So things that a bank sells to make money that will get you into debt = good
Things that a bank sells to make money that help you and make things better = bad
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Yes, because the world is black and white where debt bad shiny card good.
Why would people be allowed to make decisions about wether to borrow when Monzo could decide that they won’t lend to anyone, all you need is a shiny card?
I wasn’t arguing the usefulness of one or the other, just that I’d like to see banking features in a banking app and not just an “oooh shiny” advert which if I’m not mistaken people were shown
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I am a Monzo Plus subscriber. I do like the additional features and I think they are good value for the price. And I do think Monzo still has a great offering for free customers with a great basic feature set - to me the Plus and Premium features are definitely add-ons and not things I would expect as standard.
However, I do worry Monzo is pushing Plus and Premium a bit too hard.
For existing customers, it’s okay to have a little prompt, but I can completely understand how the constant reminder could be a bit much.
My biggest concern though is the pushing of Plus and Premium for customers who have not even joined Monzo yet.
I note that they are the first two feature highlights on the Monzo homepage below the header right now (see screenshot).
Surely the homepage should be used to push the basic account and get customers to sign-up? Maybe with Plus and Premium mentioned further down.
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To be honest I have less of an issue with this. New customers likely won’t be aware of what Monzo offer so it’s a great way to showcase it. But existing users who have acknowledged the existence of Plus/Premium and decided they don’t want it shouldn’t be bullied into getting it just to get the annoying adverts to go away.
Once or twice is fine then just ease off a bit, at least until you have a new feature you can advertise
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In your screenshot you can clearly dismiss that pop up, I’m not a fan of them in any app but haven’t seen another banking app where you can’t dismiss the pop up
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The counterpoint to that argument would be that getting customers to sign up now by advertising a basic account and then afterwards advertising Plus/Premium to them could be seen as a form of bait and switch. ‘Come join our shiny new bank!’ Ok, no you’ve joined, pay us extra to use this stuff.’
Advertising Plus and Premium up-front means that at least the customer is full informed and doesn’t have any surprises after signing up with a basic account.
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I can see where you are coming from, but I don’t think this is bait and switch. The basic Monzo account is a great product and has all the essential features you need.
Plus and Premium just offer optional extras - it’s more like getting on a plane and being offered a price to upgrade to business class. It’s not a completely different product.
But above all that, I’m not saying don’t promote these accounts on the homepage or elsewhere, I’m just saying I would prioritise the information differently.
Surely it makes sense to list the core features everyone gets - the key selling points of why you should switch and bank with Monzo - before mentioning the cherries you can have on top of you choose to join Plus or Premium.
As a digital bank, I think Monzo often has to overcome some hurdles in customers minds before they switch. It makes sense to tackle these first head on, explain why it’s worth making the move for budgeting and the app etc. Once customers are sold, that’s a great time to say if you want you could also have this or that.
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Upselling is everywhere - Monzo, Revolut, Curve, you name it. I’m not interested and just click through. Nothing any card has offered me from £5 to £20 per month has been worth it. Monzo are making very little money from people like ourselves, particularly with interest rates as low as they are. I am not surprised they are constantly on at me to upgrade. When you “make every single one of your customers feel like they have the best banking in town” - this requires staff, money, systems - all of which cost money, which Monzo don’t have that much of. The only way they can rectify this is squeezing more out of customers. They could go down the route of charging ALL customers a fee (I can see this coming for LOTS of fintechs, and will ditch each as they introduce them), with consequential loss of capital. That’s what Tandem did with their credit card, which I believe is now closed. When you say “I for one would not choose Monzo as my current top pick or recommendation” - I am sure they will be devastated, but unless lots more people think like you do, I don’t see that being an issue.
I thought this at first too but when you consider that they don’t have as much overheads as the traditional banks and they still manage, I think it’s very unlikely.
- They don’t have antiquated systems that need constant maintenance just to keep going.
- If they want to expand and provide something new, again, the difference in cost will be large.
- Then we haven’t even got onto the bricks and mortar side with having physical branches, staff costs, heating, rent etc.
Just like Tesla with their cars. It will just be software flags and chargeable extras.
EG. Tesla charge you ~£200 for heated rear seats. All cars have it built in but it’s just the button to control them that is disabled.
This is what I believe the future of banking to be. Basic is free, then lots of optional extras for a fee.
Thanks for posting a link. What’s it for?
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Good discussion of the history and future of ‘free banking’ as discussed earlier on. I think Monzo get a mention.
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