Shared Pots

Definately!

This really shows promise. I have a partner where I would like to offer a shared pot- either with a physical card or virtual pay card. It would help with bill sharing, eating out, every day expenses.

Also, would like to explore using this as a pocket money account for my daughter? This would be excellent- especially if I can see a transaction list.

Looking forward to seeing how this progresses.

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Such a great feature! Really excited to see it happening.

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  1. Why would you leave something like that so late?! Just doesn’t seem responsible. But yeah I get your point. I also think that if it’s that important to order something between a group, don’t leave it so late. Make sure you have time to get all the money and then order. Just makes sense to me?

  2. I reckon there should be different rules if it’s for a couple. A joint account like pot, rather than a group. More than 2 people and you need everyone’s confirmation, a couple or a setting that you can change to say you trust the people aren’t gonna take all the money will solve that issue.

  3. Administrators for a pot is a good idea, but they have to be trusted.

Of course you don’t want to give access to your money to people you can’t trust, but certain situations don’t work like that - what if you all wanna put money together for shared bills in a shared house? You might not trust those people not to steal all your money, but you’d like the convenience and ease of having the funds all in one account.

Hi all, I just went trough all the replies and wanted to answer some of the main questions that came out:

Who actually owns the money in the pot? And what happens when people leave the pot?

@Frankiejr @nanos The idea is that the shared pot belongs to the creator of the pot. The owner is the only person who can withdraw money, although they can also decide on the type of permissions they’d like to give to the people they share it with (ex. add only, add&withdraw). If people leave the pot, money will stay with the owner.

yes, this is something we want to do :slight_smile:

Is there any way to limit withdrawals if it shows on everyone’s account?

Yes, it should be possible to set up withdrawals limits. One of them could be to limit withdrawals up to the amount you’ve contributed.

If you create a shared pot, does everyone who it’s shared with get to see it in their “account” tab too, and if so, would there be any restriction to prevent them withdrawing money?

@tbutz yes, everybody will be able to see the pot in their account tab and keep track of contributions.

I’ve seen quite a few concerns around trusting people when sharing pots and I agree that we should definitely do whatever we can to make this feature as safest as possible. However, we can’t predict unethical behavior :frowning: Good thing is that you’re only sharing a pot and in no way would the people you share it with be able to access your account’s information!

Could this support deposits in the form of monzo.me?

@Alexhurren maybe not at the beginning, but something to potentially consider as well. The initial idea is to be able to share it with people on Monzo as ideally you’d like everybody to get easy access and visibility to it.

I know, that would be awesome! Although, I think this should be part of a different conversation as it relates to pots in general and how they work

This is still early stage exploration but we’ll keep you posted :wink:

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A great answer thanks!

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So this is not intended as a Joint Account replacement, then? Because that’d be utterly unsuitable.

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I think there are different permissions that the creator can give to other members eg to add & withdraw as mentioned. I misread it like you initially but if only the creator can withdraw money it would be pointless. I think having different custom options like this allows for different groups/ relationships of people and if you can custom the amount and permissions all the better. I would be comfortable with my partner accessing all the money in the pot but I might not feel the same way for a shared pot between housemates or a pooled pot for a birthday gift between friends.

Really like it - but personally the best use I can see from this is for bills (collecting money for presents is great but relies on everyone having a Monzo current account as their main bank account - which is very unlikely).

And using it for bill would only be useful (in my opinion) if you could pay direct debits directly from Pots. So I think this is a good idea, but will be a bit redundant unless direct payments is introduced first/alongside.

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I’ve said it before, but In my opinion, this isn’t about “access permissions” it’s about ownership.

I feel it is absolutely crucial that money in our joint account is owned by both of us. (Especially should one of us die. Until then it’s probably mostly emotional that I don’t want to own money on my own, but if I die, and all the cash is held in an account that I own, my wife - who doesn’t currently work - would be even more screwed than she already would be.)

The same applies for a “flat mate bills shared pot” sort of scenario.

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Also, given that Monzo have previously indicated that one reason they wanted to do joint accounts differently is the potential for abuse of joint accounts (one party racking up massive overdraft charges, leaving the other liable for payment), I really feel that a model where one party is essentially gifting money to another, and has no claim to ownership whatsoever over what’s supposed to be a shared pot, is a MASSIVE step backwards.

It’s not actually a shared pot at all: it’s a gift pot…

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So these are possible…

  • Unmarried couple use pots as joint account. The partner with the permission dies, other partner cant get access. Also they don’t have a will so the remaining person potentially gets zero?

  • Couple have shared pot - cheating partner who is pot owner adds mistress/lover :laughing:

  • A group of housemates share an account for bills/rent but pot owner closes account and runs off with the lot.

Essentially the person with no ownership is gifting the money, but they just have some visibility.

Does a joint pot allow for overdrafts? (how many people have an overdraft on a joint account?). And if there is access and permission on said pot - both could spend but only one could be liable?

Monzome/Split the bill kinda already fill what this tries to achieve (sharing bills or gifting money) this just feels like a poorly considered variation which actually doesn’t cover the real life use.

Anyone got any glitter? :poop:

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One of the screenshots has a button to apply for overdraft.

“Who’s this on our pot?” :smiley:
image

Joint accounts don’t stop one person cleaning out the account+overdraft and running, unless the account is locked down to require all users to sign. All users in a joint account are liable for any debts (see here).

@nanos Looks like that overdraft button is just for you, not the pot

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I think you are very right. These shared pots could be an amazing idea, for purposes where joint accounts aren’t appropriate.

But without being able to set up direct debits going out of them, making payments straight from them, and with ownership resting solely on one person, their usefulness is severely crippled, as they make very little sense for “collection for a gift”, outside Monzo HQ, and even less sense for paying bills…

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As I mentioned earlier, this feature isn’t designed to be or replace a joint account. It’s meant for small uses: a gift for a friend’s birthday or a colleague’s leaving, for a shared household’s bills, or for saving up for a trip with friends, and everything in between.

Also, the intent of this feature is to share a pot with trusted friends or roommates (you know where they live if the pot’s owner was to run with the money :rofl:), and, although you’ll certainly be able to, it’s not meant for sharing large or any sum over a long period of time.

We certainly want to minimize the bus factor. That’s why we’re designing this feature so that the owner of a shared pot will be able to give withdrawal permissions (full or partial) to any person with whom the pot is shared with.

Just to be clear, no, pots and shared pots are not current accounts on their own, therefore aren’t eligible for overdrafts.

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Then what is? Genuinely curious as in i thought this was meant to be mvp/starters for monzo’s version. Is it that this is something totally different and that there’s something else coming or no there’s nothing?
A few times joints and seconds have come up and monzo staffers have mentioned “we think we can do it a better way” or and pointed to pots as an example.

The perfect example of why you might need or want an additional current account over a pot which has limited functionality?

Then why wouldn’t someone just monzo.me the money to the person buying. Its not like 5 people need access to go and buy the gift - its also unlikely that everyone for a collection will even bank with monzo (i feel like monzo.me answered this 2 years ago - and i think faster payment, payM, paypal, pingit and a ton of other stuff probably answered this before monzo.me etc).

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I d love to see this features to prod asap I was one of the early ‘requester’ :slight_smile:

Exactly what Monzo needs and can’t wait for this to roll out.

I would like to see the ability for the pot owner to assign a maximum daily, or maximum transaction amount. That would be great.