All banks benefit from this though and if you really care it’s not hard to transfer your money elsewhere.
Correct. That’s why I said ‘market’. Banks and building societies across the board are making a killing right now on deposits.
What I was trying to infer was that we should be cautious about celebrating profitability of fintechs in those circumstances. Dead easy to make money when you can make 0.5% by lodging everything at the BoE and still offer a market leading rate…
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I came back from Poland a couple of weeks ago and exclusively used Monzo whilst I was there. What was intriguing was that on almost every occasion, I was offered DCC to sterling, and on almost every occasion where this happened, either the cashier told me to use the zloty option, or memorably, one in a restaurant hit the latter without me asking.
This is normal. I’ve had this pretty much everywhere I’ve ever gone with Monzo etc and presumably any other “FX Free” card.
This is a big plus for the Currency Cards such as the HSBC Global Money, you don’t have this issue.
If I recall correctly, wasn’t this practice banned for debit cards? It was a real issue in Spain 10-15 years ago, where vendors would often refuse to perform the transaction in Euros saying ‘their systems didn’t allow it’ - absolute rubbish, it was just an instruction from management. This led me more than once either leaving the goods on the counter and walking off, or paying in cash. They even tried it on with CaxtonFX and FairFX cards, which were denominated in Euros.
I’ve never had it in Germany, France, Italy, Switzerland, or Luxembourg since then, which is why I am mystified it’s happening now. Indeed, it didn’t happen in Poland in 2019 either. I took note of the exchange rate offered, and when I bought a pair of jeans in C &A, I was charged £42, and the DCC price displayed was £44. It was every single shop and restaurant.
Are you surprised at being given a choice, or are you surprised by the cashier advising you to take the local currency option?
Either way, this doesn’t seem to be a Monzo-specific thing.
So what is the situation with reopening closed Monzo accounts?
Seems to be a mystery. I’ll try and see what happens.
Seems a bit hit and miss. You probably can’t reopen a closed account but seem to be able to open a new one sometimes if you leave it a month after closing the old one. Also seen fine if you’ve closed it via CASS.
I’ve sent an email but I’ve just tried to open an account and it doesn’t have an issue with my email being the same but it says my number is already in use so I can’t do it myself.
I think this could be to the contrary tbh.
If someone has CASS away once, why would Monzo be in a rush to let that customer come back, just to possibly do it again (for another switch incentive elsewhere)??
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How does it work with other banks when you switch away. Can you just open another account at some point?
The only bank I’ve every switched from is Santander but I’ve never attempted to open an account with them again.
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Yes, you can certainly apply to open another account, having switched away once, with many banks, as I have successfully done so with Halifax and Santander.
The issue with some of the fintech banks could be (a) policy or (b) technical.
Some of the banks where the mobile number is key, are (or appear to be) reluctant to adminstrate returning customers as their IT seems to require a manual override/erasure of the mobile number aligned to the closed account, in order to allow it to be assigned to a fresh account.
At the end of the day, whatever the rationale behind their decision, each bank has the ultimate right to refuse to accept any application, just as we (the customer) have the right to close accounts and not bank with them any more.
Though I am sure you realise that already.
No harm in asking Monzo though.
I joined them in 2017, just as I did Starling in the same year, and have not left them, so I have not experienced the frustrations of trying to return.
I have also been with Chase since day one of their launch in the UK, so have not had to try and return to them, though I know many have tried to return and been given somewhat different responses regarding the length of time they have to wait in order to apply again 
Bit of a guessing game all round really.
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I certainly won’t be closing account’s anymore. Clearly not worth it.
Indeed. I CASS’d away a long time back. They’ve resolutely refused me access ever since (stopped trying a while back now, anyway).
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I always open a 2nd account with whoever I’m switching from before I switch. If nothing else I’ve still got access to any savings accounts and the app
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That was my tactic with Santander.
With Virgin, I’d opened 4 (you could then), so had three to burn, and with Halifax I had three Reward accounts, sacrificed one for equivalent of two years rewards in switch incentive (Co-op £125).
No available switches left for me now.
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I CASSed my original Monzo account and had the same issue with my mobile number already being in use when I tried to open a new account. I contacted them and they deleted my number so that I could use it again.
This was a couple of years ago and it appears that they may have tightened things up since then. There’s a long thread on their forum about it.
I brought this issue up a while ago as they used to be very smug about the fact you could reopen an account after 30 days and Starling made you wait a year.
Now it seems most people can’t reopen accounts at all.
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This. I have closed and been successful at re-opening in the past, I was able to get to the point of opening one the other day (I was just seeing if this would be possible mainly) and it was working fine. They don’t seem to have a clear policy (which is par for the course)
It was only ever really one response. “There’s a 12 month limit” and when people hit that they changed their mind and said “maybe in the future”. I’m not aware of anyone who has been successful in rejoining.
It’s their choice at the end of the day. Personally I feel it’s a dumb one for any bank as there can be many reasons why someone might close and want to re-open an account in the future. I get the whole rinsing for CASS bonus etc but I’d imagine any bank accepts that a percentage will join for the switch bonus and go elsewhere when another comes along.
A 3 month window would be the one for me.
Yeah, I was referring to anecdotal evidence/comments on forums about the length of time for Chase. For example, some have claimed that at one time it was a 30-day limit! Never seen that from official channels.
Like you, I have ever only seen two “official” responses from Chase, both, I believe, were on Twitter replies.
One stated “12-months”, as you have said, and the other something along the lines of “we are currently unable to accept returning customers at this time”. The latter of which sounds like, and we’re in no hurry to either.
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