Pay Direct Debits early

If a DD is due to be taken on a Monday, it shows in Monzo on Friday (the working day before). It would be useful to have an option inside that pending transaction to remove the funds from my balance immediately - so I can be sure I won’t accidentally spend too much over the weekend.

It sounds like you might find a Committed Spend Pot useful. You can vote for Committed Spend Pots here:

3 Likes

I agree, it’s a good idea.
Almost concede the amount prior to the DD date. I had a couple DD this week and would have found this idea useful.

I have seen information shared about the committed pot, but the idea is still relevant to pay the available funds to an upcoming DD, much like funds disappearing from a pending transaction.

3 Likes

Now getting paid early is nearly done - it’s be great to have the option to pay DDs early

1 Like

You already can. Just pay the company through their website.

DDs are initiated by the company concerned. Monzo don’t know how much to pay until the company tells them, so it would be difficult and probably open a whole new can of worms I suspect.

2 Likes

I have a direct debit due on Monday

Monzo already knows how much it is

It’d be nice to pay it on the Friday instead of waiting until Monday

Edit: however I agree with you

it would be difficult and probably open a whole new can of worms I suspect.

2 Likes

I don’t know for sure but I suspect that would break the DD system. The timing is part of the process so I’d be surprised if it can cope with people fiddling with it like that.

Wish I could convert all of my DD to SO so I have control, not the merchant! I did try this with one but they didn’t have a clue what I wanted to do and kept on telling me about setting up DD!

I think it’s up to the merchant. If you can persuade them to accept an SO, you’ll be good to go.

The banks don’t have control. The companies you’re paying (which may be banks) do. That’s the whole point. Very few seem to accept SO in my experience (and you’d lose any DD discounts if they did).

I did mean the merchant… I’ve corrected. Thanks

I’d be concerned about this feature because some of the companies I deal with are borderline incompetent so I’d wouldn’t want to rock the boat :grimacing:

Not all companies have ‘credit’ systems so if you paid your bill before it was due I’d be worried about it getting lost. Couple that with how messy it would get for both you and the company to work out AND your Monzo budgets would be all over the place :exploding_head: you could pay a company twice in one month for example.

That’s just the tip of the iceberg. I don’t think it is entirely on Monzo to implement this either so with all this I personally can’t see it being a good idea or something that I’d use.

2 Likes

Not really…that depends on if the company has already gone for the direct debit. They normally call for it a few days in advance, meaning that by the time you’ve seen it showing as pending, it’s already committed and will likely be “double taken”

You can of course call the company to ask them not to take it, or ask monzo not to pay it, but then it’ll be a failed direct debit and R.I.P credit score…

I agree fully with your other point - difficult to achieve and opens a can of worms.

OP - you could just cancel all your direct debits and set calendar reminders to pay them manually. But I wouldn’t recommend that.

1 Like

Wasn’t there talk of banning discounts for paying by direct debit as it was unfair to people on limited incomes who could only get basic bank accounts which often don’t have DD functionality? I think it was around the same time the card surcharges being banned was first brought up.

There are accounts that don’t allow direct debits? :open_mouth:

I believe some of the more basic accounts dont have this functionality, junior accounts etc…

Well, here’s a thought.

Committed spending pots are already something being discussed, but if each customer had a ‘discreet committed spending pot,’ i.e. one that exists but that can’t be seen in-app, couldn’t the customer then ‘pay’ the direct debit on the Friday, have the money go into the discreet pot and appear as though it has left their account (when in reality, it’s just sat and waiting for the direct debit to complete) over the weekend, then have the company take the direct debit from the customers discreet pot on the Monday.

For all intents and purposes, the customer paid their direct debit on the Friday, and the company gets their money on the Monday.

I think this could be a good half-way point, and it would likely not require much extra effort on Monzo’s side - assuming they’re already considering committed spending pots, I haven’t seen that thread.

Having said that, if you see an issue - change my mind! :+1:

It would likely be a lot of effort as it is a different approach than what they are going for. All the direct debits and standing orders will be paid from the main account, just using money moved in from pot (if available)

Early pay day is a great success. It does however mean the gap between payday and bills is a little longer.

I’d like to be able to tap and upcoming direct debit at the top of the feed to release the funds early.

The benefit is that I can get paid and pay out my bills all on the same day and know exactly where I am rather than having to wait for the time between 27th and 1st (in my case).

I’m aware there are manual workarounds to this and the new ability to pay DDs from pots is good but this additional feature I request would be a great additional option.

I’d be happy for Monzo to make money on holding the funds at the BoE overnight. I.e. taking it early out of my account into a Monzo suspense that I don’t see that then auto pays the bill on the correct date.

I really don’t like having money available that I don’t actually have available. It’s the same thing locked pots aim to solve and they are good but they are easy to unlock.I’d rather the money all go out en-masse asap after payday

Monzo recently launched Bill pots - it allows you to create a pot, schedule money to be deposited into it (or use the salary sorter) and then you can adding direct debits to be taken from that pot.

This effectively gives you what you’re looking for, with some extra protections:

  • if the direct debit is more than you’ve allocated (maybe it changed), the excess is requested from your main account. Remember that the direct debit process is a 5 day process, so monzo don’t know about the amount until that cycle starts.

  • if the direct debit is less than you’ve allocated, the remainder of your money remains at your disposal.

If monzo were to take this early and ring fence it, there would be additional transactions later to either return excess funds, or collect additional funds.

1 Like