Why Monzo Cards Aren't Working Today

No worries guys these things happen, looking forward to it coming in :house_with_garden::slight_smile: Hopefully will add even more possibilities. Who is the third party processor?

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According to this site (which does contain some inaccurate information), it’s GPS -

http://www.bankingtech.com/570702/uk-challenger-banks-whos-who-and-whats-their-tech/

And there are tweets in their feed from January this year confirming that -

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At least they are keeping us very well informed. Regular banks would not be able to be so efficient. I’m still happy to use monzo. It will be good when they are directly connected to MasterCard saves relying on a middle man!

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:heart:️ the transparency with the updates of what’s going on, and the push notification to say it is an awesome idea so users don’t have to go hunting for the information. Great approach, as I get the impression that legacy banks would still be trying to cover up the failure with as little information as possible :unamused:

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Took this section form the blog post discussing the possibility of this reoccurring.

“We’ve just finished a 12-month project to connect our systems directly to MasterCard. When we launch the current account later this year, it will not use a third-party card processor and instead transactions will be processed entirely on our own technology. We see ourselves as a technology company as much as a bank, and going forward our strategy is to bring all critical systems in-house and continue to develop our own platform atop modern technology which we control”.

The amazing response to this issue from the Monzo user is being noticed btw

this makes me proud to be part of this community!

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Actually I thought the coms were too trigger happy - lots of reassuring sounding timescales that ended up totally inaccurate.

While it’s nice to get the actual updates from the supplier, so we can make decisions like sensible adults, we don’t know the supplier as well as monzo do to judge their reliability.

After Beta, with people relying on these cards, the updates we saw today would get monzo in trouble - better to be clear what you are committing to and what is fun rumours.

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Hey @Shubb I’m really sorry about this :disappointed_relieved: I agree, looking through the status page, there were a lot of estimates that didn’t come through. I can only imagine how frustrating that must have been for you :pensive:

I’m so sorry that you felt mislead. We took a conscious decision to pass on updates to you from the supplier, as we don’t have visibility of the problem itself. If we’d have known that we’d all still be here 10 hours on, we might have done it differently.

As you say, things will change when we launch the current account. When more of our systems are built in house, we’ll be able to provide much better and clearer information, because for us, keeping your trust is the most important thing we can do.

Thanks for bearing with us, we’ve learnt so much from today about how to do this better next time :slightly_smiling_face:

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Is there any caveat between Monzo and said supplier that will result in Monzo being compensated?

A user in the developer’s Slack channel has just said that their Revolut card is working again now & Curve posted this recently

so it looks like the issue might be about to be fixed. If I needed to use my Monzo card right now, I’d be trying it…

Hey @beanhead85! We’re compensating users that have lost out as a result of today’s outage - we believe that its only fair that if we’re providing a service that people rely on, we’ve got to be able to help out when it doesn’t :money_with_wings:

I’m not sure I’m able to answer your specific question, but rest assured we’ll be asking them challenging questions :wink:

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You handled the situation exactly right. There is no perfect response some people want more updates some people want less - what you go with is what feels right for the product and brand you are representing and striving to be.

If anybody values the plastic method of payment should always carry 2 cards just like if you are in a car you should always carry a spare tyre Anybody complaining of such inconvience should look at their own preparation.

Assuming 100% have smart phones then we always have Apple / Android Pay to act as a safety net as I did today.

Probably a good learning for what really is a new team at Monzo and an emergency is good for all people to go through at least once.

As always keep up the excellent work

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:eyes:

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I assume that is for their current accounts, not the prepaid cards.

I don’t think so - there’s at least 6 other prepaid card issuers dealing with the same issue today & obviously Loot & Revolut (to point out the biggest issuers), are definitely prepaid only.

What gives you the impression that they would be the processor for the current accounts only (if Monzo weren’t going to stop using them obviously)?

It looks like we’ll get an ‘official’ confirmation at some point -


It would be good if in future you send out a notification using the app when an issue like this occurs. I’m on android and while I get a banner when I launch the app, an actual notification would have notified me in advance.

It would, that feature’s being discussed here -

Been using Monzo for about fourth months. Just signed up to the community forum because I wanted to say how impressed I am about with the comms around the outage. I liked that I first received a notification on my phone and then regular updates if I wanted them. The transparency, concern for users and the wording around the issue – it’s great and I’m very impressed. Nicely handled, Monzo. :slight_smile: Knowing what to say when and how to say it isn’t easy, especially when it’s a third party affecting the product. Much respect.

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Thanks @norynato that means a lot to us all!

On a slightly different note, I’ve been looking after this thread today, along with a few other channels, and you guys have been the most supportive and accommodating :heart_eyes: It’s been lovely to keep come back to all your thoughts and messages :heart:

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So now we can have a ‘what were you doing on the Monzo went down’ thread…

I was eating Lebanese in South Ken, bizarrely, the restaurant payment system was experiencing issues too, sounds like someone made a big boo boo somewhere that we will be reading about in The Reg tomorrow…

Hope you guys manage to get some sleep tonight…!

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