Our mission at Monzo is to make money work for everyone. This includes money that you might need to borrow to achieve goals like buying a car, paying for a course, or improving your home.
We know that the idea of debt can be daunting which is why we’re serious about doing things differently at Monzo. Our borrowing principles are a commitment to being a responsible lender and keep us focused when solving problems and making decisions.
In 2019 we published our ‘lending principles’. Since then we’ve launched Monzo Flex, improved how we work with people in financial difficulty, and we’ve got a lot more customers who borrow money from us. With these changes and lots of feedback from customers on what's important to you when borrowing money, we're refreshing our principles to make sure that they still reflect how we think about borrowing at Monzo.
We're committed to 3 borrowing principles
As part of our commitment to being a responsible lender, we follow 3 principles. This is our promise to you, and shows what you can expect if you borrow money from Monzo (whether that’s a loan, an overdraft, Monzo Flex or other products we build in the future).
1. We keep you safe and feeling in control
We want to protect people from getting into unmanageable debt. So we have a strict criteria of who we lend to, and decide using info from our credit reference agency, as well as our own data.
You can change your mind about borrowing with us any time and repay in full with no charges for doing so. With Monzo Flex or an overdraft, you have control over your credit limit - it’s quick and easy to reduce it in the app or close your account.
2. We're upfront and honest about the costs and considerations of borrowing
We’ll always be upfront about what borrowing will cost you. And we’ll show you what that means in pounds, and as a percentage. Plus, we don’t charge any extra fees for borrowing with us - no fees for taking out a loan, overdraft or Monzo Flex, no fees for paying back early and no late fees.
And if we need to use complex terms for legal reasons (like APR), we’ll always explain them. So nothing’s harder than it needs to be.
APR stands for Annual Percentage Rate. It tells you the rate of interest you’ll pay on an annual basis including any compound interest and expected fees. It won’t include missed payment fees or early repayment fees (but we don’t charge these).
3. We're fair and flexible if your needs change
We know that life can be unpredictable, and things change, so we’ve got a team of people dedicated to giving you personalised support. Especially if something’s wrong it’s important to contact us so we can help, whether that’s losing a job, struggling with mental health, or something totally different).
Depending on your circumstances, we can give you extra time to pay back, come up with a more manageable repayment plan or refer you to free advice organisations, if that's what you need.
You can speak to real friendly humans over live chat through the Monzo app. We're here 24/7 for emergencies, and from 7am to 8pm for anything else.
We’d love to hear your feedback and ideas
We’re sharing these principles with you because we want to be held up to the high standards we’ve set ourselves. We believe in everything we’ve said, so if you see us falling short then please let us know. And as always, we’d love to hear any other thoughts and feedback over on the community forum.