Monzo Community Forum Privacy Notice [updated 15/04/25]
Table of contents
- Who are we?
- Getting in touch
- Your rights
- Where we store or send your data
- How to make a complaint
- Changes to this notice
- Monzo Community Forum
- The information we hold about you, and how we use it
- Our reasons for using your information
- Who we share your data with
- How long we keep your information
Who are we?
We’re Monzo Bank Limited (‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) and operate under the name Monzo.
We’re registered with the UK data protection authority (the Information Commissioner’s Office or ICO) under number ZA108184.
We use Discourse to run this Forum and you’ll find their privacy notice here, this includes information about what cookies are and how Discourse uses them.
Getting in touch
For any questions, please contact us however you prefer:
- email communitysupport@monzo.com or
- write to us at Monzo, Broadwalk House, 5 Appold Street, London, EC2A 2DA, UK.
Your rights 
You have a right to:
- access the personal data we hold about you, or to get a copy of it;
- ask for a copy of your personal data in a portable (machine-readable) format or make us send it to someone else;
- make us correct inaccurate data;
- ask us to delete your data, though for legal reasons we might not always be able to do it;
- say no to us using your data for direct marketing and in certain circumstances ‘legitimate interests’, research and statistical reasons;
- withdraw any consent you’ve given us; and
- ask a member of staff to review an automated decision.
To do any of these things, please get in touch using the details above.
Where we store or send your data
We may store the data we collect from you outside the UK, or transfer it to organisations outside the UK. When we do this, we make sure that your data is protected and that:
- The UK Government has deemed the country or organisation to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data; or
- we’ve agreed specific contracts approved for use in the UK which give personal data the same protection it has in the UK.
How to make a complaint
If you have a complaint about how we use your personal information, please contact us through the app or send an email to help@monzo.com and we’ll do our best to fix the problem. You can also reach our Data Protection Officer (DPO) at dpo@monzo.com.
If you’re still not happy, you can refer your complaint to the ICO’s Office, the UK regulator for data protection issues. For more details, visit their website.
Changes to this notice
We’ll update the privacy notice on this page and if they’re significant changes, we will notify you through messaging you through your community account.
The information we hold about you, and how we use it
When you sign up to the forum
- Your name
- Your alias
- Your email address
- Your date of birth
- Your operating system
- Profile photos that you upload
- Where you use your Monzo account
When you use the forum
- Your posts, and anything you choose to post
- Anything about you that you choose to include in your profile
- Your IP address
- When you were active
- Your interactions with posts
Information as a Monzo customer
We may compare your information to our Monzo customer database if we need to to understand who is using the forum, to help look at complaints or issues that you may raise.
Special Category Data
We may process sensitive information about you that data protection laws call special categories of personal data (‘special category data’) if you post these types of information in the forum. This information can reveal a person’s:
- Racial or ethnic origin
- Political opinions
- Religious or philosophical beliefs
- Trade union membership
- Genetic or biometric data (if used for identification purposes)
- Information concerns a person’s health, sex life, or sexual orientation
Our reasons for using your information
Data protection laws say we need to have a lawful basis for using your personal data. At least one of the following must apply:
- Contractual duty
- Legal obligation
- Legitimate interest
- Public interest
- Vital interest
- Consent
In this section we explain which one we rely on to use your data in a certain way.
We need to use your data for a contract with have with you, or to enter into a contract with you
This includes:
- Creating your community profile
- To post your content on the forum, including any special category data that you may include
- Send you notifications
Legal Obligation
We need to use your data to comply with our legal obligations, specifically to:
- Prevent illegal activities
- Monitor your posts for any harmful content
Legitimate Interest
We need to use your data for our legitimate interest, or those of a third party. This means using data in a way that you might expect us to, for a reason which is in your and/or our (or a third party’s interest and which doesn’t involve overriding your privacy rights.
We may use legitimate interest for:
- Improving our products and services
- Improving the forum
- Fixing bugs
- Enter you into, and run, prize draws
- To assess your eligibility to the forum, such as to ensure you are over 18
- Make sure everyone is following our Community Code of Conduct
- To understand the sentiment of members of the community
Vital Interest
We may share information about you externally (generally with law enforcement in an emergency), if it’s necessary to protect your or another person’s life and you cannot consent.
Consent
We’ll ask for your consent to:
- Communicate with you about the forum
- Contact you about follow up research
Special category data
Data protection laws say using special category data is not allowed unless a specific scenario applies including where: you have given your explicit consent, we are protecting someone’s vital interests, we are establishing, defending or exercising a legal claim, where you have made the data public or for reasons of substantial public interest grounded in law.
As our forum (and everyone’s posts) are publicly accessible without the need to make an account, we are permitted to process any special category you post for the purpose of enabling you to use the forum. We may also process any special category data you post for reasons of substantial public interest to prevent illegal activities.
Who we share your data with
Here we mean companies that help us provide services you use, and need to process details about you for this reason. We share as little information as we can. These include:
- Discourse, our forum provider
- Other Monzo companies
- Companies that help us with customer service
- Law enforcement and other external parties
- Regulators, when we are asked to
Posts can also be seen by other Forum users, and are also accessible to people without a Forum account.
How long we keep your information
We’ll keep your profile information for 4 years after you stop using the forum, in case we need to respond to a legal claim. In some cases, we may keep data longer if we need to (that’s in our legitimate interest) and/or the law says we have to.
To work out how long we keep different categories of data, we consider why we hold it, how sensitive it is, how long the law says we need to keep it for, and what the risks are.By using the Monzo Community forum you agree to our privacy policy below, we use Discourse to run this forum and you’ll find their privacy policy here.
We might update this Privacy Policy occasionally, but it’ll always be available on the forum.
Summary
Monzo Community Forum Privacy Notice [updated 28/07/22]
Table of contents
-
Who are we?
-
Getting in touch
-
Your rights
-
Where we store or send your data
-
How to make a complaint
-
Changes to this notice
-
Monzo Community Forum
-
The information we hold about you, and how we use it
-
Our reasons for using your information
-
Who we share your data with
-
How long we keep your information
Who are we?
We’re Monzo Bank Limited (‘we’, ‘our’, ‘us’) and operate under the name Monzo.
We’re registered with the UK data protection authority (the Information Commissioner’s Office or ICO) under number ZA108184.
By using the Monzo Community Forum (the ‘Forum’) you agree to our privacy policy. We use Discourse to run this Forum and you’ll find their privacy policy here.
For information about what cookies are and how we use them, please read our Cookie Notice.
Getting in touch
For any questions, please contact us however you prefer:
- chat with us through the app;
- email help@monzo.com or
- write to us at Monzo, Broadwalk House, 5 Appold Street, London, EC2A 2DA, UK.
Your rights 
You have a right to:
- access the personal data we hold about you, or to get a copy of it;
- ask for a copy of your personal data in a portable (machine-readable) format or make us send it to someone else;
- make us correct inaccurate data;
- ask us to delete your data, though for legal reasons we might not always be able to do it;
- say no to us using your data for direct marketing and in certain circumstances ‘legitimate interests’, research and statistical reasons;
- withdraw any consent you’ve given us; and
- ask a member of staff to review an automated decision.
To do any of these things, please get in touch using the details above.
Where we store or send your data 
We may store the data we collect from you outside the UK, or transfer it to organisations outside the UK. When we do this, we make sure that your data is protected and that:
- the Information Commissioner (ICO) has deemed the country or organisation to provide an adequate level of protection for personal data; or
- we’ve agreed specific contracts approved for use in the UK which give personal data the same protection it has in the UK.
If you’d like more information on how we transfer your personal data out of the UK, please get in touch by Monzo chat or email help@monzo.com.
How to make a complaint
If you have a complaint about how we use your personal information, please contact us through the app or send an email to help@monzo.com and we’ll do our best to fix the problem. You can also reach our DPO at dpo@monzo.com.
If you’re still not happy, you can refer your complaint to the ICO’s Office, the UK regulator for data protection issues. For more details, visit their website.
Changes to this notice
We might update this Privacy Policy occasionally, but it’ll always be available on the Forum. If the changes are significant, we’ll let you know by email.
Monzo Community Forum
The information we hold about you, and how we use it
Information submitted through the Forum
For example, when you sign up to the Forum and give us details like your name and email. We also collect some information about your use of the Forum, like your IP address.
We have access to any information that you choose to post publicly on the Forum. Our admins do have access to direct messages you may send to other users, but will rarely access these. An example of when they might need to is if someone reports that they’ve received messages that break our Code of Conduct.
To provide our services, we use this information to:
- help us manage your account;
- track, analyse and improve the Forum; and
- make sure everyone is following our Community Code of Conduct.
Our reasons for using your information
With your permission, we use this information to communicate with you about the Forum by email. You can always unsubscribe from receiving these if you want to, by email or in your account settings.
Who we share your data with
We share your data with our Forum provider, Discourse.
We’ll also share it to:
- comply with the law;
- enforce the Community Code of Conduct relating to the use of the Forum; or
- protect the rights, property or safety of us, our customers or others.
Public posts on the Forum are public information, visible to visitors without a Forum account.
How long we keep your information
We keep your data as long as you’re using the Forum, and after that we anonymise inactive accounts. We remove all personal data at least every 4 years.
If you’d like your data anonymised before this, please contact us.
Privacy Policy 2018 - July 2022
By using the Monzo Community forum you agree to our privacy policy below, we use Discourse to run this forum and you’ll find their privacy policy here .
We might update this Privacy Policy occasionally, but it’ll always be available on the forum.
The information we hold about you
Information submitted through the forum
For example, when you sign up to the forum and give us details like your name and email. We also collect some information about your use of the forum like your IP address.
We’ll also have access to any information that you choose to post publicly on the forum. Our admins do have access to direct messages you may send to other users, but will rarely access these. For example, if someone reports that they’ve received messages that break out Code of Conduct.
Cookie information
Read our Cookie Policy for more info on what cookies are and how we use them.
How we use your information 
To provide our services. We use it to:
- help us manage your account
- track, analyse and improve the forum
- make sure everyone is following our Community Code of Conduct
With your permission. We use it to:
- communicate with you about the forum by email. You can always unsubscribe from receiving these if you want to, by email or in your account settings.
Who we share it with
- Monzo staff when they need it to do their job.
- Our forum provider Discourse.
We’ll also share it to comply with the law; to enforce our Terms and Conditions or other agreements; or to protect the rights, property or safety of us, our customers or others.
Public posts on the forum are public information, visible to visitors without a forum account.
How long we keep it
We keep your data as long as you’re using the Monzo Community, and after that we anonymise inactive accounts to remove all personal data at least every 4 years.
If you’d like your data anonymised before this, please contact us.
Your rights
You have a right to:
- access the personal data we hold about you, or to get a copy of it
- make us correct inaccurate data
- ask us to delete, ‘block’ or suppress your data, though for legal reasons we might not always be able to do it
- object to us using your data for direct marketing and in certain circumstances ‘legitimate interests’, research and statistical reasons
- withdraw any consent you’ve previously given us.
To do so, please contact us through the Monzo app or by emailing help@monzo.com.
Where we store your data
We might transfer and store the data we collect from you somewhere outside the European Economic Area (‘EEA’). People who work for us or our suppliers outside the EEA might also process your data. We may share data with organisations and countries that:
- the European Commission say have adequate data protection
- we’ve agreed standard data protection clauses with.