The deal
Money Dashboard is a virtual ‘personal finance assistant’ that aims to help people make better choices with their spending by showing all their accounts in one place. It was voted Best Personal Finance App at the British Bank Awards in 2020.
Launched in 2010, the app gives you an overview of all your spending using graphs and tables. You can add multiple current accounts, savings accounts and credit cards to your dashboard so you can see exactly where your money is going each month.
Money Dashboard is part of a new wave of budgeting apps that use Open Banking, where banks must share a customer’s information if they request it. With read-only access to your accounts, you can’t move or spend money on the app, but it can be a very useful tool for budgeting, and therefore saving more.
User-friendliness
Moneyhub can take a little time to get set up, as you have to connect to all your accounts (some are easier than others), but once you are up and running it’s very straightforward. It will save you the time and effort of logging into separate accounts, and trying to keep track of your spending and saving across different providers manually.
Personalised graphs let you see exactly where you are spending and on what, making budgeting and reaching saving goals a lot easier.
Is it safe?
Yes, it is as safe as any bank. Money Dashboard is regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). It has bank level authentication and security and uses encryption technology. This means it doesn’t actually store any of your login details such as passwords.
As it’s a read-only service, should your phone get stolen or hacked it wouldn’t be possible to buy anything using your Moneyhub app.
Sustainable option
Moneyhub brings all of your existing financial accounts into one place, and therefore doesn’t have its own sustainable option for your money. While it offers some advice on how to take control of your money and choose ethical providers, it would be good to see it recommend sustainable options for customers to then act on this.
Unique selling points
- Planner. Moneyhub enables you to see the impact that life changes or certain spending would have on your budgets. For example, you could look at the effect of changing jobs, adding childcare or travel costs, or having a baby.
- Dashboard. This is best viewed on a desktop computer, where you can see all your spending in one screen. View transactions, budgets, top stores where you spend your money, and your spend by category. The planner tool allows you to see what money is due to leave your accounts. The dashboard can be personalised to suit you.
The plus points
- Free. Money Dashboard is completely free to download and use. It makes its money by sharing data, which is kept anonymous (see below) and from commission if you take up a suggested product.
- Overview of spending. See all your account balances and transactions in one place, meaning you don’t have to log in to lots of different sites. Also, even if your bills are paid across different banks, you can see them all together.
- Visual insights. Graphs and charts show what you are spending and where, and how this looks over time.
- Secure. As safe as any bank.
- Savings. Can help in setting and achieving savings goals.
- Supports most banks. Money Dashboard can currently connect with more than 40 providers, including major high street banks.
- Desktop or mobile. Unlike some budgeting apps, Money Dashboard can be used on a desktop computer as well as mobile.
Any drawbacks?
- Shares data. Money Dashboard uses your data to provide insight to companies on market research. While this data is kept anonymous, customers will have to decide if they are comfortable with this.
- Time-consuming set up process. Connecting your different bank accounts can take some time, as you’ll have to log in separately to each one.
- Not all banks catered for. While Money Dashboard connects to most of the bigger banks and financial providers, some will not yet be available meaning you may not get a full overview of your finances.
Cost of use
Money Dashboard is completely free to the users. Its profits come from selling customer data on to market research companies (it ensures that this information is anonymous and you cannot be personally identifiable. It also earns a commission if you take up a product it has suggested for you.
How do these costs compare to competitors?
Money Dashboard’s main competitors – Snoop, Emma and Yolt are also all free to use. Instead of asking for a subscription fee they make money from commissions and providing anonymous data to market research companies.
Emma does offer a paid subscription service – Emma Pro – which give you a slightly more tailored service for £6.99 a month or £41.99 a year.
Other options
Similar digital banks worth considering are:
Top 5 ethical current accounts for 2020
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