UK challenger bank Monzo announced on Thursday it has formed a partnership with the Financial Capability Lab. According to the Monzo, the Financial Capability Lab was started in 2016 by the Money Advice Service, in partnership with the government’s Behavioural Insights Team. The startup also reported that the Lab is seeking to solve some of the most important money challenges facing people in the UK by testing new technologies and ideas, informed by behavioral science. The Lab also recently published a report, which includes 17 ideas to help people better manage their money.
“The lab aims to help the ‘financially squeezed’: people that have lots of financial commitments, but not much money in savings. These people might find it tricky to cope with sudden changes to their financial circumstances or unexpected bills, and could be more likely to be vulnerable as a result.”
Monzo also noted that through its mobile app, users can control their spending as well as set budgets and put money aside for savings.
“We’re excited to harness the skills and experience of the Money Advice Service and the Behavioural Insights Team to improve the features we already have, and develop new ones too! We want to add as many useful tools to Monzo as we can that give you the power to manage your money more easily, and we want to evaluate them to make sure that they actually work.”
Monzo went on to add that its team already has some ideas about what they’d like to work on, but they’d love to hear what controls customers would like to see that might help they get more control over their money.