@Bookman, @yogi I love this conversation, great ideas and great discussion on concerns and thanks to Xinja for providing us with a platform, these are the sorts of discussions banking customers should be having in order to shape a more money conscious society. Gamifying while promoting awareness must be the goal?
I heard a great feature Monzo have/are introducing, one to stop payments to gambling companies to assist those with gambling addiction.
Wow! That is an interesting idea indeed. Stopping payments to gambling companies. I feel like that’s quite controversial. I know people who would hate that idea… as they are completely in control of their habits and enjoy a good ‘punt’, and yet I know of others who would really benefit from this. Interesting.
Yeah from what I gathered its a feature you can turn on if you feel you have an issue, so the control is completely in your hands however re-enabling gambling spending takes 48hrs if I heard them correctly. It’ll be interesting to see how this is received.
Okay well that’s very interesting. The ability to turn it on or off makes a big difference!
I personally do not think it is a good idea.
a) They are likely to just leave it turned off.
b) Coles did a similar thing but with no on/off option and people just changed bank.
c) They just will end up at the poker machines or the TAB.
d) There is already lots of help out there.
e) Most importantly, banks should not be controlling how people spend their money.
Hi @Bookman - great point - is it going too far? Like all the things that stop studying teenagers not using facebook during exam time - do they just turn them off? - link re Monzo is here http://www.altfi.com/article/4426_ FYI
To jump back onto topic…
Another possible useful feature for the overview of a long term Savings account is a “This time last year” that shows how much you had last year. Maybe even the ability to see a yearly growth chart that has -
month 2015 - amount
month 2016 - amount
month 2017 - amount
The interest gains and losses ideas is still my favorites so far though.
I think I may have butchered the explanation slightly. The user controls whether they are allowed to spend their money on gambling products, they’re allowed to by default, however when they come to turn gambling spending off as an added barrier to curb an addiction of some form they are made aware of a 48hr cooling period before it being able to be turned back on. That’s at least how I understood it. Personally I don’t think it’s a bad thing however you do raise a good point, how far is too far?
I think the feature could be expanded to be an option where you can set how much is taken out of the card for x number of days.
For instance, my son is going to the mall with friends, I could set it to say $50.00 for 1 day and I know he cannot spend anymore than that.
Or if going away for a holiday and my 16 year old daughter is going to be at home I could set my card to $100.00 a day for the duration of my trip.
Or I could be going on holidays and want to limit my daily spending or as a precaution against theft.
I think this is a way to give it multiple uses without isolating a specific group. The problem gambler could still use it to apply limits to their gambling too.
Building on some of the other ideas here, maybe you can introduce gamification concepts to help provide another possible solution to someone struggling with a gambling issue - as part of a suite of options. Gambling can often be a problem for the people who can least afford it. As suggested above, maybe it can also be used to reach goals, etc.
There could be a real opportunity here for trialling all sorts of new or different approaches. So, something like… “Hey, instead of using this money for XYZ, we’ll put it as a bonus interest amount on your savings account next month”.
Yes, people can get money from elsewhere and yes, they can do what they want with their money, but people are not always rational (even though we’d like to think we are) and it’s always worth trying new approaches for difficult problems.
Perhaps by approaching the issue in new or unexpected ways, Xinja might have some success.
That’s actually a really interesting thought @yogi - I know of some people who are so addicted to gambling they will even play ‘the pokies’ on their phone when there is no real money involved. So what if they could do something game-like on their phone, involving money, that is actually healthy!
Interesting… @XinjaNinja.
Yeah… you’re very much trying to approach the issue of the underlying addiction and repetition of the activity, particularly when the line starts looking a little blurry.
So, how can you “redirect” some of the less desired actions towards something that might be more benefical or even neutral (which would still be an improvement).
Lots of varied implementations could be trialled - perhaps a trusted friend or family account holder vouching for you, gets you an extra wedge of % or you get X months free account keeping fee if you fulfill Y criteria, etc etc. - make it pay to do the right thing. Obviously, you need to put failsafes and safeguards in place and you’d have to have items that would be more likely to decrease certain behaviours and increase more desired ones. This could also work for a savings goal outcome.
Off the top of my head…
Round off option for saving -
This is in a sense taking that micro purchase apps idea on saving and expanding on it.
Have a option where you can set your main account to round up any purchases and the difference automatically transferred to another account (Savings) or kids account.
E.g.
Joe spends $12.35 at the cafe on his card.
Round up is set to one of the following options -
Cents
5 dollars
10 dollars
at cents - $0.65 is automatically transferred to account B
at 5 dollars - $2.65 is automatically transferred to account B
at 10 dollars - $7.65 in automatically transferred to account B
I personally would love this feature for both adding to my kids savings and my own. It’s easier to save if you don’t have to think about it 
Monzo offer this option to round to the nearest £1. It’s amazing how quickly you start saving! Definitely a worthwhile feature.
Good shout, I like the round to higher values.
Hey!
I’ve only just heard of Xinja and I really like what you guys are doing. The product that I’m really waiting for is your transaction account. I’m not sure if these have been covered in another post somewhere, but the features that would be the most useful for me personally are as followed:
Samsung/Google/Apple Pay - Love the glow in the dark card, but I really don’t like carrying cards around. Particularly, when I can just pay with my phone.
Competitive interest rates (for savings accounts)
Security - 2 step authentication, biometric authentication, & locking cards directly from the app
Credit score - There are a lot of apps that help you check your credit score, it would be great if you could somehow integrate that into your app
Transparency and CSR programs/initiatives
On another note, I would love to see a rewards credit card product from you sometime in the future.
Hi @millennial - the transaction account will be launching in a few months (subject to our getting a banking licence) and then rolled out to general public over time. But just so you know what we’re planning:
1.Google/apple pay - we are aiming to launch (transaction account) with these but date of android app not yet clear so may impact
2. Competitive interest rates - we will be at a minimum competitive! - we should become more so over time as our general costs lower with scale - this will allow us to pass on more cost savings to customers in the form of higher interest rates for savings/lower for borrowing - this is when the benefit of digital only (lower costs) starts to kick in
3. We are looking now at the best security measures on the app when it’s go to encompass transaction accounts (and therefore increasing levels of security) - all of these are on the table!
4. Credit score - nice idea! we are keen to make this as transparent as we can for people applying for home loans in particular
5. Transparency/CSR - how we ‘execute’ transparency is also on the roadmap - for example we are planning an open api. We’d like to start that as a thread actually- would love to get lots of ‘for instances’ from Xinjas as to what they mean. As to CSR - or social impact - one of our key mission in action statements is to ‘bake societal benefit in to our products’ so we are looking at how to do this. A great example is where a win win is created thanks to an alternative model - are you familiar with lemonade insurance? LOVE their model! This should be another thread too methinks…we’ve had quite a lot on that topic already but would be good to get going in the forum.
Rewards - yes - on the roadmap - lots of options - integration with existing, creation of a xinja reward currency, tying rewards to successful financial outcomes to reward good financial behaviour - all being discussed.
Keep it coming 
I carry about 12 different points/rewards/coffee cards - Flybuys, Woolworths rewards, Gloria Jeans, BCF, Dan Murphies, etc.
Would be great if I could free up my wallet a bit and use my Xinja card for all/most of them. Somehow link my Xinja card account to those points accounts.
@Bookman Phil - quite agree - a dream would be a a centralised points exchange… leave that one with us - wonderful idea:slightly_smiling_face:
If Apple Pay/Google Pay is supported the need for linking Xinja card account to the vast array of loyalty/rewards cards would be negated, as these cards can be stored within the respective mobile wallet. Woolworths for example have full support for both platforms, this seems like it would be time wasted implementing something that’s already supported by existing platforms.