With all the recent changes I’ve noticed something…under Monzo I’m on the worst overdraft %age and aren’t eligible for a loan…am I doing something wrong? I read somewhere about it being to do with how far away your net salary is compared to that of what you input as a gross salary? Is that right?
I have current credit scores of:
640/710 - credit karma
999/999 - Experian
550/700 - equifax
As far as I’m aware these are all really good scores - is there something I’m doing wrong? Is there some information I need to change?
Thanks for your time
phildawson
(Sorry, I will have to escalate this.)
2
The delta between what the CRAs TransUnion (and now also Experian) have as your estimated salary and what you enter does contribute towards Monzo’s scoring system. I would have thought its got to be way way off to have a significant impact though.
As for the scores you have I have almost identical to yours on all three, and up until a couple of days ago Monzo wouldn’t give me an overdraft or loan.
Without any changes my side they are now offering a £2k overdraft at 29% and a £13,500k at 6.1%.
It should probably be 19% and £15k in reality.
Anyway you probably haven’t done anything wrong. You could try reaching out on chat to ask if they can tell you anything about the assumptions they have made. I had no luck in getting anything useful out of them, other than what the estimated salary was. I’m hoping if it was out you could supply payslips to correct the assumption.
Thanks Phil - that’s interesting - how do the CRA’s estimate your income? Maybe I just need to wait for things to settle - but it’s very off putting. I don’t even need either at the moment…it’s just nice to have a comfort blanket if anything were to go wrong.
phildawson
(Sorry, I will have to escalate this.)
4
Well all the banks have an agreement to report your incoming monthly transactions total to the CRAs so they can easily work out what your take home is, and from that your nominal salary.
Monzo will look at what you have incoming and what it predicts is outgoing to see if you can afford a loan. If it thinks you have low wiggle-room it’ll class you as a high risk in being able to be good for the payments.
Monzo will tell you if you ask and curious to know est salary, not that you can do much with the info.
As @phildawson said I recently went through the same thing and managed to get some great help from someone on the lending team who works at Monzo.
Long story short. Monzo are new to lending and they’re being super cautious about who they give loans and overdrafts to. This is because they haven’t refined their systems to work things out as accurately as they can in regards to an applicants financial status.
As a result, I wouldn’t use Monzo as benchmark on if you’re eligible for a loan or overdraft. Monzo will get there over the coming months but for the time being I wouldn’t be concerned
tl;dr it’s not as simple as this If you contact them in app they should be able to give you some more information as to why you’re not eligible.
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phildawson
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6
Not that I’m encouraging loans at all. But you can always check what you currently would be offered and what rate using Zopa without it hitting your credit report with a hard search.
And to look here too.
I must add…
Only get a loan if you are in the with no savings to help out.
Thanks both - so I actually have my car through zopa at 2.8% and like I say it’s more of a comfort blanket and not understanding why my CRAs tell me I have great scores but Monzo think they’re
I actually contacted Monzo chat and they said they’re still rolling loans out which is strange because i had an offer already but it’s been taken away.
Said I’d try Monzo for 2020 so we’ll see how it goes!
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phildawson
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8
I think car loan is fine, thats about the only key one that makes financial sense over higher % rates. 2.8% sounds decent.
If you have the Zopa app theres a Borrowing Power section that’ll show how desirable you are to them via Equifax data. The Eligibility will show some random guaranteed rates, but the chances of them being exactly what you need is slim but could provide a good indication. Actions show what you could do to help, but that might be nothing.
With 550/700 I would guess at 10/10.
Monzo don’t actually use Equifax though to get your report.
If you check out Credit Karma app (TransUnion) its now much better now at telling you what things it thinks can help your chances.
Having said that if you are 640/710 then you’re already Excellent in their eyes so most lenders who use TransUnion should be giving you decent limits/rates as you wouldn’t have missed payments etc. As always it’s up to the lender to make their own assumptions.
Monzo is just a bit crap at this atm, same goes for overdrafts.
Edit:
Just to also add Monzo have just partnered with Experian so them including that report and cross-referencing in the next month or so should change it if you have things listed on there thats not on TransUnion. I don’t know if they will use your estimated salary from Experian too, but I would assume they might and average it out so that could also change things.
Banks make their own decisions based on their own interpretation of the data they receive. The CRAs, in contrast, make up numbers as an excuse to try and sell us things. Any relationship between the two is tenuous at best.
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phildawson
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10
Just adding this, Monzo say they get your report once a month but it looks like their decision changes during the month.
I’ve just looked at my screen grabs of when I’ve randomly looked at it, and it swings between an offer and nothing, but appears to be increasing despite no changes to my report.
12 Dec: no overdraft, £3000 loan
16 Dec: £500 overdraft, £6000 loan
21 Dec: no overdraft, no loan
27 Dec: no overdraft, no loan
3 Jan: £1000 overdraft, £7000 loan
30 Jan: no overdraft, no loan
1 Feb: £2000 overdraft, £13500 loan
11 Feb: no overdraft, no loan
I have the noticed the text changed too, so here’s the 30 Jan followed by 11 Feb.
do you not think the offer changes due to other users taking / not taking up the offers of loans , existing loan book being cleared releasing funds to lend out again - Monzo presumably have a fluctuating loan amount to offer ?
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phildawson
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12
You might be onto something there.
Yes I would have thought they would have a set amount they want to loan out at any given point.
It does seem to be around the start of the month, but probably not enough readings to make an assumption.
So it may not be the persons risk but Monzo ability to cover the amounts.
It could be valid for loans, but seems weird for the overdraft to be following that pattern too though?
phildawson
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14
The loan though you’re given the full amount into your account with an agreement to pay it back. Monzo can’t go oh I’ll have that back.
Overdraft is there for a safety net where you’re dipping into Monzos money and they can take that away. I wouldn’t have thought me not being offered a loan at those specific points were due to other customers accepting an overdraft. Even say £100 rather £3000, but nothing that’s weird.
I’ll keep tabs on it if I remember and see if I can build up a picture.
Looking at the history I’m predicting £3000, and £15000 next. And then nothing.
so Monzo lending team never came back to me…so I’ve come to my own conclusion that its how I run my finances with my partner…for example:
We have a joint account which I pay 1/3 of my wages into each month. BUT on top we do all our monthly spend on an AMEX credit card, our joint food, other joint house exps, holidays, her petrol and shopping and my petrol and shopping. This means the credit card can come anywhere between £1-£3k per month (still gets paid in full every month but sometimes from different sources. I guess Monzo is looking at my monthly credit card and matching it to my salary and thinking ‘HOW ON EARTH IS THIS GUY LIVING!??! He definitely can’t afford a loan right now’
So I guess I’m being penalised for being a BA Amex points whore for my free flight…
I considered this too…however the wording of ‘based on incomings and outgoings’ made me discount this.
phildawson
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17
I’ve asked these questions, I’ll update when I hear back. Tap for full size.
Tldr: it’s a need to check with colleagues. And also doesn’t think that Monzos pot of money to loan out doesn’t have any affect on loans/overdrafts being offered.
After neatly structuring each question into separate comments the COp just generalised everything you said and gave you an answer to a question you didn’t ask
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phildawson
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19
Thats happened so often I’ve stopped being annoyed by it.
I know I’m not the average customer asking the average shit they have to deal with. It’s always awkward when it appears you know more about how Monzo operates than most of the staff.
I have to wonder if they actually think that doing that would ever work and I’ll go yep I’m satisfied with that very obvious copy+paste, and go bye.
I might start being amazed at how fast they managed to type that response.
I’ve had some really off topic copy+paste replies before where it literally has nothing to do with what I’ve asked. I do try to be nice to the chat staff, so its normally a courteous thanks for that.
Probably the best non c+p reply I’ve had to date is the chat person telling how I can get to the chat inside the chat.
So to chat tap on Help then scroll down and Chat with Us
So I’m in the chat now, and you’re giving me instructions on how to get to the chat…
It is infuriating isn’t it? Not talking about Monzo specifically, but customer service in general in more and more companies these days. I don’t think it is so much to try and satisfy the customer, more that it makes the customer give up, but as long as the agents internal score is concerned, they keep closing cases with good speed.
If I saw one of my employees give a response like that I would (and have done so in the past) have them come and explain themselves to me.
with no savings to help out.
