So… I’m curious, I assume people have different reasons.
First question, what made you open a monzo account?
Second question, have you gone #FullMonzo? If not, what is stopping you?
My answers are -
1, saw the app on the Google Play Store, decided to see what it was, about an hour later I signed up, quite an impulse decision to be honest.
2, yep, full monzo, decided to just go for it, much preferred the application to my previous banks mobile app.
I’m sure I’ve told this story a few times but in the summer of 2016, I kept seeing Facebook ads for Mondo (as we were known back then!), and then I chanced upon some discussion on Reddit as well.
When I realised that it was iOS only, I forgot about it for a couple of weeks, and then the next time I saw the advert I had the brainwave that I could just sign up using my iPad. This wasn’t too long before the Android app release.
I was just instantly blown away by how easy, fast, and friendly the UI was, the metadata, the instant budgeting. It seemed about a million years ahead of Santander, who I’d been with for many years.
I was probably only using the app for a couple of weeks when I found the forum and also the Careers section, applied, went down to the Epworth St office and interviewed, and got the job not long after. We were around 40 or 50 people at that time and we’re now just shy of 1200! It’s very, very strange to think about just how quickly things have changed - repeatedly, at this company. I touched on this at Investival last month, but going from 1 tiny London office, to having large premises in London, Cardiff and Las Vegas is really astonishing in less than 3 years - London and Cardiff have moved premises twice in that time and Vegas has just had their first move, too. And now we have actual US customers too, which is amazing to think about.
And as you can expect, been Full Monzo for a while now!
1 - one of my good friends had an account and kept saying how easy it was to do money transfers, the notifications, spending categories and separating money Into as many pots as you like without having the need to open another savings account. So I took the leap and started using it as a spending account.
2 - following the spending account from October 2018 I noticed this has a modern way to approach money and the separation between my monthly budget and my balance was just I went Full Monzo in January 2019 and have been annoying people with how Monzo has been a breath of fresh air for me.
I was preparing for a trip abroad with a friend and was talking to him about travel money options. He already had Monzo and suggested I open an account due to the ease of use and lack of fees abroad.
I did, I loved it during the trip, kept using it when we got home and went Full Monzo a few months later.
Here’s my opening story from an earlier, similar topic:
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Anarchist
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7
A relative showed me the app with the ability to freeze the card. It seemed cool to me, and she had a golden ticket, so I could skip the queue.
I don’t think I’ll go #Full(any bank) in the foreseeable future. I find it easier to keep committed spending separated from from discretionary spending, and also, using Monzo on a daily basis, I value always having an alternative method of payment. #Fullmonzo just seems an odd thing to do, for me.
During 2016 I was trying to switch from cash to contactless for day to day spending but found contratless unsatisfactory because of the lag between a transaction and it appearing on bank transaction list.
I think I was searching the internet for why this happened or searching for solutions and came across an article describing the new wave of mobile-only banks and bank-like accounts - namely Atom, Monzo, Revolut, and Starling. I don’t think Starling was available yet so I tried Monzo and Revolut. I immediately loved having instant transaction info, merchant enrichment, and spending analytics and these features enabled me to switch to contactless for day to day spending. I also developed a preference for Monzo over Revolut so stopped using Revolut.
I’m not really sure what FullMonzo is but my Monzo account is the current account that I do almost all my spending from. I have 5 current accounts in total.
I keep multiple bank accounts for redundancy and extra features such as higher interest on deposits, ability to order Bankers’ Drafts required by some government agencies as well as free cinema tickets.
I had a huge overdraft with my old bank account and it was impossible to get out of. My salary barely took me out of it each month, so I was paying a fortune in interest every month too. When Monzo was a top up account I put all my spending money in it so I wouldn’t run out each month, and just left my direct debits in my old account. Now Monzo is my full account and I transfer small spare spending cash elsewhere so it stays separate from my bills. Once DDs can come out of a pot I’ll probably be fully Monzo (and when I can move my business account over too, of course).
I don’t remember exactly how I came across it, I think my mum saw the old prepaid card on moneysavingexpert and sent me the link as I was going on holiday. Used it while I was away and loved it, then just never really stopped
I would say I’m 99.9% #FullMonzo in terms of payments and salary, but I’ve got one direct debit left coming out of a NatWest account I don’t use for anything else because I’m too lazy to change it.
I’ve also just finished uni so I’ve still got my student account because my overdraft is still interest free which is handy because I don’t have a credit card yet (but I’ll probably get one in the next month or so now I’m out of uni and in the world of work - got to start working on that credit rating if I’ve got a hope in hell of getting a mortgage at some point). I’d imagine I’ll be FullMonzo properly once I decide I can be bothered to go into my mobile phone account and move the direct debit, but it’s only £10 a month so it’s not really my priority right now.
Pretty sure i saw a couple articles when the beta products was still gaining traction. It was the instant balance update that really enticed me in initially so i singed up and got a beta card but didn’t really use it that much because at the time i wasn’t really focusing so much on my finances.
Went full Monzo as soon as i got a Current Account even before CASS was available meaning i had to manually switch all my DD but Monzo has helped me clean up my finances A LOT since moving over. And i was with TSB so a pretty decent upgrade.
Certainly wasn’t and still isn’t available on my TSB current account. Your main balance wouldn’t update until about three days after a purchase but you obviously kept purchasing during the month so it was never truly the correct balance.
you could open the little pending transaction list and deduct what was scheduled to come out of your account but that was just more work that it was worth most of the time.
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Anarchist
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16
Yes, and no. Generally, a banking app will give two balances. A cleared one, which includes all transactions except the pending ones. And an available balance, which accounts for pending payments. Many now will show pending payments, as well, but separately.
Basically, all Monzo did was to not show the cleared balance, and showed the pending transactions along with the cleared ones.
No…I’ve used a number of legacy banks and only Monzo/Starling did this. It may have changed since I only bank with Monzo.
As to why I bank with Monzo…
Started at a techie company, kept seeing this orange card. Turns out the head of data had been in it from early doors, really liked it and others soon wanted it and got a card themselves…
“What’s a monzo?” Yes - this was my first reaction. I’d never heard of it before, didn’t even know it existed. Once I saw it in use, saw the app etc I was bought.
Then after a few months with the updates and saving I finally did it and went #fullmonzo
Really Glad I did! Now I’m that guy with the orange card telling people in my new workplace why they should do it.
I want to maintain my credit history and i’ve read Monzo isn’t considered by many reference agencies, so i’m keeping my Nationwide account (plus I get 5% interest on balance and 5% linked saver)
Monzo doesn’t offer any financial incentive for switching, wheras many other banks do.
The ability to categorise my spending
Wanted an account to split my spending between that and my credit card
Love the community ability to influence new features
Transparency and openess of the company
ah sorry my misunderstanding I assumed the highlighted section was from a post from Nathan and your post was why you didnt open a Monzo account , my mistake, sorry