I don’t remember that. Bruno did say that the plan was to look at budgeting next (which would include Summary) but I don’t remember any mock ups. Maybe you were thinking of something like this which definitely isn’t from Monzo?
(If I’m wrong do point it out! V keen to see mocks if they’ve been doing the rounds).
I feel google sheets templates are likely to be a step in the wrong direction.
For me, Summary should be the home of the budgeting/insight tools. Rather than involving google sheets, the dashboard should be a core part of the app.
Google sheets, then, can still exist for people that want to do something different (I guess business users might be a good target audience). I’m not opposed to Monzo offering templates, but let’s not fall into the trap of shifting core app functionality into clunky google integrations.
I would really like these polls to allow us to choose more than one reason for why we didn’t decide to join Plus.
I’m a bit torn on that. In principle, I agree with you. But in practice, I can’t see Monzo overhauling budgeting any time soon - and the flexibility of Google Sheets let’s folk get on with it, and customise it, in the meantime.
Ideally, I’d still like to see a Monzo Marketplace: where folk can code extensions for either the Monzo app (or in a Monzo controlled companion app), or to buy stuff like community created Google templates.
It’ll never happen, but I reckon it’d be a landmark shift, to the same extent as the various app stores.
What are your different reasons? Is it a combination of them all, or are each red lines on their own?
It’s interesting to read how experienced users have regarded the various budgeting features over time.
With a number speaking of lapsing the use of categories and spreadsheets (and IFTT), I do wonder just how valuable such features are as budgetary aids and how much it’s the tail wagging the dog.
Whilst a number of posters genuinely appear to benefit from them, there’s a sense of the playing with the data is increasingly just that - a fun thing with little practical output, bar the satisfaction of being in control of the numbers (and extrapolating the last drop out of them).
Just a thought…
I feel like it was a few images of the feed where at the top you had options to view the whole feed, or certain categories or merchants?
If that rings a bell?
Will try have a look…
(Edited for spelling/grammar)
The only Plus feature that has any real value to me is other accounts in Monzo, but it’s not worth £5 alone when it’s free in so many other apps — even Lloyds and Halifax does it.
Now, if my budget included spend from all connected accounts and I could see transactions from all connected accounts in one feed, I’d be on board in a heartbeat.
It rings a bell! I think that was about searching and filtering on the new feed, though. Was it @JordanFish who posted it?
Yes. This!!
That’d be lovely. Can’t see them building it unless it’s a Plus thing (surely not?) or a business banking thing (possibly, but not a priority) though. 
Yeah April 19 was a long time ago now 
Yes this would be killer. Really hoping for it soon.
I get your point - Ideally the App should be the home of Good Analysis™ - and would be the first and foremost place to serve your basic data insights needs.
But I think that can still leave a place for a more Dashboard-y overview - just simply owed to the space available in app vs on a PC screen. Maybe the Monzo Web interface is the true need then; the ability to do all of this natively in their own application online.
Things I really like Dashboards for, are views of data for all Months together - charts showing trends over the year for my full budget view - for as long as everything is In App - it’s going to be hard to overlay all the things together in a “Complete” way on a phone screen.
And like others say, the more niche bits of data management that is probably hyper specific to the user.
But I think that reaffirms the point though in ‘why’ does Google Sheets exist? It’s just “hey here’s some data! good luck!”.
I do think there is genuine value in the Budgetary aids. Wether that’s Categories, Dashboards, or otherwise - it’s all a Tool that allows me to see my full financial health picture - and that’s really important to me - it allows me to make high quality decisions about my finances, if (and Big If), it is done comprehensively.
My own personal lapsing of use - I think is because I feel the product does not allow me to comprehensively do The Thing I need it to do.
And then you get into a Catch 22 cycle of “Not many users are using X Feature so we won’t develop it further” and “We’re not developing X Feature, and so user uptake isn’t increasing”.
And I will admit I certainly played with the Dashboard idea more than I needed (I probably tested about 15 different IFTTT things with it that I wouldn’t use, just to see if it would work…) I think the challenge is in making that Dashboard as comprehensive as I would like, for it to add value… Is just a huge energy slog. (While shitposting IFTTT integration for likes is not…)
Either way I’m still keen to see what comes next for Plus, but I do hope budgeting features get some proper love.
Good points, well made, I think.
For me, there’s a difference between budgeting tools, and spending insights/analysis.
I’m (fortunately) in a position in which I don’t need to budget strictly, and I have little interest in plowing time into detailed budgeting tools.
I am, however, not so well off that money doesn’t matter, and being able to look back over the months or years and see how I’ve been spending my money would be interesting (I know, for example, that Costa Coffee get a lot of my money but I don’t know how much). These kind of insights, whilst no strictly budgeting, might nudge me into better habits (eg make coffee at home, bring packed lunch to work) so can be helpful.
There’s another reason to offer proper spending analysis: it ought to help retain customers. It’s much the same reason that Spotify et al offer “summer rewind” playlists and the like. This historical data is useful/interesting, and moving away from monzo/Spotify means you lose it.
Sorry, I meant to include this.
I don’t use the Monzo budgeting and category features at all now, so I don’t know what could appear with Plus to persuade me to go back to that level of examination of my finances again.
All my spend goes on Amex, where available, and the requisite amount placed in a bills pot for the DD. As such, none of my Amex spend is categorised. A future Plus may address that.
Where Amex is not accepted, I use a credit Mastercard, or my Monzo debit Mastercard if I feel it more appropriate (i.e. round-ups).
I cannot be the only one working their budget this way. What features would others, that do similar, like to see that would change the card use habit?
Perhaps in normal times the budgeting features made a lot more sense. Now everything largely fits into “groceries” and “bills”, at least for me.
A way around this could be for monzo to see the spend on your connected account and then pay that amount automatically.
Therefore you could mark the transfer transaction as the intended category so that you could have your monzo budget but continue to use amex for daily spend?
An even better way would just be to have a consolidated feed and budget or all transactions on all cards