Monese Discussion & Feedback

as does pretty much any Mastercard

1 Like

Except the fees :((((

£4.95 a month! Seriously?

Great customer service and in multiple languages, ability to create and send payments abroad specifying either sending currency or recipient currency in app and automatically seeing exchange rate and other currency amount (something Monzo, Starling and Fidor don’t do), IBAN and receipt of funds from abroad (something Monzo don’t do), app in multiple languages, ability to deposit cash by both PayPoint AND Post Offices, monthly allocation of free ATM withdrawals (and charges in excess of that less than Monzo’s likely 3%), create statements for variable periods, bonus paid when refer friends, it really is worth every penny

3 Likes

I’ll stick with TransferWise and Monzo

2 Likes

For many, I think the benefit of Monese is being able to open a UK bank account without having a UK address. One of my friends recently arrived in the UK from overseas, and found it very difficult to open an account with any of the main banks due to not having had an address in the UK for six months. Starling made it equally difficult.

Monese, on the other hand, does not place such obstacles in the way of their customers.

I imagine this advantage works equally well for UK nationals moving to other parts of Europe.

4 Likes

I dabbled with Monese, l quite liked it - even the cute blob characters within the app. The thing l didn’t like was erratic Faster Payment timings, some would take a few minutes, some longer in quite an irregular pattern. The site says they process Faster Payments every thirty minutes. They told me that they are planning faster faster payments.

The key benefit l could see (which isn’t so applicable to me) was the GBP + EUR account.

In terms of cost l found it acceptable, l struggle to see a long term model on totally free banking funded by (in the case of marketplaces) commission and introduction fees. I think a benefit for fintech banks and companies is given (hopefully) their low cost base they can make fees £5 etc rather than the £18 a month NatWest previously got from me.

1 Like

Since they changed their systems recently their Faster Payments have sped up a lot.

This is something I’ve been wondering about - I’m relatively new to the UK, so please forgive me if I’m missing something. I’ve had a NatWest account for 4 years and a Tesco Bank account for 2 years - in that time I’ve never been charged a single penny in fees. Most of the bank accounts I’ve looked at don’t charge any monthly fees either (unless you want extras like insurance or cashback - I could get a NatWest rewards account with cashback for £2/month). Yet I see a lot of banks, particularly newer ones/fintechs, advertising that “unlike all the other banks, we don’t charge a fee”. Or alternately, “We just charge a small monthly fee of £x, unlike those other banks that slug you with massive fees.” Where are all these bank accounts charging huge fees and why do people use them?

This was an experience ending last month… It wasn’t slow, all arrived within three hours, l am use to Faster Payments being near instant. I acknowledge they say they are updating their services further. Just that aspect irritated me.

Instant FPS is normally only when sending bank and recipient bank are both Direct Participants, if one of the parties is not or if the FPS is sent thru an intermediary bank payments can take up to the end of the following banking day, and not all banks include weekends as a banking day. So FPS between Starling and Metro may take minutes but between say Fidor UK and Handelsbanken UK a payment at 5:30 pm Friday may arrive Monday morning!

Yep l appreciate the issue that they are not directly with faster payments. For example l sent two FP to my account, both sent within a minute of each other but landed two hours apart. Like l say it irritated me, but if you are a little more patient accept your money will be there within three hours (as they do say) they are a perfectly good offer.

1 Like

UK Banks say they don’t make money from current accounts, so they have to penalise people via charges for returned items such as Direct Debit to subsidize the free offer. Does a returned DD cost £20 to a Bank, l suspect not l suspect it’s not even 1p.

The other way they encourage people to pay for banking is via ‘added value’ accounts. For my £18 l got free travel insurance (no good for me so never used), phone insurance (that was actually quite good) some other benefits and most importantly was the free £250 overdraft. Again these packaged accounts are claimed to subsidize the overall offer.

Do l think new players such as Starling, Monzo can be sustainable with a totally free offer; no. We can look at the recent debate around international transaction costs for that. Do l think that Monzo could make a sustainable offer based on marketplace introduction and commissions; possibly. The benefit they have is lower costs, not a big expensive branch network to pay for and some decent cheaper to run IT hopefully.

If Monzo et al came knocking for a small fee a month, would l pay it - yes l would. I would rather a small fee (<£5) a month and no subsequent fees than having fees creep in.

1 Like

It always amused me when a traditional high street bank charge £20, 25 or 30 for a SEPA payment but a challenger bank like Handelsbanken charge 20p to cover their costs

1 Like

As far as I can see no FSCS Protection on Monese. Sounds fishy to me with no checks on address. I’d be worried about them going under. Monzo is transparent therefore there’s trust, and with FSCS on the Current Accounts, Secured.

Monese is like Monzo was with the prepaid card, not covered by FCSC (or an EU equivalent) but money ringfenced. So it is just as safe or not as having your money with Monzo’s prepaid card.

Monese do still check applicant ID and residence. Where they are able to prove their UK residence that proof is seen but if they a new resident just gone to the country say for a new job or following marriage they will check existing residency elsewhere and if applicant has documents regarding relocation such as a job contract or marriage certificate they may look at that depending on their nationality (as that effects right to work). The great thing is they do AML and KYC checks in house so you don’t get automatically rejected if you don’t have the usual documents. If you don’t have a passport but have a NATO ID or Police warrant card or perhaps have an ISA or pensions annual statement instead of a bank statement they may consider that, or accept government issued ID documents given to refugees. They would rather ask for more documents and get dozens until they are satisfied than say The Computer Says No. Obviously they still turn people down, but they are more flexible than traditional banks or fintechs that have hived off their ID checks to a third party.

2 Likes

Monese is an electronic money institution as many who operate in this space are. Monese bank with Barclays so the risk is on Barclays going bust rather than Monese. Does that make Monese a risker proposition, maybe a tiny bit.

Monese do identity checks (take a picture of ID, take a picture of yourself; same process as Monzo and Starling) which does pass through some validation process, only after that are limits lifted on the account. I suspect those checks satisfy money laundering regulations.

1 Like

There is no suspect about it. Their checks do comply with AML regulations and indeed it is not just banks but emoney, credit unions, insurance companies etc that all have to comply with AML and KYC rules.

I used to be a Money Laundering Officer at a financial services firm reporting to the then National Criminal Inteligence Service, so have an interest in these matters. I have been in the Monese offices in London and Tallinn and on one of my trips to their Tallinn office (where their customer services is based) I spent some time in their department watching checks in progress and asking them questions on their policies and proceedures, and personally feel they are as robust in this regard as the likes of Monzo or Starling.

5 Likes

True, I’m on the test Current Account so forgot about the prepaid haha, I guess it would be compared to that best, However I still stand with, Monzo has been transparent so far, therefore I feel willing to trust them and when I read as a headline on a website “no address checks”, I’m not inclined to trust.

Quote “Simply install our mobile app, and use it to open a personal UK Current Account instantly. There are no credit checks, and you don’t need local proof-of-address”

  • edited comment out, I’ll admit when I was wrong.
2 Likes

@SheaLavington you take things so personally. Try not to. @anon44204028 appears to have experience and be knowledgable in this area. This community is an opportunity for us to all learn from and help each other.

2 Likes