All that does is increase the inbound for support. Incredibly unlikely to happen.
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This is a great point. While developing this feature, we worked with the Financial Capability Lab, a collaboration between the Money and Pensions Service and the Behavioural Insights Team. The suggestion is that the ability to write a reminder to yourself, that we play back when you go to remove a block, can be a powerful source of friction.
Weāll be looking at the data soon to check how effective it is 
I also hope that weāll get time to extend this feature in future. That might mean, for example, more spending controls, not just blocks. Think ādonāt let me order takeaway more than twice a monthā or similar(!). Or in the case of friction, I think a short cooldown ā maybe 10 minutes, just enough time for the urge to pass ā could also be a very effective mechanism to help in moments of impulsivity, without overwhelming our customer support teams 
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Also, as others have pointed out, please remember that this block isnāt meant to be used to stop a company taking a payment youāve contractually agreed to 
(We already have some safeguards to stop folk doing this, but itās tricky to catch every case!)
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If you block eating out, how does this work if you forget and eat in a restaurant and then are unable to pay ?
It feels like itās a good idea for things where you pay before you receive, but blocking when you pay after you receive could get tricky.
An answer is to allow the block to be removed easily, but then that has its own issues
IMHO, the reminder is totally useless. Again, I appreciate the feature can be used in many different ways, for many different purposes. But if you are trying to control impulsive behaviours, 10 min cooling off simply wonāt do.
And obviously, itās not for trying to evade contractual obligations, even though I can see the slippery slope.
Point is, gambling block is great, but there is more than gambling that people might struggle with and trying to control.
Yep. This is exactly the sort of balance we need to make sure we strike 
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Different people are going to find different frictions helpful. This is also why we signpost to the extra support we can offer, as part of the block creation flow.
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I love it! Perfect for those pesky subscriptions you couldnāt usually stop because they have your card number and banks usually say they canāt stop those kinds of payments when requested (even though we know they can stop them).
On a separate note I love how Monzo refund me after a charge for a set amount but not used the min fee because my charge didnāt go over the min fee. Love how quick and responsive Monzo is. You donāt get this with other banks!
āNobody bit the last time I said this so Iāll try againā
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This is a second presentment of the actual amount charged, so refunded on the basis of the merchant saying no we donāt need Ā£15 we need Ā£11.62, so merchant forced the money back.
Works similarly with pay at pump, revolut is fairly quick with this too (possibly a Mastercard thing having seen a few comments about this vs visa delays).
An actual refund may take a day or so to arrive.
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In an effort to cut down on takeaways, which is going quite well, I blocked transactions for āJust Eatā using this helpful feature.
Iām assuming the different parts donāt talk to each other, but I was somewhat surprised when āJust Eatā appeared as a cashback option.
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This is unfortunate. Itās something we flagged at the time, but mustāve fallen through the cracks. Let me see if this is something we can fix
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Thanks so much for taking the time to flag this @Liamk. Weāve just shipped a fix, so this shouldnāt happen again 
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I tried this, complete fail 
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As mentioned previously, it would be extremely useful to be able to specify a cooldown period for unblocking a merchant (even up to 168 hours).
At the moment itās just too easy to just unblock.
Its a good feature, but could be great to break bad habbits.
If youāre adamant you want it, would this not result in you messaging monzo in anger?
Some folks canāt handle their needs and wants very well, and will want someone to blame they canāt have what they want when they want it.
I donāt think a cooldown in this manner would be appropriate, excluding the gambling block from the situation (whole other topic and non refundable in any circumstance).
Aināt nobody like me when Iām hungry
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I can see the appeal of having a cooldown added, however I can also see the reasons against:
Having the block active in the first place and having the added friction of going to a different screen to unblock it before you can order is usually enough to put people off and make an informed decision.
As Carlo touched on, people donāt like to take blame for their own actions. If you place a block on a merchant and then you unblock them, you can only blame yourself. If they added a cooldown, and so you were forced to contact support to unblock because you were ādesperateā and couldnāt wait for the cooldown to end, then you shift that blame to Monzo for āenabliingā rather than taking responsibility for your own spending habits.
Things like gambling are different as thatās an addiction with a big Risk-V-Reward aspect and can land people in masses of debt.
I like the feature Iāve been over spending on a competition site which donāt have to use gambling controls as they donāt class themselves as a gambling site you canāt use the block gambling feature, where this spending block fails though it can just be turned off maybe allowing us to set a time limit or a 48 hour delay from turning it off to being able to spend again would give us more time to reconsider spending