“Let me choose my own PIN '!”
Wut? Is that something you madly cannot do in the States? Is that not quite what it means?
That one is completely mystifying to me. As someone who’s banked my way around a great many banks across the US (I learned early on the value of having accounts at multiple banks so that I’m not stuck if something goes wrong with one or even two), the vast majority let you select your own PIN these days. Any bank or credit union with brick and mortar branches certainly will. The only thing I can think of is that it might be an issue with certain prepaid cards.
To tackle this point by point-
In any significantly populated city, yes. Any of the major banks (Chase, Citi, Wells Fargo, etc) will have someone who can help you in the dominant second language in the area as well as English, as well as possibly more. Spanish and Chinese are common. There are also some smaller banks that cater to a certain community that will have people and resources available for that community regardless of where their branches are located (example: East West Bank catering to Chinese, Hanmi Bank catering to Koreans, etc).
However, mobile banking is a different story. Many banks still don’t fully support other languages in their apps, and online only banks especially have for the most part been English-only. If Monzo can work in multilingual support, it wouldn’t just put them on equal footing, it would put them ahead of the crowd.
One thing that always baffles me is Americans lack of awareness of no fee banking options that are easily available.
Honestly I think it comes down to how people actually want a physical bank branch where they can cash in money from checks. People here feel like they need to interact with people, and you can’t just get that with an online bank.
The article below has some commentary on US expansion strategies of N26, Revolut, and Monzo. There is not really any real information on Monzo’s strategy but may still be of interest to this thread. The author is of the opinion the underbanked segment of the US population represents a large market which all 3 banks will target. Credit card usage is probably not particularly relevant for this segment of the population.
The confusing part of that is that the chart shows that Starling has nearly 800 downloads in the US last month- since they don’t yet operate in the US in any capacity, I wonder if that’s them testing something or if it’s just Brits downloading from US app store accounts for some reason?
Like this?
Most Likely
Although one concern I see with going after the under/unbanked is that they’re also… higher-risk. I’m worried that going after them too aggressively, then having a bunch of accounts that they have to later freeze/close and then becoming a repeat of that BBC Watchdog episode. That’s a stain on their reputation I’m not sure they can afford here while they’re just starting out.
Alot of the reason for unbanked in the USA is fees all of the big banks have minimum daily balances. Chase for example charges ~$12.00 unless you have $1,500 daily.
Oh yeah, Chase. I closed my account with them as soon as I lost my student (=no monthly fee) status. (I still have credit cards with them but banking, no) Wells Fargo looks to be similar. But yeah, I do my banking these days with banks that don’t charge (US Bank- free as long as you have an active credit card with them, Discover Bank- totally free, local credit union- totally free, Capital One- totally free, BMO Harris- totally free, SoFi Money- totally free), so I’ve forgotten.
The free banks tend to be online, or credit unions. There is a large unawareness of these. The friction to sign up can be large too, requiring printed and signed paperwork. Sometimes notarised.
The last part is something I’m glad has changed in recent years. I remember signing up for my BMO Harris account years ago (2014?) online and receiving a packet of papers in the mail that I had to read over, sign, and then send back before I could start using my account. (If they asked me to notarize it as well, I would have told them to never mind) Compare to signing up for Discover Bank last year and SoFi Money this past summer, where the only paper involved was the little “welcome” thing that came with my debit card.
Did something change with the regulations to allow this? I honestly haven’t been paying as much attention as I perhaps should be.
I doubt. I had to sign physical paper this summer.
Heck, to do a bank transfer I had to get a Medallion Signature Guarantee.
And we think some of our UK banking practices are stuck in the stone age
Wait, what? I figured this was still the case with opening an account in person, but I’ve not had to handle paper forms for online account openings since sometime last year (as mentioned when opening my SoFi and Discover checking accounts). Am I having a significantly different experience because I’m a US citizen with SSN, credit file, etc?
Among so many other things, like the fragmented mess of “instant payment” systems we have instead of a single Faster Payments system like in the UK. And the fact that same day ACH bank transfers are only just now being implemented.
Reading some of the posts on here and getting a little more insight into the US banking system, I think Monzo (and the others who are trying) may have their work cut out breaking into the American market.
If they can succeed though, best of luck to them all 
This was Schwab 
Yes, the best they can do is cracking the Un and under banked. This would be miraculous.
They can also get customers from competing banks such as in the UK.
Getting regular Americans to switch from CC to debit for everyday spending will be hard. Tho, due to poor credit they can likely convert cash spenders to debit.