Starling’s OG Embossed Card is one of my all time favorites.
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I’m sure it’s what swayed me between monzo and starling at the time, and the simplicity of the app. Monzo was also simple but starling colours were more me.
I have started using Starling Again at the moment. It’s acting as the card I use for the tube to and from work.
I am liking it a bit better then Monzo.
I do like the design of the app.
The card design is nice yeah. Simple and elegant I think myself.
I am thinking of moving my Business’s other Bank Account to Starling just for the simplicity to be honest
@jo You proud of me for talking good about Starling?? 
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A new bank using Engine by Starling has launched in Australia.
Looks like you just re-skin the starling app.
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They have deployed a few banks so far. Salt Bank in Romania for example. They have already onboarded several hundred thousand customers to Salt and are growing quickly.
I’ve heard there is a French bank in the works too.
I can easily see the Engine division dwarfing their UK banking business at some point. The potential globally is huge. Especially with legacy banks who would rather not upgrade their own systems and would rather just start from scratch by migrating customers over.
One to watch.
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Hopefully better than TSB did.
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The internal interface for managing an Engine-based bank looks pretty nifty too. It’s nice that everything is in one place. I’d imagine with legacy banks, there are dozens of different systems for various tasks? @Carlo1460
I’m also assuming this is what Starling CS staff see on their end for the UK bank…
Screenshot from their Engine sales site:
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Lloyds was absolutely horrendous for anything, especially collections I’m sure had about 5/6 systems back in 2022.
Barclays was pretty neat, considering their app is shit. A bit like how monzo has BizOps but not as functional.
BizOps for Monzo is pretty great as a CRM.
Won’t even open the can of worms for the civil service 
Edit: that image above looks for too complex for any system I’d want to use.
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This would also suggest that Starling have already done the dev work for a credit card offering within the app, as their Engine customers are able to do so now.
I guess they are either working on one or have chosen not to offer one in the UK…
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With the £29m fine no wonder they can’t afford to.
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£29m is small change in the grand scheme.
They need to do better though, I wish to return haha.
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I seem to remember a rumor in the States about Starling moving over one day into the US Market
I also closed mine coming up for a year, I contacted CS and they said they aren’t taking back exclients at the moment. Suspect the find and slap on the wrist has made them cautious about letting back the old folks.
Based on?
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Smhhhhhh :3
I have it on fairly good authority that they have chosen to pause any credit card release. A number of reasons:
*Strategic and technology constraint requires current account as prerequisite for wider relationship (as FD does), which means a CC likely to simply cannibalise interchange revenue from their debit cards - no net gain;
*Net interest income likely minimal unless they invest heavily in promotional deals upfront (zero interest periods etc.) and this is hugely costly and needs scale - it could even be negative if they offer a long interest free period;
*Highly competitive space (including flex products offered by so many now) with material credit risk, regulatory risk and reputational risk all outside of current risk appetite.
My guess would be that Chase UK will reach the same conclusion and the credit card rollout will be very slow and then unwind as they realise they are not going to make money from it, unless they have appetite to buy an existing issuer to build scale and rebrand this (which is possible).
I separately believe that FD would likely not launch a credit card today - it is purely a legacy from an era where it was more key as part of the proposition and they worry about customer attrition if they close it. And they have the HSBC infrastructure and scale to lean on, so marginal cost is more modest.
The one I struggle with is Monzo. I am surprised they feel their credit card offering makes sense - would love to understand why they chose to offer it and how it is going.
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I don’t see it as a Credit Card. It’s a BNPL loan product masquerading as a Credit Card.
Of course, views will differ on this. This is just how I see their Flex offering.
An interesting take for sure. You seem to have inside knowledge. Do you work in banking?
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I agree that the Monzo CC is positioned as a BNPL product, and with a good App / set of options behind it. But it is a volume business if it is to be profitable and I don’t see them winning huge amounts of business from their existing clients - not enough anyway.
And any interchange revenue will be a loss to their debit card - so they start at a material disadvantage to many.
We will see. I may be wrong. There may be something specific about those who bank with Monzo that bucks the norm.
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I tried using it full time before and just couldn’t get past this. It doesn’t behave how I expect a credit card to behave. Payment timing is weird, shorter interest free period unless I split the payments etc.
I’m sure it’s a valuable proposition for many, not for me.
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It’s very cleverly done though, to be fair.
They have successfully normalised taking out a BNPL loan to buy a pint of milk (an example).
By referring to it as a Credit Card, they have taken away the stigma of BNPL and have instead benefited from the allure of Credit Cards.
It’s an achievement in marketing, for sure.
I’m not saying it’s a bad product. Clearly it works well for many people and that’s great.
I just can’t imagine Starling doing the same. They would likely go for a more traditional offering.
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