Barclays Additions Plus Account

MSE_Martin · 20 July 2005 at 12:48PM

Barclays has launched a special offer on its fee paying Additions Plus current account, claiming to be worth £1,000 to the lucky customers.

What’s the offer?

The £12 monthly fee for the account will be subject to a total refund after 10 months, although it will be charged in full again each month after that. Barclays are also offering an interest-free overdraft and 0% Balance Transfers on a Barclaycard, with no fee, also for the 10 month period. To get these benefits, including the refund of the monthly charge, you must deposit at least £1,000 a month.

The limit for both is £5,000 i.e. you could have up to a £5,000 overdraft at 0%, and balance transfer £5,000 onto your Barclaycard. However, both of these are credit scored, and Barclays say they will usually only match size of your present overdraft on your current account.

Is this any good?

Not bad, but only for tarts among you needing 0% debt. The in-credit interest on this account is very poor, yet as long as you ditch and switch both the account and card as soon as the ten months is up, you can make some decent cash through stoozing (see REVENGE: Make cash from credit cards) or switching debts to 0% deals (see Best Balance Transfers).

However, Alliance & Leicester’s Premier Plus* account has really taken hold of the current account market of late, and is proving very hard to beat. If there’s any chance of you forgetting to switch at the end of 10 months, or it seems like too much hassle, then you’ll be better off sticking with A&L – or joining them if you haven’t already (especially now there's a £75 bonus possible - see best current account article

Here’s a full comparison, including benefits offered by the two providers.

(Note: as there was no way to do a table here, i've used a jpeg, but it means the links below aren't clickable, use the ones above instead)

PS. I've altered the links to A&L above so that when you click it, a little revenue is generated for MoneySavingExpert.com. As usual this doesn't impact or change either the recommendation or the result in any way. Read more on this sites non profit driven ethical stance.

omega27 · 20 July 2005 at 2:40PM

So if you only paid in £999 in one month out of 10, they wouldn't refund any of the £120 fees? Or am I just being cynical??!

grumbler · 20 July 2005 at 3:26PM

I think the answer is YES. However, they don't insist on £1000 monthly credit to be a salary ...

Mandy_R · 20 July 2005 at 6:47PM

I've just looked at the Barclays site for the Additions Plus account and the overdraft is only interest free for the first £250 (well thats how I've read it anyway) so its not a great stooze after all. Have they changed the t's and c's now Martin has highlighted it?

mary · 20 July 2005 at 7:04PM

But how about the 0% 10 month BT though?

mary · 20 July 2005 at 8:12PM

As we have a joint current account, I doubted that I would be able to apply for an Additions Plus account in my own right, as I am technically an existing customer. However, I've just been on the phone to them, and have upgraded our Platinum account to Additions Plus. Okay it will cost £12 per month. But as the guy says and the small print too, if you are dissatisfied you have up to 90 days to get your money back. So, we're covered for 3 months from today which nicely lets us have free worldwide travel insurance for our summer holiday to East Africa and then simply cancel the upgrade upon our return! You don't have to give a detailed explanation as to why you are dissatisfied, just that you have changed your mind.

Not only that, I enquired about the Barclaycard Platinum card. The small print said
5.1. If you are not an existing Barclaycard customer you can apply for a Barclaycard Platinum card with a 10 months interest free

But we have both Barclaycard Visa and Mastercard, so I thought the following
would be applicable:
5.2. If you already have a Barclaycard you can apply to transfer balances to it at 6.9% p.a. interest for the life of the balance transferred.

The guy looked up our account and said that I had an invitation in my own right on the account to apply for the Platinum Card, and it was pre-approved.
So details are in the post.

No credit searches will be done, he confirmed, as I/we are existing customers.

Thanks Martin, it was worth a call to see what I could get. Nothing venture, nothing gain.

yebaws · 20 July 2005 at 9:59PM

I've just looked at the Barclays site for the Additions Plus account and the overdraft is only interest free for the first £250 (well thats how I've read it anyway)

That's they way I read it too. Anybody find anything different please let us know...

J

Careful_ly · 20 July 2005 at 11:06PM

It is there in the terms and conditions point 4

Seems to be a match of existing overdraft limit or 1.5 x your monthly deposit into your existing account.

Sorry not able to do the clever link things

AndyR_3 · 21 July 2005 at 9:18PM

Mandy_R wrote:

I've just looked at the Barclays site for the Additions Plus account and the overdraft is only interest free for the first £250 (well thats how I've read it anyway) so its not a great stooze after all. Have they changed the t's and c's now Martin has highlighted it?

That's how Additions Plus normally works. However, as part of the special promotion, up to £5000 is available interest free for the ten month period.

Mandy_R · 22 July 2005 at 12:12PM

Thanks for that Andy R. Might give it a try now.

user1234_2 · 22 July 2005 at 11:07PM

Great...I get very interested in this offer then find it is only available to non-Barclays customers. That's what we get for being loyal Barclays customers!!!

PS Martin you might want to make it clear that it an offer for people who switch to Barclays and excludes Barclays customers upgrading to Additions Plus.

Barclays Additions Plus Account

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