How Venmo destroyed a cultural taboo

‘Bei Geld hört jede Freundschaft auf’ or ‘Money is where every friendship stops’ — This is a famous saying Germans will hear or say frequently in their lives…

Growing up, I was taught to avoid owing money under all circumstances. My dad never left the house without a number of credit cards and a few hundred euros in his wallet. He never ever wanted be caught out and be in the embarrassing situation, of God forbid, not being able to pay or, even worse, ask someone else to lend him money.

Going out to a restaurant or bar in Germany will most likely end in people going ‘dutch’ at the end of the night (it should really be called going German!), where people would pay their exact share of the bill. Living in London and having a number of Spanish, French, and Greek friends proved to be somewhat socially challenging for me. Their culture of paying the bill and expecting the other to pay the next time, is just not something that goes down well with Germans. Who knows whether that is fair and either will end up paying what they consumed? Or, what if they forgot who paid the last time? And let’s not talk about the mess it creates when you have more than two people — it’s totally unmanageable!

Even until recently, friends owing me money has been a frequent source of frustration. Reminding them that they owed me money, was just awkward and unpleasant. But I also often felt a little resentment to the ones who would just simply forget that I paid for them. My brain comes with an inbuilt, long-term memory of all the times I paid for others and they did not pay me back. Forgetting is genetically impossible! And people forget a lot… At a Fintech conference recently, Mihai Ivascu mentioned that 90% of money owed under $10 is NEVER paid back. *Gasp*.

Lucky for us, that problem seems to have somewhat disappeared recently. We have Venmo to thank for this.

Venmo has not just made paying friends incredibly convenient and quick, it has introduced a few very clever features that have fundamentally changed people’s attitudes towards debts.

1. Emoji prediction

Emoji prediction transforms boring subject lines into fun messages. It takes the seriousness out of the whole thing. It is a lot less formal and cold than just a text message. Who doesn’t love emojis! 😎💸💰

2. Request money

The ability to make it super easy to request money has meant that is totally normal and ok to do so. Nothing awkward anymore about reminding your friends to pay you back. In fact most people do it straight away.

3. The newsfeed

The most important Venmo feature is the newsfeed. It exposes that paying for friends (and them paying you back) is the new normal. It even encourages users to like payments! I find myself frequently looking through the Venmo newsfeed and seeing who pays who for what. Even my cleaner accepts Venmo which I only discovered as a friend who uses the same cleaner paid her. You can find out what trips people go on, which restaurants they go to, how frequently they go out, etc. It has taken stalking to a new level!

So thank you Venmo, thank you for making paying your debts fun and common. Thank you for changing people’s attitudes. Thank you for making people talk about money. I can now sleep at night!