Episode 04 · 27:09
When 'lifestyle design' doesn't go to plan. Our Monzo feature request
Losing a Monzo card in Bali exposes the gap between a life designed for freedom and the mundane systems that freedom still depends on. Dan and Tom turn the mishap into a product critique, imagining better card tracking and replacement inside a modern banking experience.
The episode asks a grounded lifestyle-design question: what happens when the plan meets midnight, travel and a missing piece of plastic?
The useful bits
What to take with you
- Design a flexible life with recovery plans for the ordinary failures that still happen.
- The most revealing customer journey often begins when something goes wrong.
- A good replacement flow should preserve access while containing risk.
- Product ideas become sharper when described from the stressful moment the user is actually in.
Watch the conversation
The original episode.
Full conversation
Transcript
Transcript generated from YouTube captions. Dan/Tom speaker attribution is AI-assisted and may occasionally be incorrect.
So you know what's just happened I've basically lost my monzo card as well so um for those of you that have just joined us um I am actually in Bali right now um and we were in Singapore um and then we moved to Bali and basically it's now it's like gone midnight oh well it's half 12. and basically we we spent a whole day in this like uh restaurant um because it's got Wi-Fi and stuff and I was working and then I was.
Like cool now it's time to leave um went outside to the reception area trying to use the word uh try to use the app grab because grab is the Uber out here and basically it won't accept any of my cards so I'm I'm signed up to use my card but it won't it says no we can't do this payment so I added a bunch of different cards it didn't work so then I was like cool I'm gonna have to use cash.
So I go and speak to the receptionist and basically the receptionist is like yeah sure I can I can drive you over to a cash machine you can get cash out I'll drive you back and then you can get in the cab so dry like go in this buggy or this golf cart but you know like a six-person golf cart and I'm like oh this is kind of cool so we drive like two minutes down the road to this single.
Room where there's a single cash point in it so I put my card in obviously get the money out and I think sometimes the combination or like the order is different sometimes your card comes out first then your cash comes out other places your cash comes out then your card comes out now I think because he was waiting in his in my getaway vehicle which is this golf buggy cart thing and um I'm like gotta get home I don't want.
Kimmy to get cold while she's waiting kind of thing in this um reception although it's pretty humid here anyway and I get my cash I get the receipt and I just get in the golf cart so then I'm like cool driving back this two minute driving I'm like I should tip this guy for doing this because this was really helpful of him because this is not our hotel but he he wouldn't know this kind of thing and then got back and I tip him.
He's like oh thanks man and then I literally walk off um back to camera and then I'm like right cool I've got cash now so I'll book the taxi book the taxi and then I'm like hang on where's my Monster card gun where is it I'm like did I look did I so I I like I don't have it on me I walked over I looked where I tipped because I was like oh maybe it's Spilled Out when.
I did it then or something and then I was like I've lost it need to go back to cash money so while my taxi is on his way I went back to the same guy I'm like I'm so sorry I think I've left my card in the machine and he was like it's probably going to swallow it you know because machines after three minutes or whatever if you don't take it as well as it right sounds like cool really sorry.
That you're gonna have to take me back so you basically then vacuum the golf cart drive to the cash point he then says to the local guy like uh this guy's left his card or whatever um but in the local dialect kind of things I didn't understand what he said so I then walk in check it's not there so I'm like cool freeze like freeze the card so annoyingly and I think um this is probably like the second time ever.
That I've done something like this but it's it's irritating no matter how little you do it or how much you do it it's irritating but thankfully it's monzo as in the very good but I'm like do I order a new card or not so thankfully got back the taxi guy was guy was like calling me like where are you and I was like oh I'm coming I'm coming because I'm like in this golf car basically but um yeah I finally got back.
So I'm glad because I otherwise I would have been cashless and then you know having to walk back and and stuff but thankfully I got the cash before I lost the card which is the good order rather than using the card when you need to get cash but I've got back I'm assuming you've got it's just yeah it's just annoying isn't it so I'm more annoyed at myself because I'm usually pretty good come in as hot are you yeah I'm coming.
In hot with the fact that I lost my Monster card so now now I'm like I need to speak to monzo like do I ask monzo to send it out to Bali it'll probably take seven days maybe like I mean I'm here for 50. not worth it yeah I mean Kevin's still got her monzo curve so I might as well just like transfer over and then she can use hers the card rather than the account don't you yeah yeah so you can move the money.
To other accounts at least yeah that's it and I think ultimately I think the card probably was swallowed but it felt so bizarre because I'm not like that usually and Kim was like chances are because your getaway vehicle was waiting you felt the pressure and you were like come on we're rubbing this back let's go I'm freaking waiting for the receipt but not the card but I I believe it's because they did the the uh have it come.
The different order so cash comes first then the card it must be because I don't think I lost it in the it was like a two minute buggy ride I don't think I lost it but nonetheless now we will never know and that person that's found in monzaka is like cool let's spend some money you can't because it's frozen you never know that person might be listening to this podcast oh yeah for 50 years time yeah like it just washes up.
Somewhere and someone searches Dan Rylan because it's on the card and they find out that I have this podcast in episode three they talk about the fact that they lost it in Bali yeah good marketing Ploy oh yeah but monzo like well monzo's cool anyway I mean I'm using card to buy stuff a lot of the time but if I freeze it then I can't do Apple pay but Apple pay doesn't they don't really take Apple pay they want.
Your physical card to put in the card machine so it's a bit uh okay quirky but you know roll with the punches right I mean at least you can use your card and it's not it's not cash and cash only but but yeah anyway that was my that was my kind of story hard life of the traveler yeah yeah that's it but tell you what like doing this travel life of you know Beach while your own video calls and.
Stuff is obviously with the camera off um and very much mute kind of thing so no one catches the background noise but um yeah it's a good experience so if you ever can get to to this setup then it's quite nice I mean I was it's very much a lifestyle design I keep on saying with camera that like we're prototyping uh the fact that I'm kind of doing UK hours so my hours broadly speaking of 4 P.M till 12 midnight and a little bit so.
What time is it for you now it's 42 minutes past 12. at night it's quarter two six in the afternoon uh evening yeah so it's like what seven hours seven hours or yeah seven hours I think it is so um so yeah but I I quite yeah seven I I like the fact that technology enables us to do this as in you're still in the UK in North Wales and I'm here and it's like as if we're in the same room and and now.
I'm in valuable places so I think that's really cool but um yeah looking forward to trying out the lifestyle of traveling and working at the same time and see how that fits and and works together but it's been great so far I've only been here basically 24 hours I think I've already lost my card I was fine I was fine in Singapore that's fine in Singapore I'm one of those guys that's like you know check your cars and your cards and keys.
Before you leave the place you know because that's embedded into your brain like scorned back to your brain from your parents right I guess all the um Instagram pyramid schemes to work out in barley they don't tell you about losing your card and the the frustrations of normal life getting at you yeah this will be this will be so um you know like NatWest or the HSBC adverts of like you've lost your card abroad and they're filming someone abroad and they've lost.
A card in the good old cash machine and they type in these four numbers and then it gives you money like basically monzo should use me as a PR stunt Lucy card in Bali and I'll just like video it and I could sell the video back to them oh yeah actually maybe that's it I will promote the freezing feature by saying like Vlog the fact oh I've just lost my card and now I don't know what to do and.
Then like and then you know them to uh monzo to pay for you to be in Iceland or something just to freeze your card on this nice holiday you know supposedly I think either Iceland the country are suing Iceland the brand or Iceland the brand is suing Iceland the country or something because Iceland the brand want to keep hold of their IP and they want to be known as Iceland and not have to change their name or anything so I think it's something like.
That because I think Iceland the country might be trying to buy trademarks or something in that sphere so no one can call themselves Iceland or something but I thought that was quite a funny thing to have that's very interesting there was also um a Welsh a Welsh company called aurori or something like that which is a name of a place and they couldn't trademark it because someone else had trademarked snowdonia and I'm like wow you can trademark snowdonia snowdonia is like an area is.
It not or something like that yeah it's a big clothing brand that's trademarked snowdonia and then this small brand got a letter to be like you need to stop selling t-shirt jumpers and stuff and then I think they were like let's change it to Welsh then and it'll be fine but I don't think that washed or whatever I think it's probably because you know maybe there's not so much support for trademarking stuff in Welsh um as English but.
I I don't know I don't know interesting but yeah that's that's my Hut take that is your hot lifestyle design the the on the living on the edge of Lifestyle design basically yeah so lifestyle design but with Humanity yeah with human failures with the humans that fail the design and even if it was a robot chances are the human programmed the robots who is always coming back to a human failing it but it is what it is that's how the.
Cookie crumbs so so what how would you pitch an idea to monzo to fix whatever's happened for future for when they listen to us when we're billionaires we're great ideas they should basically have um region specific printers that print and airdrop new cards so they could drone in and use like a 3D printer in every Hotel yeah like either that they hijack 3D printer the 3D printer ecosystem so you can three 3D print a new Coral card or whatever color right.
Because it doesn't matter but it would need the chip in it somehow so maybe they would have local areas like you know one one like designated monzo wrap for each country that they that they're in or or support I should say so then you can basically airdrop like physically drawn over a new card because I'm thinking cool chances are they print their cards in the UK or the states because they're in the states right they're in USA and they're in London or.
In the UK so I would assume because I'm in Cardiff as well they've got a place in Canada I would assume that they print in the UK and send to the UK but if you're abroad would they print it in UK and send it to you like special delivery or whatever but I mean they might do it for free on a one-off chance if you you know if I tweeted about it monzo come and save the day I thought oh my God and make a big.
Like the other thing ultimately if you drop someone's create a whole podcast about it yeah yeah listen to this podcast how great they are or not so yeah I would basically either get the ability to pre-3d print the cards all have a local printing station kind of like like um not Drop Shipping kind of like um what's it called when you have like t-shirts and they get printed in another country for you and you just send it it's kind of Drop Shipping but.
It's just like on-demand printing right yeah and that would be just in every other country and then if they were able to either motorbike it over to me so it was quicker delivery or drone it send over a drone but you know you always see those videos of Amazon drones getting stuck on the pavement or whatever or someone will like knock it over or vandalize it so they'll be like where did my card go es yeah shame you don't have like a if.
Apple buy monzo and then have like a find my feature in the card that then you know exactly where it is when you run back to those situations yeah I definitely think that that should be better because you know the whole like tracking wallets or like like phones now phones you can track them tracking wallets where you'd have the cards in you'd have to have the tracker or the Apple tag in the wallet but I'm like but what happens if you lose a card from.
That wallet it doesn't matter but if you could build it in um the card then that would be loads better but I mean they have crazy that you can do so all they need to do is map that same design even if you like pay to upgrade your card to be like a find my mechanism I think that would be quite cool yeah in between this weight until everything moves over to Apple pay and then you won't need yeah I think.
Especially if you're abroad then they're more likely to you know still want the chip of the card to go in but if they were if there were Apple pay Apple pay would like solve my problem it wouldn't matter that I did it but in losing it I have to freeze it which then means Apple pay doesn't work or would you be able to chat with monzo to get a new card so your online one is a new one and then input it into your.
Wallet because they do have if you upgrade they do have like digital cards right as in like you can purchase something and then you burn it and then like you get rid of it but um yeah yeah it's just unfortunate that they don't really accept Apple pay here um they want the physical card which is fine which is fine but uh but yeah so I would say if monzo are listening have a army of 3D printers or printer.
Card printers somehow that are in different regions that then they can airdrop you the card through a drone infrastructure so then it's not stuck from roads and stuff so I mean you could even be like you know how the Apple have recently brought out the satellite stuff where if you're on a real like if you've got no signal you can actually tap into like a satellite thing like you know once in a while when I'm in the middle.
Of nowhere and I lose my monzo card then this like you know I I literally wouldn't I literally wouldn't mind paying like a one-off fee of like I don't know you you would pay 20 pounds right now if they were drone over a card and like here's the card especially if I need it tomorrow or like 50 Quid like yeah I mean even a little bit more right if I was like suck my problems like a Batman sign of the monzo m in the sky.
Yeah if there was a monzo m and then you know they collaborated with Elon Musk and used his satellites to like rock it into a into some sort of like the nearest park and then you just go to the nearest park and then you unscrew the top and then you have like like smoke comes out and the monzo card turns up or something I thought that would be funny because Sheamus it isn't like um SIM cards that just everything.
Is just a card with it and because it's an NFC isn't it and shame you can't just set it of like monzo gives you the card to your Apple and then you set the card so then you can burn it and then you have that choice of if you want a card or not that'd be yeah like programmable like empty cards that can be like programmed on the NFC by that could be worldwide yeah yeah so then you have.
Control over burning or buying yeah but then again yeah yeah we'll be like bring on an image burn or bow yeah um it's kind of like what What's Hot or Not isn't it on the scale I think in some ways it's all because we're trying to go backwards of like people want physical cards so if you lose a physical card how do you restore that but really e sims's thing like I'm using an esim now which is like weird because I.
Literally scanned a QR code and now I have you know another I don't have another number but I have another carrier which allows me to use data which has been like really slick and easy so yeah I'm trying all these like new stuff but I'm not trying to lose my card to experiment of like how good is it to lose your card I'm not trying to do that but you should Vlog it it'll become Millions yeah this one like sub.
Story like that's my card so yeah I haven't chatted to monzo support yet but I'm sure there'll be like hey we can either send it to you and it'll be some hey now you said the s word I'm gonna have to say that this podcast is exclusive like uh mature yeah yeah 17 Flats I was thinking when I I think you said it last time on like you said it in a podcast before and I was like I'm just.
Gonna upload I don't market for kids and YouTube but it's kind of like you know sometimes you can say oh it is swear to the podcast but that's if you think the s word is swearing but it's fine yeah that's my that's my hard take unfortunately I can't take exciting so do you have much plan for your barley trip other than hopefully not losing more cards well I think it's like experimenting with you know like like I keep saying.
Lifestyle design of like experiment because both of us work with just an internet connection um then it's quite easy so like Kim has been like down scaling all of her Tech to be like so she's got a small midi keyboard that's um basically an octave and a half like a piano keyboard not a computer keyboard which is probably just a little bit larger than a laptop it would fit in a backpack and um and obviously these microphones are pretty good for whacking.
In the in your in your backpack and I don't need an audio interface because it's just like straight from USB micro USB to USBC um which is helpful so yeah it's like learning with if you need obviously we're we're super lucky that we're both in digital as in music is still digital so if you can get that set up then you can transfer things into like smaller devices um to move things around but I recognize that doesn't happen with everybody but.
Like if you were a teacher for example or a tutor you could basically do things remotely and you'd buy a tablet so you could draw stuff and or whatever right so it's just about optimizing the tech and the things that we have to to like have it all in a backpack really that's cool and I guess by going minimal you have to be a bit more creative sometimes because you have those limitations of small items and stuff 100 and I think.
Like going on holiday when you've got done it a couple of times you start to notice like like some key things that are like important to have so what I've started to I've noticed two things really like one I always bring an extension cable with me because you just end up how like you'll end up finding one plug in the hotel room whatever and then you need multiple charging things so I have a an Ikea like um three plug and two USB extension.
Thing and also that's kind of like protective right because the fuse of the extension cord would probably blow before the fuse of my Apple Chargers I assume so um not that it's surge protected but we'll try that next week yeah so like extension cord really helpful and then like the second thing is um you know for like you shower stuff I don't have like a shower bag so I just bought like freezer bags not ones with zippers but just like large feedback and.
Then you can just tie a bunch of stuff together so like you know you've face creams your suntan lotions your toothpastes your shower gels your you know face wash and all that stuff you just bang it in one bag and tie it and then you know as you go along you rip it open and then you you know create another one obviously I don't think the plastic is biodegradable which is a faux fire of mine so I'm gonna get canceled.
Now but you know I'm using them sparingly but just like simple like small plastic bags uh like helpful to have for like and then become more Echo as time goes on yeah plastic bags that you can see through them so then it's not like a carrier bag because you can't see through certain characters so then you can like quickly see oh right this is where my toothbrushes or this is where my thing similar to like really you know.
People that have makeup bags or wash bags really they should be see-through so then you can see what's in them um I think that's kind of unfair so those are my two travel hot takes because I guess it's been in the pipeline for how long two plus years you're meant to go out yeah basically Kim and I have like built up to this just before covid we wanted to to experiment with one month in Bali and we had to cancel it because code was.
Hitting in that February so we canceled the whole thing but now we finally you know aligned it all to be able to do it this month um the month so it's the February before went into lockdown into the March was it yeah I think we basically booked either the entire of March and it was in February where it's like right things are kicking off right we're not we're not going to go abroad it's a bit too risky because there's too much unknown so we.
Then canceled it could have got locked down in Bali for like a year or two yeah I mean it wouldn't be a bad place it would be a bad place to be locked down so long as you don't lose your monster car first week last month okay yeah day zero day one First 48 Hours like I'm a business owner but really you just like become a Trump by day 30 because you've lost all your cars yeah and they need a physical car they don't.
Take up and that's it you realize how Reliant you are on like certain infrastructure and and how like now when you travel abroad yes there's loads of local people trying to like um kind of hassle you for like taxi which is fine I'm not bothered about that because people got to make levels right but like instantly when you walked out in Singapore they were like right here are the basically the Ubers events of Singapore so like you can download these.
Apps and that will sort you out because it's broadly speaking you know safer in a um physical sense because you hope that the validation of this person's registered the ID and so long as the person that is in the photo is actually still the person in the car because I know people switch cars and stuff as well as you then don't feel like you're being screwed over when they overcharge you or anything like that and also I was able.
To pay by card so um there's less need for withdrawing money which then means you're saving on conversion rates and all that stuff so there's a nicer tea to all that stuff so I'm kind of like used to the benefit of go into a different country and kind of utilizing the the their version of Uber or their version of um like those apps and and stuff as well that's interesting so yeah apart from negatives of losing cards what what is a positive that.
Stands out I think um traveling makes you realize how small the UK is in the grand scheme of things and if you don't realize that already with just generally the access that we have to info information and news and stuff but it just makes you appreciate different cultures and um be respectful of of that um and how generally speaking there is there is innovation everywhere and I really like the way that Singapore have got some stuff set up.
Um with how they do their um their cities because it's super super green like everywhere there's trees much more than how you would typically feel um in kind of like the UK or whatever so like some of the infrastructure choices are a little bit different and I think like they benefit from that and then in Bali and stuff like it's very um focused on like um tourism and stuff so there's a bunch of like opportunity that for people when.
They when they do like create their bike company or they sell um souvenirs or they run a massage parlor or whatever it is right there's like there's so much money in just providing for tourism so long as the tourism is like stable obviously covert threw that out so yeah there's lots of provision and broadly speaking there's loads of nice people that like of course there's the odd moments here and there but um but yeah everybody's nice everybody's friendly and it's it's nice and you're.
Like you're meeting different people different cultures different languages and it's just um you realize there's a bit more to just London or just you know North Wales or whatever so um it's good I always like that feeling you're much much smaller than you think which in my mind is like inspiring because there's lots of opportunities off the back of that but someone else might be like this is overwhelming but yeah for some reason I don't feel that that way which is good.
It's just the way that I'm wired happy to be wired but as long as you don't tell it to a gym guy you're much smaller than you think yeah go down that's it and yeah the same again like restaurants or gyms like barley seams like because it's hot you don't really want to be eating like chocolate and stuff as you normally would or snacks so you're a little bit healthier because you're snacking less it's too hot so it's uncomfortable so you're walking and.
Sweating a bit more which is which is good burning off the calories you know you're drinking more water so I think General kind of lifestyle is improved because of the Heat and also just um what you feel comfortable eating which is which is good as well but um yeah if you get opportunities to travel I think it's good to do it one just for like soaking in like what you appreciate what you don't what you don't appreciate like.
How you can change your life and adapt your life all or kind of like Inspire yourself and and that kind of stuff so and it doesn't be abroad you know it could be just literally like different parts of the UK even like there's different like subcultures even in the UK you know yeah that's the thing it's different scales isn't it and that's the thing you can do it with friends or family even if you do have that online element that you.
Can do on the cheap model of the story you can lose your Monza card anywhere yeah and on that note I've got to jump to another call so keep hammering but don't lose your monster call monzo cards I can't even speak either it's too late till next time Stay classy.