Creating and Editing an Expense Jar

To create an Expense Jar, you need to go to the home page of your Monzo app. There, scroll down to the section labeled "Expenses" and tap Add expense. When asked what kind of expense you want to set up - choose Custom.

Give your Jar a name and choose an image - then you'll be able to assign which merchants and categories you want linked to that Jar.

For merchants - you'll be able to choose from a list of thousands of popular merchants as well as any other merchants where you've already used your Monzo card. If you still don't see the merchant you want - you'll be asked to fill out a form so we can add the merchant for you.

And for categories - you'll be able to choose from any of our default categories like Groceries, Eating out, and Shopping. If you've set up any custom categories, you'll also see them in the list.

You'll also be able to enable Auto-cover. This option will allow Monzo to automatically move money from your main balance to the Expense Jar, if you make a purchase where the Jar doesn't have enough money. If this is disabled, and you make a purchase your Jar can't cover - the charge will be declined.

💡Pro tip: A Jar with a merchant assigned to it will always take priority over a Jar with a linked category.

For example, if you have both a "Starbucks" Jar (with 'Starbucks' linked as a merchant) and an "Coffee" Jar (with 'Coffee' linked as a category) - when you tap your card at Starbucks, it will come out of your Starbucks Jar.

ℹ️ Please note: Merchants and categories can only be assigned to one Jar at a time. So you can't have Starbucks linked to both a "Coffee" Jar and a "Dining Out" Jar at the same time.

Individual Jars can have multiple merchants and multiple categories linked to them at the same time. And you can even mix and match both merchants and categories in the same Jar.

ℹ️ Please note: Even with auto-cover enabled, we never move money from other Jars to cover your spending. And there currently isn't any way to have allow money in Jars to cover sending on your main account. Money in Jars is designed to be protected in a way that prevents you from accidentally spending money you were trying to save.

If you ever decide to close an Expense Jar, we don't cancel any recurring charges you had set up with merchants linked to the Jar. You would need to cancel those bills with the merchant itself. If a transaction comes through from a merchant after a Expense Jar is closed - the transaction will go to the main account balance.