Monzo/Starling Banking/Revolut

englishpremier · 30 Aug 2019 at 16:33

Heads up for those that get paid in one currency and spend in another. Starling Euro account is now charging 0.4% conversion fee. Still miles cheaper than making GBP to euro transfers direct, but a little inconvenience nonetheless.

One way around it is to transfer to to Revolut in GBP then back direct into the Starling Euro account. Of course you could pay direct from the Revolut account but many are cautious about leaving any significant sums with them for a decent period of time.

Mahonyy · 30 Aug 2019 at 16:34

Staring:

Most high street banks charge you €6-€40 for euro payments and many of them also add hidden exchange rate markups of 2-3%*. From the 1st September, if you want to convert currency, we’ll add a transparent 0.4% fee to cover the cost of running the account – but holding, sending and receiving euros with Starling is, as ever, completely free.

LeeUK · 30 Aug 2019 at 16:36

I used both Starling and Monzo in ROI and it just exchanged at the Mastercard rate. I never use cash over there.

Swifty55 · 25 Sep 2019 at 11:30

My house sale goes through next week. Will a Monzo account be a good thing just to transfer that money to it and use it to save more deposit on my next purchase?

Will just be used purely to transfer savings across each month.

Davie die kabouter · 25 Sep 2019 at 11:35

Got this email from Revolut, seems they're branching out in to share trading.

https://www.revolut.com/legal/trading/

Anyone more educated than me on these things want to chime in on this? They seem to get a bit of a bad rap at times, not sure if this is too risky.

LiE · 25 Sep 2019 at 12:33

Monzo Plus getting a new team and a from scratch approach.

https://community.monzo.com/t/monzo-plus-a-fresh-start-with-some-fresh-faces/80726

Junglist · 25 Sep 2019 at 14:04

Nice. I am on the fence about dumping my Natwest Platinum account and joining the monzo benefits. Would work out roughly at the same price and has contents insurance included

LiE · 25 Sep 2019 at 14:27

JunglistE said:
Nice. I am on the fence about dumping my Natwest Platinum account and joining the monzo benefits. Would work out roughly at the same price and has contents insurance included

Current Monzo Plus has been removed, the post explains it a bit better. They are going back to the drawing board because the forum blew up with rage after they released the bundles.

The_Abyss · 25 Sep 2019 at 23:12

Davie die kabouter said:
Anyone more educated than me on these things want to chime in on this? They seem to get a bit of a bad rap at times, not sure if this is too risky.

Follow the breadcrumbs and look for Sapia Partners LLP. Try and unravel the myriad of passporting permissions to operate between here and Lithuania. Ask why multiple legal entities are involved with the effect of distancing the brand away from the money and the UK regulator. Question yourself as to whether you understand how the operation works, and what the risks to your money are.

LiE · 26 Sep 2019 at 11:58

Monzo have released their Bill Pots and Salary Sorter today - https://monzo.com/blog/2019/09/26/introducing-salary-sorter-and-bills-pots

These are really good, makes having Monzo my main account possible now.

ubern00b · 26 Sep 2019 at 12:05

LiE said:
Monzo have released their Bill Pots and Salary Sorter today - https://monzo.com/blog/2019/09/26/introducing-salary-sorter-and-bills-pots

These are really good, makes having Monzo my main account possible now.

As a matter of interest, what other bank account can do these things that now make using Monzo as your main account possible and not before?

LiE · 26 Sep 2019 at 12:14

ubern00b said:
As a matter of interest, what other bank account can do these things that now make using Monzo as your main account possible and not before?

Previously I had a NationWide account for my direct debits and Monzo was our joint spending account. Now I can move all our salaries into the Monzo account, use the salary sorter to put money into pots (savings, petrol, groceries, bills, etc), including a bill pot where all the DD/SO come from. This leaves me with a balance in Monzo that is reflective of our monthly spending allowance. All of the committed spending/budgeted costs can now sit in pots away from daily spending. The bill pot is the real game changer, as it means the money is ring-fenced and you don't have to manually move money out to cover bills.

Essentially before I had to have a separate account to ring-fence the bills from the spending.

Deleted member 77746 · 26 Sep 2019 at 12:18

They are also removing the referral scheme.

ubern00b · 26 Sep 2019 at 12:33

LiE said:
Previously I had a NationWide account for my direct debits and Monzo was our joint spending account. Now I can move all our salaries into the Monzo account, use the salary sorter to put money into pots (savings, petrol, groceries, bills, etc), including a bill pot where all the DD/SO come from. This leaves me with a balance in Monzo that is reflective of our monthly spending allowance. All of the committed spending/budgeted costs can now sit in pots away from daily spending. The bill pot is the real game changer, as it means the money is ring-fenced and you don't have to manually move money out to cover bills.

Essentially before I had to have a separate account to ring-fence the bills from the spending.

But this is not unique to Monzo, all accounts work this way. It just makes it easier now.

My wife and I have been using Starling like this for nearly a year now. One of the best things you can do is call up all your bill providers and change the date your bills come out to as close to payday as possible. Makes a huge difference for us and our monthly spending/insights. However, putting all your bills in a "goal" as Starling call it is what we do now and just move the money out when it gets taken. The ability to assign a pot as "bills" and have it taken directly from there is absolutely a great function though.

Oh, and who wouldn't want to get paid a day early! Brill

LiE · 26 Sep 2019 at 12:57

ubern00b said:
But this is not unique to Monzo, all accounts work this way. It just makes it easier now.

My wife and I have been using Starling like this for nearly a year now. One of the best things you can do is call up all your bill providers and change the date your bills come out to as close to payday as possible. Makes a huge difference for us and our monthly spending/insights. However, putting all your bills in a "goal" as Starling call it is what we do now and just move the money out when it gets taken. The ability to assign a pot as "bills" and have it taken directly from there is absolutely a great function though.

Oh, and who wouldn't want to get paid a day early! Brill

But that's my point, I don't want to move money manually for bills, so bill pots was a must have for me. Without that the best solution was to keep all my bills in a separate account away from my spending account. Now they are the same account.

ubern00b · 26 Sep 2019 at 13:10

LiE said:
But that's my point, I don't want to move money manually for bills, so bill pots was a must have for me. Without that the best solution was to keep all my bills in a separate account away from my spending account. Now they are the same account.

Yea I get that, my point was just you framed it as "NOW I can use Monzo as my daily driver" where you could have before. These new features make your life easier but its not something you currently enjoy.

Raymond Lin · 26 Sep 2019 at 13:36

LiE said:
Previously I had a NationWide account for my direct debits and Monzo was our joint spending account. Now I can move all our salaries into the Monzo account, use the salary sorter to put money into pots (savings, petrol, groceries, bills, etc), including a bill pot where all the DD/SO come from. This leaves me with a balance in Monzo that is reflective of our monthly spending allowance. All of the committed spending/budgeted costs can now sit in pots away from daily spending. The bill pot is the real game changer, as it means the money is ring-fenced and you don't have to manually move money out to cover bills.

Essentially before I had to have a separate account to ring-fence the bills from the spending.

How does it know what my bills are going to be before they arrive?

Or is it simply a rough personal guess on your part?

LiE · 26 Sep 2019 at 13:47

Raymond Lin said:
How does it know what my bills are going to be before they arrive?

Or is it simply a rough personal guess on your part?

The way it works is that when the DD/SO is taken out the amount will be pulled from the bill pot automatically for the same amount. It doesn't actually take it from the bill pot directly. You would need to know how much the bills cost to put the money into the pot to cover it. They are adding a summary feature soon so you can see based on previous DD/SO amounts how much you'll need to put into the bill pot to cover everything.

Kreeeee · 26 Sep 2019 at 14:42

englishpremier · 26 Sep 2019 at 18:01

ubern00b said:
Yea I get that, my point was just you framed it as "NOW I can use Monzo as my daily driver" where you could have before. These new features make your life easier but its not something you currently enjoy.

That seems to be the trend, people getting excited about everything Monzo does. I've taken a look at my Monzo account and I still find Starling better. And use Revolut (sparingly) for some foreign payments. Just can't seem to trust Monzo, after they backtracked on foreign ATM withdrawal fees, then got into the business account market after claiming they never would, there are a few other niggling little things too. Then there is the fact that it is the most in debt, and least likely to make a profit of all these digital accounts. The funding won't keep coming forever. I wonder who's going to buy it up.