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Budgeting & bank accounts

Archives for December 2006

Select Account?
Firstly, Happy New Year to you all. May this be the year we all become debt free!! Secondly, this is my first post but I felt that it was time to be as pro-active on these boards as I am attempting to be with my finances. My questions is this, I currently pay £7 a month for the privilage of having a Lloyds Select account…
Changing my current account.
After reading about the A&L Premier Direct Current Account : 6.10% AER (fixed until 31.12.07)1 on balances up to £2,500, 0.10% AER (variable) on balances over £2,500 After 31.12.07 account reverts to Bank of England Base Rate less 1% It seems a little silly to stick with First Direct, which, as far as i know is : AER(1)…
Bank acct for lottery winner
Unfortunatly not me, but I have always been curious, if you win the lottery can you put it all like into an HSBC account, or do you have to use specail banks/accounts?
How long should you keep bank statements pls?
Hi all, Just the question above really. Its with Lloyds Tsb and even though we have online banking, we still get paper statements but have alot from a few years ago. How long should you keep them? Thanks.
Current account - not with my current lenders
I'm about to go onto a DMP and so need to open an account that isn't linked to any of my current creditors who are MBNA HSBC Halifax Egg I thought I'd be ok with Alliance and Leicester - but as I got to the end of the application it seems that they are run by MBNA. I'm afraid that opening an account with them would mean…
Bank Account for 14 year old - please help!
I have decided to give my teenage daughter an allowance each month to help her learn about budgetting etc. To help her we want an account with a cash card so she can control her own spending. But I've looked around the major banks to see who is offering the best incentive but none seem to offer anything? I would have…
£100 from the Royal Bank of Scotland
Well I tried VERY hard to get my £100 new customer incentive from the RBS. I applied and sent off all personnal doc's, well they lost the lot, its taken me months of time and effort only to be offered £150 comp' and the Finacial Ombudsman agrees this is a fare settlement!! What do you think? should I appeal or not?
Aaaah Abbey nightmare
Just received a letter this morning saying a payment I made over a week ago wasn't processed. What good is sending a letter, I know it's Christmas and it's slowed it up a bit in the mail, but if I send a payment online it may be helpful to know by e-mail or at least a note on the accoun0t if something is wrong. I'm going…
accounts with £250 cheque guarantee
I know Barclays platinum offers a 250 limit for cheque guarantee but are there any other accounts out there which give a 250 guarantee limit with no fee for the account (and preferably some non-negligible interest on credit balances!)? I do use the debit card facility mostly but do prefer having the chq gtee too. Many…
OFT and Bank Charges
So what do people think when the OFT make banks reduce the OD charges to £5 or £10 a go?!? When that happens, no more reclaiming bank charges, but what will the banks do? People think that they'll introduce a monthly charge, like other places in the world. Or will they just charge people £10 for every time a payment goes…
Alliance and Leicester Overdraft Matching
Hello, Hope this is in the right place. I'm all set to open an Alliance and Leicester Premier Direct Current Account to take advantage of the 0% overdraft and cash back. However - I've been reading the small print on the website and it says that to consider matching your current overdraft you must of been in credit for 2…
Crown Currency Exchange
Hi All Am going to US next year and am looking for best way buy my travellers cheques. I normally use M&S as they have a pretty good rate and are commission free however as am not travelling for a few months I wanted to try Crown Currency Exchange as the $ rate is 2.000 for AUG 2007 and 1.9730 in MAY 2007. Looking to…
Adding accounts to Egg Money Manager
I don't know about anybody else, but I wouldn't be without Egg Money Manager anymore. It's so much easier having all of your account details available on one screen and under one set of login details. The one gripe that I do have is that some of the accounts that I hold are not recognised by Egg. This means that I can't…
Visa Current Account
Hi, We've swapped bank accounts and now we have a visa card instead of a switch or maestro. We wondered if places that only take credit cards (visa / mastercard) will take our visa bank card. It works on things like Xbox live because it doesn't distinguish between visa credit card and visa debit card. Just wondered if this…
Account for Young Person with facilities!
I want to open an account when my DD is 13, but I would like to have an account for her that she can operate on the Internet and organise money transfers into her savings account. Some accounts will give her a debit card at this age (no problem) but the ones I have looked at wont give her internet access until 16! She neds…
does moving money constitute 'income'?
Hi, One current account says that you must have an 'income' to open an account. My friend doesn't have an income right now, but is wondering whether she can transfer money to and from a savings account so there would be enough activity on the account to keep it alive. But is this the same thing as saying 'income' on an…
PLEASE LOOK ...remortgaging to pay off debts... good idea or bad?
Hi, We have a repayment mortgage of £158000 at the moment and our house is worth £185000. We have £25000 of debt in various different loans all with an average of 7% apr. At the moment if my husband doesn;t earn any commision at work we end up being £400 short every month which is eating into our overdraft that is nearly…
Charged interest at HSBC for using Overdraft even though student
Hi I have just looked at my account and realised i have been charged about £5 a month in interest on my account for being in my overdraft. I used to have a student account but it now simply says bank account, even though i'm still a student. my overdraft limit was £1500 and ive never been near that, but am being charged…
Should i move from HSBC?
Hi I'm thinking of moving from HSBC after reading martins article I want to try and reclaim some charges too but want an account that suits my needs. we earn a combined 50k a year and have a few accounts two personal accounts (one each) one bills account one living account. and we some times dip into the over draft too so…
Bank Clearing
Why can the banks not to weekend bank clearing? Is it all checked by person because surely a computer can do electronic clearing on the weekends? I get paid on a Friday and then I go to pay my bills/to other accounts it takes five days *sighs*

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MSE News

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Lloyds, Halifax and Bank of Scotland to cut overdraft rates for millions but hike them for others – here's what's happening and full help
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Budgeting & bank accounts

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