The Top Easy Access Savings Discussion Area

MSE Dan,

Please stop recommending accounts with overseas banks as best buys without warning that they are not as safe as most big UK banks and Building societies.

Although the government has guaranteed retail deposits, there is no fund in place and customers could be waiting years for their savings and will lose interest in the interim.

Much safer to put your money in a large UK institution that the government will bail out straight away as they did with Northern Rock.

R.

Interestingly, I've just had an email from icici saying my account is up and running, despite the previous one saying the cheque from the joint account wasn't acceptable... I'm going to log in to check ifthe account has a balance other than nil!

Jenni

MoneySavingMedStudent wrote: »

Hi, I was hoping some of you might be able to help. I am a medical student and as such don't have much money to save away, but want to start giving it a go!
As it is i have approx £250 i can put away and then perhaps another £50 per month to put away at the MOST. However, I would also like easy access to my money and if needs be withdraw everything whilst gaining the largest return. Im not sure how best to go about this. I presume i dont pay tax so could go for one of the savings account but as i have so little money and would like as much access as possible I'm not sure what to do next. Hope someone can give some advice as all the research I've done on the site has overwhelmed and bamboozled me slightly!!

may thanks,

MoneySavingMedStudent

You have to consider whether you want the most right now, or to maximise your future savings income. If the later, then go for an ISA; growing your ISA pot now means a greater proportion of your savings will be protected from the taxman in future years. If you want as much as possible for potential immediate use, I would look at the LloydsTSB Monthly Saver. It pays 8%, although you can only have it open for a year; you can make withdrawals without penalty.

You say you presume you don't pay tax; as long you earn less than £5,035 from all sources this year this is true. However, your bank won't know this unless you tell them and will therefore deduct tax from any interest earned; make sure you pop into your branch and fill in the relevant HMRC form to allow them to pay you all of your interest.

NB If you are above the tax threshold, an ISA would have to pay more than 6.4% to give you more than an 8% savings account. However, the tradeoff I mentioned between benefit now and in future tax years still applies.`

I didn't seem to have a problem with ICICI either.

Opened a sole HiSave account and with a cheque from a joint account - seemed to open straight away.

The issues with mistaken emails are probably the case of an employee not quite in the know, then overuled by a senior person.

I think someone mentioned not recommending overseas banks - and in the most, I'd agree especially after the Northern Rock stuff, but once that overseas bank has a proper presence in the UK, i.e. more than 1-2 branches, regulated by the FSA and adopted the Banking Code, you're fine.

ICICI and IceSave have both done that!