This is disheartening, but not terribly surprising, news.
I was with Simple back in 2014. I left in 2015 then came back and left for good in 2016.
On one hand, no other bank has tried so hard to make financial responsibility a first-class citizen
in their mobile and web apps. They made setting aside money and budgeting expenses very, very
seamless to do. I wish other consumer banks learned from what Simple was trying to accomplish.
Simple also had the most pleasing and tech-forward mobile and web apps of any consumer bank; it was
a step above everything else. Lastly, Simple's customer service was unrivaled. Being able to use a
chat platform that didn't suck _and_ get connected with a human within five minutes was not possible
elsewhere back then.
On the other hand, some of Simple's business decisions were...frustrating.
It took me _over five days_ for them to replace a lost card. Most banks can replace overnight for an
additional fee; Simple didn't even give you that option. This was pretty frustrating given that they
encourage you to use their card for everything.
I couldn't pay a bill larger than $3,000 one time (which was ironic given that I was paying off a
credit card). I don't remember why, but I remember thinking "this is dumb; any bank would process
this payment no questions asked." Trying to pay this bill through Simple was a massive exercise in
frustration.
I actually encountered _multiple_ bill pay failures with Simple. Paid bills would never get funds
disbursed. Payments would show up multiple times in my ledger. The worst of the failures I
experienced happened when I paid one of my student loans but found out _days_ later that the payment
actually never went out due to a "technical error." This caused me to miss a payment and eat a late
fee. I actually landed up speaking to their CEO at the time about it over the phone; he gave me $50
as an apology consolation, which I thought was cool.
They also didn't support eChecks, which meant that every payment I made would take _at least_ three
days to clear through ACH. I remember being very relieved when I switched to Chase and could process
payments in 24 hours.
I'm _still_ salty about a failed database migration they performed which took out their backend ATM
services while I was on vacation. Couldn't get money out or move money in for a day or two. This
would _never_ happen with a bigger bank, and even if it did, they have brick-and-mortars as a
fallback.
After BBVA pseudo-acquired them and their legendarily-prompt service went south, I switched over to
Chase and never looked back. After Simple removed their Bill Pay feature, I wondered why they just
didn't get fully-acquihired or something.