Monzo Surpasses 13 Million Customers as Business Clients Grow

British digital bank Monzo says it now has more than 13 million customers.

The company announced Wednesday (Aug. 6) that it now serves 12.5 million personal banking customers — 20% of U.K. adults — and more than 700,000 business customers, with Monzo adding around 1 million customers just in the last quarter.

Monzo in June released its annual report showing a 48% increase in revenue to 1.2 billion pounds (about $1.6 billion), with customer numbers up 25% to 12.2 million, and its customer deposits rising 48% to 16.6 billion pounds (about $22.5 billion).

“Since then, Monzo has welcomed over 300,000 new customers every month, with May and June the biggest months on record for new sign-ups,” the release added.

Two-thirds of these new sign-ups are coming from word-of-mouth recommendations, the company said. This includes Monzo’s 13 millionth customer, a woman in her 50s, who opened an account following a referral.

The company also touted some of its newer offerings, such as “Undo Payments,” which it described as an “industry-first security feature,” giving customers a 10-60-second window to cancel a bank transfer if  there’s been a mistake.

“Monzo is fast becoming the bank of choice for small business owners, especially female founders,” the release added. “Today, 40% of Monzo Business customers are women — more than double the U.K. average, where only 15% of SMEs [small and medium-sized enterprises] are female-led. This demonstrates Monzo’s unique appeal to female entrepreneurs looking to start, run and grow their businesses.”

Research by PYMNTS Intelligence shows that many smaller businesses, while valuing the personal services of smaller, local banks, still value digital platforms.

Last month, Monzo was fined 21,091,300 pounds (about $28.5 million) by the U.K.’s Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for insufficient financial crime controls. The fine covered a 20-month period between 2018 and 2020, in which Monzo failed to establish and conduct proper customer onboarding, risk assessment and transaction monitoring.

“Monzo onboarded customers on the basis of limited, and in some cases, obviously implausible information, such as customers using well-known London landmarks as an address,” Therese Chambers, FCA joint executive director of enforcement and market oversight, said in a news release.

In a statement issued to PYMNTS, Monzo CEO TS Anil said the FCA’s investigation covered a period that concluded three years ago and “draw[s] a line under issues that have been resolved and are firmly in the past.”

The things Monzo learned during that period allowed it to make improvements to its financial crime prevention measures, Anil added.