Leave a Review Novo
Not an acceptable business account
My experience with Novo has been very disappointing. The biggest challenge I’ve faced is customer service, which has been close to nonexistent. Can’t get through to a live agent, instead you have to email them and wait. And wait. And wait. Over a week once, most recently it’s over 48 hours and no reply. Another challenge is bill payment. If you rely on checks in the mail you’ll wait 15 days for it to reach your vendor. The app signs you out too quickly and you have to reauthorize your device every 30 days, even with 2FA. The low/no fees are good, the app is good enough (when you can get into it) but I do not recommend this as a business solution.Show lessMarcInSaMo
Scam alert!!!
Novo is a joke. I opened an business checking account here about a year ago and have barely used it because they have so many problems. First smallish deposit took 20x for the mobile scanner to accept the check. Took 2 weeks to process and update my balance. Never sent me a debit card and I had to request one after they kept insisting to check the mail. Now I’m dealing with the biggest problem of all—tried to deposit a very large check (with temporary raise on deposit limit) for my upcoming home purchase and they are holding the funds for more than a month. A month! Most banks have a regular deposit schedule with it being complete in 7 business days. Not Novo. They are not actually a bank—only partnering with Middlesex Federal. Yet they advertise banking services all over their app and site. Customer service is nonexistent, or canned bot responses with no real answers. Stay far far away. Better to go with a brick-and-mortar bank, as these online neobanks or fintechs don’t appear to be regulated. I’m fighting to get my money back. I suspect most of the 5-star reviews on this app are FAKE.Show lessFionaRenée
See the potential but doesn’t work
I took a long time to decide on a business bank account and decided that novo would be the best option for me. When I initially downloaded the app, everything was functioning correctly but all of a sudden, it logged it me out and won’t let me log back in. I keep receiving a screen that says “unrecognized device” and I need to confirm by going to my email. When I confirm via email, the app remains on the unrecognized device screen. I connected with customer service and they said the only way for me to regain access is to change my email which would unfortunately mean the account would no longer be connected to my business. Really frustrating & now I can’t easily access my funds.Show lesscb113759
NO. NEVER USE THIS BANK
I put over 5K in this account for my business. One morning around 3am. My card information was stolen and my account was wiped out. THERES ONLY CENTS LEFT. There’s no one to call, you have to chat them Mon-Fri during business hours. Ok. Now you have to dispute every charge on your own. There were 63 fraudulent charges. It’s over a month later. I have a business to run, this is unacceptable. Some charges were processed back to the card they froze. So they were declined. Now I’ve been told to give my new card info to the place that stole from me. ARE YOU SERIOUS. I don’t know who did it and why would I give them my card info. What is going on. It took a month for them to mess up more. Still no money, still no helpful solution. I couldn’t be more unsatisfied.Show less777la
Fraud charge and they don’t care
$500 charge from China on my “virtual” card that I didn’t create or give access too. So basically someone in China created a fake virtual debit card and withdrew $500. It was grayed out in my transactions. I tried to report the fraud which is only available through the app. They said wait until it posts. It post and they give me instructions on how to dispute a charge but when I go to transaction under settings the screen locks and flickers giving me no way to dispute. I go to support ticket and they haven’t replied with any status or update in 10 days. Novo works until their is a problem. I have no faith in this company for the safety on well-being of my funds if they can’t handle a simple dispute. Moving all my business somewhere else. Worse customer service I have experienced in a financial company!! Put your money elsewhere!Show lessCfl@TheBeach
Was very good but now needs more improvement
1. Check deposit process is annoying and very badly implemented. We are depositing 100s of checks a month and I came to the point I had to open another bank account in another institution because Novo kept rejecting checks! Non of the checks was ever NSF or not paid.
2. APP keeps crushing on transaction review screen. Keep freezing when you trying to look at the transaction screen and see all updated transactions
3. Checks being deposited not confirmed until next business day if deposited after 3PM est. very Bad and I don’t know any institution who does that. Please learn from your competitors (Blue vine) it’s almost impossible to keep track of deposited items.
4. Support is not convenient no way to call anyone.
Good things.
1. 1 Day ACH if done before 3pm. Helps to pay employees at right time.
2. Same day ACH option is super helpful
3. Interface is very pleasant and convenient.
4 I would add few features. - feel free to discuss with me.Show lessexter1
Good bad and ugly
I started a small business and I had everything I needed to be setup for success until one day I noticed a fraudulent transaction where someone used the debit card. Customer support responded after 2 days. And the phone number on the back of the card was picked up by actual person who sent another message to the support - this to me was a total joke. Now I am thinking… what if I needed this money now and nobody is there to get the transaction blocked and credited back to the account … this is the price you pay for the free features. I actually found the merchant where the card was used fraudulently and sent an email and within 30 minutes the transaction was refunded. Meanwhile the support team is totally silent and unreachable. After 2 days I got a message from them that there is nothing they can do since I already took care of getting my money back. The person on the phone explained that the review process for unauthorized transactions takes up to 120 days in which you don’t have access to your stolen money.
Here are the things I would change if I was working at Novo:
1) when customer disputes the transaction immediately credit the account.
2) create a channel for immediate communication in such cases
3) Build protection against fraudulent transactions.
Currently the app and the online platform are secure enough and super annoying to login but the debit cards are super insecure.Show lessYDimitrushev
Developer Response
Sorry to hear about your unauthorized transaction, but thank you for your feedback! We're always looking for ways to improve the disputes process and we appreciate your comment.The lack of customer support is appalling
I wish I could recommend Novo because I generally love when people try to do something new in the banking industry. But their lack of timely and effective customer service is a total failure — and frankly makes the service nearly unusable. I came here because I thought this would be the “Simple Bank” of business checking — but Simple had stellar customer service, and Novo does not.
Whenever I’ve had an issue, whether needing a new card, unexpected declines, or disputing a transaction, it has NEVER been resolved in an acceptable way. I’m fighting with AI bots and responses from a human are sporadic and agnostic. I haven’t had a bank card in over a year because each time I request one it never makes it to my house.
It’s an app that holds money. That’s about it. The integrations don’t make up for not having a customer service phone number. But if this is your top choice for business banking, I’d think again. Go to a bank with more robust customer service or just use Venmo. You’ll be less frustrated in the long run.Show lessOmigoshitsbleeding
It’s Good except…
Anybody who has used Novo loves/hates it. They’re known for slow to terrible customer service and I’ve fallen victim to that myself. As an app made for business owners, this just can’t be. Nobody needs access to money more or faster than us.
My favorite feature as a Profit First business are the Reserve accounts with automatic percentage allocations to each of the important accounts (Operating Expenses, Owner Compensation, Profit, Taxes and Income). This helps me see what I have and keeps my business running efficiently.
Until response time is improved, however, Novo will never be a 5 star banking solution for me.Show lessYolitaFelice
Decent small business banking
Overall very good app for a small business banking account. Over a year of using it, the downsides that I have noticed are:
1) it takes longer than normal for a new card to be shipped to you, with a large bank like Bank of America or Wells Fargo, a new card usually arrives in a week or so. With Novo, the new card takes several weeks to a month to arrive.
2) the bank is not eligible for Instant transfers from venmo. Apparently Novo does not have the infrastructure to participate in instant transfers. But they can still take standard transfers from venmo.Show lessJay Wing
