Monzo Labs: Shared Tabs 📑

[barrymckelvey]

Hi

I’ve tried setting this up but having an issue

I’ve switched on the feature in Monzo Labs. In the Home tab I select Shared Tabs Enabled in Labs, then select Take Me To Shared Tabs and Create a Shared Tab. Then Create a Shard Tab again. Select a Contact but the next process is greyed out at the bottom of the page, therefore I can’t set it up

Anyone else getting the same issue? How do I fix it?

I’m using the latest version of the Monzo App, 2.23.0.

Thanks in Advance

Barry

[tjvr (Tim)]

Thanks to everyone who’s shared their experiences so far! We’ve found it super-helpful to read through your comments.

As we get closer to releasing Tabs, here are some of the ideas my team are thinking about doing next:

Keeping a tab running after settling
We’ve seen a lot of reasons to change the current settlement behaviour:

• It’s not clear what clicking “Settle” will do; many people find it surprising that it sends payment requests.
• It’s weird that you can Decline payment requests.
• You have to wait until the end to receive any money (as @priceaj pointed out!)
• We want to support long-running tabs (e.g. flat shares), which are settled up regularly rather than at the end

We’d like to redesign Shared Tabs so that anyone who owes can pay at any time; if you’re owed, then you can send a reminder to nudge other people; and you can only close a tab once everyone has paid.

Splitting the bill unevenly
Several of you have requested the option to adjust how payments are split. While we think it’s easiest if all payments should be split equally by default, it would be useful if you can edit the amount each person will pay—just like Bill Splitting.

Make it obvious you can delete payments from a tab

Add a payment to an existing tab straight from the transaction details screen

Hopefully it’s interesting to hear what we’re thinking about – but I should re-iterate that we’ve put Shared Tabs into Labs as early access, so we may decide to release Shared Tabs to everyone before we do any of the above!

[awjdean]

@barrymckelvey

Select a Contact but the next process is greyed out at the bottom of the page, therefore I can’t set it up

Have you give your tab a name yet?

It’s not very clear that you have to name the tab. I think the option to name should be on a separate screen after selecting the tab participants.

[nathanthomson8 (Nathan)]

Thanks Tim.

Glad youve taken the feedback onboard and look forward to seeing these improvements in Shared Tabs

@tjvr

so we may decide to release Shared Tabs to everyone before we do any of the above!

Out of all your points i think the one that I would stress be included before moving out of labs is:

@tjvr

Splitting the bill unevenly

I think this most needed one and without it will render tabs pretty useless in alot of potential use cases

[barrymckelvey]

Hi

Thanks I hadn’t named the Tab, I completely missed that option at the top of the screen.

How do I delete a Shared Tab after it’s created?

Thanks in Advance

Barry

[FlyingDutchman (Sam)]

Does this mean that settling closes the tab? I’ve not used one yet but it seemed a bit ambiguous.

[tjvr (Tim)]

The terminology is very confusing currently

Trying to avoid jargon: currently, anyone can declare “we’re done here”, which sends out payment requests, and you’re no longer allowed to add transactions to the tab. Once everyone has paid, the tab moves into “Archived tabs”.

If we do long-running tabs, we imagine that once everyone has paid, you can only declare “we’re done here” once everyone has paid; when you do, and it immediately moves to Archived tabs.

[FlyingDutchman (Sam)]

@tjvr

Trying to avoid jargon: currently, anyone can declare “we’re done here”, which sends out payment requests, and you’re no longer allowed to add transactions to the tab. Once everyone has paid, the tab moves into “Archived tabs”.

So there’s currently no way of keeping a tab open after sending out payment requests? For example on a group holiday, settling up at the end of each day, but keeping the tab open for the remainder of the holiday? I guess in that scenario you could always create a new tab each day.

[priceaj (Aaron Price)]

And this is why Monzo are awesome!

[tjvr (Tim)]

That’s right: as it is now, after requesting payments, you have to start a new tab.

[Gigione]

Hi,
this is a great feature and i could finally to get rid of the spreadsheet we are using to reconcile our household expenses.

I quickly tried adding an expense then my girlfriend pressed settle and this is the result:

The payment hasn’t gone trough, so just checking if it’s a bug or is she has to do something else after settling the tab.
Our expectation would be that the payment happens just after settling the tab (may be with a would you like to pay now or later confirmation)

Aso I wonder if a bit of guidance on what happens next under the settle button would be of any help.

Creating a tab on ios was slightly confusing (i did manage eventually).
I found that naming the tab and search were visually too close and I thought i was searching rather than naming so at first I dismissed looking for my contacts underneath.

After entering the tab name I would expect the keyboard to go away after pressing return. I felt i missed the feeback that the naming was done and i could then choose the contacts. Is it worth considering splitting the naming and contact picking in 2 steps?

For next releases, it would be great if we could have a scheduled settling process when creating a tab: when it reaches a certain date (eg, end of the month) or amount (to make sure you don’t get too much out of pocket).

Something like:
1 choose name
2 when you’d like the tab to be settled/closed
(When reaching a date or a x amount)
3 pick contacts.

Thanks for the good work and for giving us the chance to give feedback.
Cris

[awjdean]

@Gigione

Is it worth considering splitting the naming and contact picking in 2 steps?

Yes please!

[Paulw (Paul)]

The notification my partner received about the tab was a different name to what I called it. His notification said “join Pizza Party” if that helps decipher why I might have done this

[tjvr (Tim)]

@Gigione

The payment hasn’t gone trough, so just checking if it’s a bug or is she has to do something else after settling the tab.

Currently, when you settle the tab, we send a number of Payment Requests to everyone who owes money. These appear on the Home tab, just like Bill Splitting. You then tap “Accept” for the money to move.

We’re aware this is confusing, so we’re reworking things so that money moves immediately, instead of sending payment requests

I found that naming the tab and search were visually too close

This is also good feedback, and something we’re aware of—thanks!

[tjvr (Tim)]

We’ve just made some changes behind the scenes, so that we can bring you long-running tabs and uneven splits in the near future. Let me know if you see anything broken!

In particular, you might find that the “owes/receives” amounts change by a few pence. Everything will still add up, and we’ve made sure that everything’s still fair

[FlyingDutchman (Sam)]

@tjvr

We’re aware this is confusing, so we’re reworking things so that money moves immediately, instead of sending payment requests

This could be an issue for people who keep a lot of money in pots… I think still approving the payment is the right way to go.

[Kumnaa]

I’ve not tried using this yet but was wondering if there’s a distinction between starting a shared tab from the joint account vs solo amount? I know bill splitting struggles with the joint account and assume this is the same?

[tjvr (Tim)]

To be clear, you’ll still have to manually approve the payment! There just won’t be the extra step of sending payment requests.

[tjvr (Tim)]

Bill Splitting and Joint Accounts

You can split the bill from a joint account. This will send out payment requests from your joint account: so when a Monzo user pays you back, it will go into the joint account.

If you share a monzo.me link with someone not on Monzo, it will always go to your personal account.

Payment requests are always sent to your personal account, so if you pay someone back from a bill split, it will always come from your personal account, not your joint account. (I’d like to change this…)

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Shared Tabs and Joint Accounts

Shared Tabs are a group between a set of users, not a set of accounts, so you can’t start a tab “from your joint account”: you start a tab with you and some friends.

Currently, you can’t add joint account transactions to a tab: you can only add personal account transactions. (I’d like to change this too!)

I use my joint account for everything, so I made sure that Bill Splitting worked for joint accounts too. Haven’t quite convinced my team to prioritise this for Shared Tabs yet… we’ve got some more important things to do first!

[Kumnaa]

Bill splitting is “broken” for us and joint accounts only when I go to do the weekly shop and buy some booze for myself and the misses along with the essentials. Our alcohol we pay for from our own accounts. This means I need to split the £80 Morrisons shop by requesting £15 from the misses (which I can do no problem) but I also need to request £15 from myself (which I can’t do).

I’ve tried getting her to split the joint transaction with me from her side after we’ve sorted the split from my side but it won’t let us by then