits, and not things like a mortgage yet anyway. So was just wondering what the change process is like. Any guidance/advice would be much appreciated.

I guess the key question is, do I have to contact every company that I have a direct debit with and ask them to change the payment details to my Monzo?

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Presently, yeah you do have to change your DDs and SOs manually. But once Monzo implements CASS you won’t have to.

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There’s a lot of questions and answers here:

but yes, until they implement CASS you’ll need to switch them all manually.

Yes, you’ll need to switch them manually, but remember you don’t need to do it all at once, it isn’t a big deal to space out if needed.

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All I did was login to relevant provider portal and changed bank details, took a few mins and that was it… few days later it shows in the app and you should also get a letter fro provider confirming the change.

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Okay yeah understood.

So how does everyone feel since they have changed from a traditional bank? Much better?

Just wondering whether I should make the change. Like I said, I don’t have many direct debits, 5-6 max, plus my wage salary, and that’s all I’d have to change. So not too troublesome.

When is CASS expected to be implemented?

I love it, but I have a few current accounts, and I’d suggest anyone have at least two. Monzo and Metro Bank would be a good mix :slight_smile:

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I think the key thing is that it’s relatively straight forward if the companies that you are dealing with have all their databases up-to-date.

So far I’ve moved a DD from AAISP and tried to pay my Tesco Bank Credit Card with my Debit card. AAISP worked after directly contacting the MD through his Blog (where he was talking about Monzo: http://www.revk.uk/2017/11/monzo-current-account-and-fast-payments.html?showComment=1511710310967#c7979046101541382110) and Tesco Bank flatly refuse to accept the card. So your mileage may vary.

The difficulty with the Debit Card seems to be getting Merchants to understand that it’s no longer the pre-paid card and that they really do need to do something about it!

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We’ve tried to make the upgrade as quick and seamless as possible, and I think we’ve achieved that!

As for the Current Account Switch Service, we don’t offer it yet but we’re hoping to as soon as we possibly can. It’s quite a bit of work, but we’ll update everyone when we have an idea of a release date :slightly_smiling_face:

For now, you can either set up your direct debits/standing orders manually, or if you like, you can wait until we implement CASS and move everything over at that point! There’s no need to do it right away - you can use CASS at any time.

Much like yourself, @SkeltonTom, I don’t have too many direct debits so I found it really easy to go and set things up. Getting your salary paid in can of course vary in difficulty depending on your employer, but you’ll just need to give them your new details and hopefully they can quickly update it for you :sweat_smile:

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That’s great.

My worry is, if I decide to make the change and started to change the direct debits over, and then say 4/5 went through okay but the 5th company didn’t accept my Monzo, then what would I do? If I’d already transferred the other across.

Some companies also do charge admin fees for changing your bank details, correct?

If one hasn’t been set up by the day its due, you can transfer money back to your old account instantly using Faster Payments.

I’ve never been with a company that charged for changing a direct debit. Some may I guess? But it’s frowned upon to make things more difficult for customers to pay their bills.

Okay, my worry is that some companies won’t accept me to use Monzo? As I’ve seen people mention on here that they got rejected when attempting to change to Monzo.

Some companies didn’t recognise the Monzo sort code because they only updated their databases irregularly, but as time goes on these are becoming fewer and further between. There’s a list on this post which anyone can edit and update:

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A lot of that was sorted in the preview phase - by now all companies banking should should be updated in accordance with the BACs agreements… so you should have minimal problems

I’ve never had that problem before but can’t say that it’s impossible! At the end of the day, a Merchant shouldn’t stop you from giving them money, you would think!

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If this does happen you could maybe leave/transfer some money to your other account in the interim? I did this the first month as it took me a while to update Specsavers (they didn’t have a problem with Monzo just insisted I go in in person to sign a mandate…) I know there are still a few issues but they’re fairly few and far between now. I didn’t have problems with my direct debits and have never had my card refused :slight_smile:

Heh… as if companies that haven’t updated their databases are going to get any better :stuck_out_tongue: I wonder if some of them ever update them.

The TV Licensing fiasco was only very recent and it’s not 100% certain it’s dealt with yet…

My wife is in an ongoing conversation with the gym. Apparently she got someone to admit their databases were out of date the other day, but forgot to take the name of the person she spoke to. Next day, back to square one ‘it must be a problem with your bank’, etc.

Your Direct Debits don’t all need to come from one account. I have three current accounts with Direct Debits setup against them.

I’ve never heard of a company charging for Direct Debit. Usually they pay you to use it. It’s cheaper for them than other options.

Don’t feel like you have to, but you could list the companies you have direct debits with and then see if anyone here has encountered problems with them. Could be worth a shot?

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