A&L Esaver stay or not?

SEMO-Mark

Hi all, Im not great with interest and how money all works :P but looking at MSE a while ago I opened an esaver account with Alliance & Leicester. My account has £7k in in it and i dont pay tax (not working enough for tax as im a student ) on 1st October 2008 i was paid £35 for that month in interest £38 in November and it has dropped to 1st March i got £10. I understand the current situation and i know all interest rates have dropped but I wondered am i really loosing out staying in the esaver and perhaps should move it. In september i will need to withdraw a fair amount (couple of k) for uni uni fees so an annual interest paying account may not be so good? Any ideas or should i leave the money where it is and wait to see if the interest eventually goes up?

Many thanks

Mark :j

D1zzy

Hi Mark
Interest rates are now so low on instant access savings accounts, I don't think it matters much where you have your 7K. If you move it somewhere that has a better rate, chances are it will fall soon anyway. (I assume that you don't want to lock it away in a fixed rate account)
I guess your best option might be to look around for accounts with a FIXED bonus - at least that bit will be guaranteed e.g.
"New ING Direct Savings Account customers can enjoy a great variable rate of 3.00% AER (including a 1.97% gross p.a. bonus fixed for 12 months)" - but there may be others around with better bonuses

If you can be bothered with several accounts you could also look at regular savings accounts which pay highr rates ( eg Barclays 6%) or the Halifax reward current account which will pay you £5 per month for putting £1000 through the account each month (you can have upto 3 )