RBS to Monzo - UI/UX Suggestions

UK Feedback & Ideas
1

I’m new to Monzo, having joined in June, and currently use RBS as my main bank. I’m particularly interested in Monzo, but I don’t feel it’s quite there yet for me to make the full switch. These are a few changes I think would make Monzo a stronger alternative and convince me to move over altogether.

1. Simplify the Home Screen & Navigation

Monzo in the good ol’ times was better in the sense that it done the simple job asked of it. Now, for example, there’s a ”+” button, Suggestions and “Do More” which all serve the same purpose.

This is counterintuitive on Monzo’s part - the amount of complaints I have read about this alone is significant. Combining them into a single Discover tab would give the app a far better look and get Monzo’s message across without being overwhelming and obnoxious.

I’d also strip the Home screen back to the essentials: Notifications, Debit/Credit Cards & Savings, Pots, Rewards

Debit, Credit/Flex and Savings could each have their own clearly separated card at the top of Home, with users able to simply swipe between them.

Activity & Trends: should be behind each card and only appear once the relevant card is selected. With privacy in mind, recent transactions, spending and other financial information shouldn’t immediately be visible whenever the app is opened.

I’d also simplify the navigation bar to: Home: Cards, Pots, Rewards and notifications Grow: Savings, Investments, Credit Insights, Mortgages and Insurance Payments, Help, Discover: New Monzo products, services and offer

Also, introduce shortcuts for the five people you pay most frequently without having to delve further into the app.

2. Improve Flex

The new £100 minimum for 3 months interest free has made Flex much less appealing which is clearly evident by the reaction to it. However, I’d make this suggestion to Monzo; link longer interest free periods to the paid tiers. Understandably, offering longer 0% periods costs them money. However, including these within paid tiers could offset this, give additional value and reason to upgrade.

This would make Flex much more competitive with Klarna, PayPal and traditional 0% purchase credit cards by offering 4 or 6 months interest free with Max, or potentially 9 or 12 months interest free with an Ultra/One tier.

A minor design point, but I’d also refresh the Flex card itself, both physically and within the app. The current design feels out of place. A cleaner, more minimal design would look much better and feel more premium.

3. More Customisation

I’d like to see more theme options, particularly a true black theme with transparent elements and stronger colours, rather than the current washed-out colour palette.

4. Introduce Monzo Ultra/One

I’d like to see Monzo introduce a new premium Ultra tier above Max, with a higher monthly fee but a stronger and more customisable set of benefits. I believe there is a new tier on the horizon referred to as “One” and with this in mind, it should have as a minimum:

  • 9 or 12 months interest free with Flex
  • 24/7 digital GP service
  • Game Pass or a similar service
  • Customisable perks etc

A Game Pass and a 24/7 digital GP access could draw in solidify the younger crowd that already mostly use Monzo but also draw in the older demographic who are still reluctant to make the switch to digital banks.

I’d particularly like to see a “choose your own” approach. For example, choosing a certain number of benefits from categories such as entertainment, health, travel or financial benefits. Let us build a package that provides value to us personally. If Monzo were to implement this, I believe this could be their trump card.

Ultimately, I think Monzo should bring back some of the simplicity that made the app stand out in the first place, while giving users the choice to customise it around the features they actually use.

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2

Love an AI post on here.

Monzo isn’t meant to be like all the other banks just FYI.

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Any chance of your own thoughts?

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In fairness I put the post into chat and asked it to summarise those points I mentioned; whether AI is involved in how it is formatted should be and is irrelevant to the discussion. Rather the value in the feedback I have suggested is what we should be discussing. I find your comment disappointing, and it goes without saying has added nothing of substance to the feedback I have suggested :slight_smile:

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5

Absolutely unnecessary for such a passive aggressive comment and re AI see my response above. In fact I don’t necessarily see an issue in people using AI at all in their posts in online forums as there could be an abundant of reasons for the use behind it, i.e a language barrier. I’d appreciate if next time you offer your insight into the suggestions I brought up instead of, quite frankly, wasting both our time and adding nothing to the discussion. As the saying goes “if you have nothing nice to say, don’t say anything at all”

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This isn’t an exam. Nor do you have to formulate your thoughts like it’s a job application. Monzo aren’t going to read it or respond anyway.

Ask AI to search the community for you and you can reply to all the other topics about what you’ve asked it to write for you.

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I think you need to find an AI that knows what a summary is.

That’s definitely not summarised.

Is there a summarised version, that’s … a summary?

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9

Forgive me then for thinking Monzo look at these forums for feedback lol. I’d heard otherwise that Monzo are one of the best and tend to take a lot of the feedback they receive on board which is why I’ve given it a shot and wanting to move away from RBS.

I have had a wee look around the forums, but some of the threads are ancient and aren’t that specific to the ideas I have given above. Also, I wasn’t sure on the rules when it came to posting on them. There isn’t any thread relevant to the navigation bar, and what I proposed with the activity and trends being hidden unless selected due to privacy etc I couldn’t find either through the search. Admittedly, there were some results for customisation but I’d thought it’d be better to list them altogether as it’d probably get more traction.

With Flex, it is mostly regarding the getting rid of the 0% interest for purchases under £100 I have seen most recent posts were about, but as I’ve explained above, Monzo is looking to make money, and in order to make that work for our benefit as well, this is how they could improve Flex by offering a more premium tier which albeit priced higher but offers better value for money for those that would be open to it.

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10

Touché :stuck_out_tongue: I can write one up if that’d be better lol

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11

I think a survey not long ago did detail some suggestions at tier based rewards ie cashback, google Gemini, some other stuff.

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In the very beginning they did. Now it’s just here because they haven’t got around to shutting it down yet.

Even the very best suggestions with hundreds of votes have no impact on what Monzo will actually do. They do what they want, that they think will improve customer experience and/or generate revenue.

All of your suggestions have been posted numerous times in various guises and Monzo know, they just don’t want to do them for a whole host of reasons.

P.S. This was a much better post when you wrote it yourself!

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That sounds promising, how often do these surveys come out? Such a shame to hear that they’re not as receptive to the ideas on this forum as they once were :frowning:

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14

When they were small fry they could utilise platforms like this to improve the service but then it becomes a mammoth and has to accommodate so many different customers it’s more difficult to manage 15 million vs the 30 of us on here.

Wild guess but Christmas is around the corner and that means revenue to be made so we might see something this side of the year but there’s nothing to solidify that unless @davidwalton has seen anything in the app tear downs.

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15

Not much really, including today’s app version update (v7.42.0)

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16

Having looked back at some of the older posts and seeing the development of the app, I agree. It has so much promise but if that’s the case it’s a shame.

To be frank we know it comes down to money and Monzo is a bank and it wants to make money. If they were to realise though that continuing to take on feedback its only going to strengthen them.

For instance, aye Flex probably costs them money because of its nature being 0% interest free and this is why we can see them bringing in £100+ only purchases being eligible.

If they were to link the longer interest free period to their paid tiers, this achieves their aim of making the Flex product valuable and thus profitable and at the same time adding value for us through through the paid tiers.

My $0.02

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17

Welcome. Some good ideas but can’t disagree more about not having transactions on the first screen - 99% of the time that is why I’m opening the app. Could have it as a toggle option to hide it for people who live with an abundance of caution

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I do wish Monzo had toggles for some stuff but transactions wouldn’t be it.

Maybe at some point they’ll do an app revamp.

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They’ve not long done another one.

More toggles is the last thing the app needs.

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You can see your recent transactions in your notifications bar unless you mean further back? But even then the app just now only shows the 3 most recent transactions on the Home Screen so you would need to delve further into the app to see more info anyway. I don’t think I’ve ever bothered looking back at past transactions if I’m being honest. 99% of the time is to look at the balance of what I have left to spend. It goes without saying that most banking apps now have privacy in mind as standard and have hidden card activity or at least give the user the option.

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You can change it to 5.