How does tipping work with Monzo and Square? Lots of retailers use Square to accept contactless payments, but you only select the tip after the payment has gone through! So i tap, get the push from Monzo, then select the tip. But the retailer doesn’t actually receive that tip…do they?
Tipping by card in US varies by how they process it. A lot of places still use Swipe and sign - they’ll then present you with the signature receipt which has a gratuity space and they’ll amend the payment amount or take a second payment.
If it’s via chip then most terminals will allow you to add gratuity on the terminal.
Otherwise when you receive the bill write the gratuity on it and change the total and they’ll charge this. (In New York take the tax and double it for the gratuity amount)
When I was there last November we had swipe and sign pretty much everywhere and we found that they didn’t actually take the tip (I think only once across dozens of transactions on three different monzo cards). This was all on prepay though so that may have changed.
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Swipe and sign, I understand, because the payment is processed after.
But I’m talking about contactless, where my card is charged at the point of contact. I select the tip on the iPad after being charged - and I can’t see any adjustments being made to the amount in my Monzo account later…
All the years I have been to the US, they give you the bill, you put your card down, they take your card away and bring back the credit card receipt, you add the tip 18-20% and sign and pocket your card, they remove the signed receipt leaving you with a copy.
The amount you see on your bill is the amount you signed for. Only time it went wrong was my first time using “Mondo” (as it was) and I got charged both the pre-tip amount and the tipped amount. I was promptly refunded when raised an issue.
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Last time i was in the US (bearing in mind it was almost 2 years ago), almost everywhere I ate they took the card away to process the payment. I don’t understand why portable card machines are not common?
It meant when I returned to the U.K. I cancelled my cards and got new ones because it just felt so bad security-wise.
Maybe things have improved/or possibly already better in other parts of the US vs where I was?
I was in the US in July 2018 and having my Monzo card was amazing for restaurants.
Everywhere would take my card and swipe it through (and i get a notification of the amount). I write down my tip amount and that would go through a day or two later.
I used contactless once in a H&M and the clerk was genuinally shocked, they didn’t know their POS would accept it.
I had the same questions myself.
I never used my card in the US because of that. You just give your card to a third party and trust them for no reason.
I just used my card while in the US to take the money off ATM. That was about it.
Cash is still the king in the US, not so much in EU.
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It’s a weird system in the US, pretty much the same process regardless if it’s sign/chip. They’ll basically bill you for the meal, then when you add the tip… they’ll bill you the meal cost + tip and refund the first charge.
Takes a couple of days. Best carry tip money 
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You should see it change a few days later.
At a very high level, it works by authorising the bill amount when you tap/insert your card and then later collecting the full bill + tip amount (yes, they are allowed to do this by Mastercard rules, up to a reasonable percentage).
One day the US will catch up with the rest of the world, but by that time the rest of the world may well have just gone completely cashless.
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I am thinking that the future of payments will be QR - just like it is in China.
It’s fast and painless.
Perhaps, I think that will be true or NFC will stay in control but everyone would have to move to android / apple pay or cards will have to have added authorisation to allow transactions of over £30, but it would be good if an email address was also transmitted so that receipts can be emailed without having to spell out your email to the person on the checkout. Will cut down on unnessacary receipts being printed too.
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I’ve always liked the idea of having a receipt automatically emailed to you when you make a transaction. Like you said it would save so many trees 
Would be so beneficial to have all your receipts in one place too.
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An example of this is when my Apple Watch broke last week. In 5 minutes I was able to find my original 3 year old reciept in my email and could find out the date of purchase and all other information needed for my warranty and I could print it out at will if needed. Always got access to it and easily searchable when its in my emails opposed to the original copy stuck in a filing folder somewhere from 3 years ago.
Oh I wouldn’t like a QR system at all.
NFC (Apple Pay etc) is much better I think.
Yes, however, with the NFC you’d at least need a POS terminal.
With the QR code, you just need a sticker. It’s a cheaper option.