Monzo and other app based banks

[EastAnglianFox]

Monzo and Starling user, travel a fair bit and both are brilliant. My savings and common sense regarding spending has improved massively.

 

Plus both come with really funky looking debit cards which make me feel cool when paying at a shop 

[Unabomber]

Can you withdraw cash with these banks?

[Jimothy]

Just now, Unabomber said:

Can you withdraw cash with these banks?

Yeah, you get a card.

 

My Starling card isn't contactless though, not sure if you can change that.

[Unabomber]

Just now, Facecloth said:

Yeah, you get a card.

 

My Starling card isn't contactless though, not sure if you can change that.

Sounds interesting might switch over. Especially with the whole going on holiday benefits. Are people full on switching over or using in conjunction with the likes of hsbc?

[Jimothy]

1 minute ago, Unabomber said:

Sounds interesting might switch over. Especially with the whole going on holiday benefits. Are people full on switching over or using in conjunction with the likes of hsbc?

I've just used mine for travel so far. My plan was to change tell my work to pay may wages in to there and move my dd money over to hsbc once paid.

 

I've just moved to a job that paid weekly though, which I'm not used to, so my plan is to pay my wages each week in to Starling and then distribute it between hsbc and monzo at the end of the month for bill and spending. 

[Benguin]

9 minutes ago, Unabomber said:

Sounds interesting might switch over. Especially with the whole going on holiday benefits. Are people full on switching over or using in conjunction with the likes of hsbc?

I’m switching over this month. It’s fab. I’ve already got direct debits and standing orders on there and they all work fine. Transferring money is easy too. 

 

Only downside is depositing money and cheques is a faf as there are no branches 

[StanSP]

26 minutes ago, Unabomber said:

Sounds interesting might switch over. Especially with the whole going on holiday benefits. Are people full on switching over or using in conjunction with the likes of hsbc?

Only using mine for holidays. 

 

Not switching everything as I get better interest rates with my current provider. 

[ScouseFox]

On 08/09/2019 at 16:14, Unabomber said:

Sounds interesting might switch over. Especially with the whole going on holiday benefits. Are people full on switching over or using in conjunction with the likes of hsbc?

use it for everything id use my card for but don’t use it for bills or wages cos you get better deals elsewhere. 

 

probs my favourite thing about monzo is the rounding up of spending. every time i spend like £8.64, it takes £9 out my account and puts the spare money into a “savings pot”. so you don’t feel like you’re spending any more, but at the end of most weeks you have an extra few quids in your bank that you didn’t think you had. 

[Benguin]

16 hours ago, ScouseFox said:

use it for everything id use my card for but don’t use it for bills or wages cos you get better deals elsewhere. 

 

probs my favourite thing about monzo is the rounding up of spending. every time i spend like £8.64, it takes £9 out my account and puts the spare money into a “savings pot”. so you don’t feel like you’re spending any more, but at the end of most weeks you have an extra few quids in your bank that you didn’t think you had. 

Yeah that is a brill feature. Nice surprise when the end of the month looms.

[stripeyfox]

Well I'm a Monzo convert (sort of). Signed up last week and started to use it yesterday. Am still getting wages paid into main high street bank and all the bills etc come out of there, but then I transfer what's left to Monzo and use that as my spends. Like the instant notification and running totals (rather than waiting a few days to see the transaction in your bank). Love the rounding up and the savings pots!

 

 

[Benguin]

10 hours ago, stripeyfox said:

Well I'm a Monzo convert (sort of). Signed up last week and started to use it yesterday. Am still getting wages paid into main high street bank and all the bills etc come out of there, but then I transfer what's left to Monzo and use that as my spends. Like the instant notification and running totals (rather than waiting a few days to see the transaction in your bank). Love the rounding up and the savings pots!

 

 

Cheers for the sign up. Turns out I don’t get a £5 just a congratulations! 

[Dr The Singh]

What's the overdraft like?

[stripeyfox]

5 hours ago, Dr The Singh said:

What's the overdraft like?

I think you can have £1000. First £20 is free then 50p a day after that, so maximum of £15 or so a month (doesn't matter if you're £100 or £999 in the red.

 

But I haven't activated it for my account, don't plan on using it!

 

[stripeyfox]

8 hours ago, Benguin said:

Cheers for the sign up. Turns out I don’t get a £5 just a congratulations! 

I'm not sure if the link worked or not? But apparently they don't pay the referral anymore anyway. But cheers anyway!
 

[stripeyfox]

On 09/09/2019 at 17:11, ScouseFox said:

use it for everything id use my card for but don’t use it for bills or wages cos you get better deals elsewhere. 

 

probs my favourite thing about monzo is the rounding up of spending. every time i spend like £8.64, it takes £9 out my account and puts the spare money into a “savings pot”. so you don’t feel like you’re spending any more, but at the end of most weeks you have an extra few quids in your bank that you didn’t think you had. 

I've been using Monzo for a month now for my day to day spends. So I basically still have my salary paid in to HSBC and all my bills, direct debits and standing orders etc come out of there. Then what is left I transfer to Monzo.

 

The rounding up thing is great - I've now got £50.00 in my "coin jar" from round ups and I also have another savings pot called "Save the date" which uses IFTTT to transfer the pennies on each day (so today for example is 7p+10p+19p) into a "pot" - which amounts to £150 or so over the year. 

 

I've not really noticed the pennies going out and this is building nicely too. 

 

 

[ScouseFox]

36 minutes ago, stripeyfox said:

I've been using Monzo for a month now for my day to day spends. So I basically still have my salary paid in to HSBC and all my bills, direct debits and standing orders etc come out of there. Then what is left I transfer to Monzo.

 

The rounding up thing is great - I've now got £50.00 in my "coin jar" from round ups and I also have another savings pot called "Save the date" which uses IFTTT to transfer the pennies on each day (so today for example is 7p+10p+19p) into a "pot" - which amounts to £150 or so over the year. 

 

I've not really noticed the pennies going out and this is building nicely too. 

 

 

yeah you absolutely don't notice the round ups, just assume things cost every so slightly more than you do. i reckon the last trip to the boozer of the month is usually always "free" cos you forget about the pot and what do you know, all the other times you've spent £9 on a round it was actually £8.30 etc. and suddenly you've got an extra £40 and you're laughing. 

 

i've never had the discipline to let it last more than like 3/4 weeks but i do always think it'd be fun to let it last for like 2 years and see how much i could save up completely without trying. probs pay for a holiday in a year. 

[Izzy]

Not sure if it's the same as Monzo but I got 'Moneybox' about a month ago.

 

Put a tenner a week plus round up's into a stocks & shares ISA.

 

I crap with ISA's and always end up cancelling them and taking the cash after a few months, but hopefully I'll just let this build over time and leave it alone.

 

The app is brilliant and so user friendly that even an old twat like me understands it 

[HowardsBulletHeader]

18 hours ago, Izzy said:

Not sure if it's the same as Monzo but I got 'Moneybox' about a month ago.

 

Put a tenner a week plus round up's into a stocks & shares ISA.

 

I crap with ISA's and always end up cancelling them and taking the cash after a few months, but hopefully I'll just let this build over time and leave it alone.

 

The app is brilliant and so user friendly that even an old twat like me understands it 

I had Moneybox for a while, it was a great app I just changed banks, got lazy and couldn't be arsed to put my new bank details in. 

 

The premise is the same as Monzo for the round ups, just that Moneybox gives you the opportunity to invest your round ups. Monzo is an actual bank with a debit card that you can use day to day, obviously not a Moneybox facility as Moneybox is purely a savings method. 

 

I've got Monzo now, love the "Hot Coral" card more than anything else. I'm a bit of a timid user at the moment and don't have any standing orders or my wages going through it. I just use it for day to day spending. It's easy to categorise payments, nice in one sense, but horrible in another that it's easy to see where you're pissing money up the wall! 

 

Since I started making my own lunch it's made no end of difference to my bank balance at the end of the month! 

[Ginger_Filbert]

I use Monzo mainly for various pots like car insurance, season ticket and holidays etc. 

I use starling for abroad. No fees and you get pretty much the actual exchange rate. 

[Tommy G]

I bank with first direct and want to stay with them and keep my DDs and salary paid into there - however could I set up Monzo and say just transfer some money there for my ''spending'' each month? Or do you have to have a minimum amount of direct debits or your main salary paid in?

 

Thanks  

[Jimothy]

1 minute ago, Tommy G said:

I bank with first direct and want to stay with them and keep my DDs and salary paid into there - however could I set up Monzo and say just transfer some money there for my ''spending'' each month? Or do you have to have a minimum amount of direct debits or your main salary paid in?

 

Thanks  

Just put what you want in. I had Monzo for a couple of months before even putting a penny in.

[Wolfox]

21 minutes ago, Tommy G said:

I bank with first direct and want to stay with them and keep my DDs and salary paid into there - however could I set up Monzo and say just transfer some money there for my ''spending'' each month? Or do you have to have a minimum amount of direct debits or your main salary paid in?

 

Thanks  

I have it as a second account s as does my wife … no requirement to pay in a salary …

 

i simply use it when on holiday

 

 Also…. There’s a handy little overdraft facility … 50p a day For up-to £1k if you’ve forgotten to transfer money from tier savings etc.  
 

Also you can pay cash in at any credit point very easily

[Tommy G]

1 hour ago, Wolfox said:

I have it as a second account s as does my wife … no requirement to pay in a salary …

 

i simply use it when on holiday

 

 Also…. There’s a handy little overdraft facility … 50p a day For up-to £1k if you’ve forgotten to transfer money from tier savings etc.  
 

Also you can pay cash in at any credit point very easily

Or I can pay in cash into first direct for free and trf across? Very rarely I have cash as I have a salaried job so chqs and cash to pay in is a rareity for me.

 

Can you customise the spending categories? i.e the way you analyse the spending. 

 

Thanks 

[Wolfox]

16 minutes ago, Tommy G said:

Or I can pay in cash into first direct for free and trf across? Very rarely I have cash as I have a salaried job so chqs and cash to pay in is a rareity for me.

 

Can you customise the spending categories? i.e the way you analyse the spending. 

 

Thanks 

A rare thing for me too but was handy when I sold something and had £300 in cash the other day!

 

yes…. When you spend money it will automatically try and catagorise it and then you can edit it…. You can set up various savings pots too

 

it will summarise holiday spend in a specific country and will also give you spending monthly reports on what you spent in various categories 

[stripeyfox]

9 hours ago, Tommy G said:

I bank with first direct and want to stay with them and keep my DDs and salary paid into there - however could I set up Monzo and say just transfer some money there for my ''spending'' each month? Or do you have to have a minimum amount of direct debits or your main salary paid in?

 

Thanks  

This is exactly how I use it. 

 

My salary still is paid in to my HSBC account. All my bills etc go from the account and i can calculate what's left and I transfer what's left to Monzo and use it for to day to day spending. 

 

The instant notifications make it easier to keep track of spending and what you have left, whilst I know that my bills are being paid from my HSBC account.