I wanted to share quite a personal experience with everybody; mainly so Monzo and its customers can see what a difference some features can make.
On Tuesday, I was rather disappointed from losing a couple of bets that I’d put on the England game, but noticed that I’d won a relatively small amount from one of them. Instead of cutting my losses and withdrawing the funds, I decided to use them on online roulette. Unsurprisingly, I lost that money.
For reasons unknown to myself, I decided to carry on, and began depositing more money in order to play more roulette. To cut a long story short, I lost just short of £700 that evening after losing every single round of roulette.
I’ve never really understood people with gambling problems; and always thought I’d have enough willpower to stop when I’d lost what I could afford.
What became clear though, was how strong the “oh go on, another £50 won’t hurt - I’ve got to win eventually!” mindset can kick in when gambling.
Afterwards, I activated Monzo’s Gambling Block (with ease, I must say) and opted to self exclude myself from my online gambling accounts for the maximum amount of time possible. I now know that even if I wanted to, I couldn’t place a bet that might lead to another incident like the above.
I’ve not posted this for sympathy or to be judged. I’ve posted it to say thank you. A couple of months ago when Monzo announced the Gambling Block feature, I recall making a point of telling people how good the feature was. I never saw myself needing such a feature but I’m so glad that it’s there to be used!
Finally, I’d just like to issue a warning. This might seem self explanatory and may sound too much like the adverts but…when the fun stops, stop. I wish I had. I never thought I’d be the kind of person to be drawn into gambling so much money. It really draws you in when you least expect it - and even though I know that statistically, you HAVE NOT got to win eventually, I was too caught up in the moment to realise.
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