Backlash at ‘single-shaming’ banking ad

Financial technology company Revolut has been accused of “single-shaming” after its current promotional campaign sparked a backlash on Twitter.

The company, which launched in 2015, bills itself as an alternative to banks and offers app-based current accounts.

It has been running ads on the London Tube highlighting the number of people who ordered a takeaway meal for one on Valentine’s Day last year.

But the campaign has been criticised as “intrusive” and “tone-deaf”.

Revolut has been contacted for a response, but no-one was available to comment.

Financial commentator Iona Bain, who first drew attention to the ads, said it was patronising and unworthy of a firm trying to attract young, tech-savvy customers.

“It doesn’t tell you anything about the service,” she told the BBC.

“It just says they will spy on your spending, so people can laugh at your poor unfortunate single status later on.”

Ms Bain, founder of the Young Money Blog, tweeted that the ad’s language was “more redolent of early 2000s Bridget Jones” than “a modern and empowered fintech brand”.

“I knew a lot of people would agree with me, but I have been surprised by the amount of responses,” she said.

She said that those supporting her comments included widows who found such ads unhelpful at this time of year.

“A meal for one, that’s a perfectly valid life choice,” she added. “It’s not their business to be shaming anyone for making that choice.”

More importantly, she said, it also played on people’s concerns about improper use of their data and whether their financial activity was private.

“It’s not just something that triggers a few snowflakes on the London Underground,” she added.

Revolut offers a current account service which allows people to make and receive payments, withdraw money from cash machines and transfer money abroad.

It was not a bank when it started, but it announced in December that it had been granted an EU banking licence by the European Central Bank. It still aims to acquire a full UK banking licence.

It has already attained the status of a tech “unicorn” – a term used to describe private start-ups valued at more than $1bn (£740m).