Lloyds TSB instant access monthly saver 8%

tim_n

Martin, hope you're still hiding around somewhere - you mention a signup bonus on http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/viewnews.cgi?newsid1108401263,93536 of £50 for the account - I can't seem to find details of it anywhere - is this a branch only offer?

lipidicman

Pagan98 wrote:

The reason the standing order of £250 was rejected on 1 June was because you had already deposited the maximum of £750 within the first seven days.

Although they state ..this does form part of the Terms and Conditions of the account, a strict reading of the T&Cs still concludes that they are in the wrong:

You can make one payment in of up to £500 within 7 days of opening your monthly saver - this does not include your first standing order.
I made a one-off payment of £500 on opening the account.

I agree with you that the terms do not match the explanation you have received

Pagan98 wrote:

For a period of 24 months from account opening you can make a monthly payment of between £25 and £250.
You can only make one payment per calendar month.
I only made one monthly payment on 30 May and one on 01 June.

The problem here is that lloyds seem to define a calendar month not as 'one in july, one in august' etc but rather as a period from a given date in one month until that date minus one in the following month. I thought this was madness, but apparently it is widespread. Either way lloyds are being awfully picky considering how unclear their terms are.

If the condition is 'the first seven days' I think I scraped through leaving 8 days until the second SO, phew!

jimclark1967

tim_n wrote:

Indeed C_Ronaldo, but it doesn't answer any of the questions above ie:

1) Do you still get £50 for opening an account - can't see any mention of it on the website (it was mentioned in Martins article)?
2) Whats this about £500 deposit? I'd love to make that kind of deposit - is it still ok now we're in July?
3) What info do I need to take into the bank?

1. I seem to remember the £50 offer was withdrawn a couple of months ago.

2. You can make a one-off payment of up to £500 in to the Monthly saver within 7 days of account opening. This is in addition to the regular standing order payments.

3. I would imagine the usual passport/driving licence and a recent utility bill will do the trick

JC

whist

Pagan98 wrote:

Okay, I finally have a reasoned response from Lloyds TSB regarding my bounced SO. It turns out that they bounce the SO if more than £750 is paid in to the account within 7 days of opening it.

.......
I hope this helps Looking_after_the_pennies and others who are still struggling. FWIW, my June SO went in on 30.06.06 and I then changed the SO so that July's SO was set for 01.07.06 (taken 03.07.06) and that payment was fine.

....
I'm in half a mind about whether to expend the effort pursuing further or let it drop.

P98.

I had the same problem with SO. I paid 500 deposit 27th June, first SO 28th , changed it to 4th July, SO bounced. I called LTSB spoke to different individuals some, of whom did not have a clue. I even got a letter which was not very clear. Finally spoke to a manager who insisted that calender month means same day each month. I told him I would test that theory. So changed my SO to 16th Of July ( a weekend) . IT went through on 17th and is still there.

After a week,I'm going to call them again and ask them their definition of calender month.

JohnFB

The time of the month for Regular Savings can be important.
2 years ago I set up a Regular Saving SO with Nationwide and originally had the payment date as the 1st of the month, as it would be after my pay went in.
But the helpful person in the NatWide branch told me to change the date to around the middle of the month as this would ensure that is was definitely one payment per month. If the payment had date had remained at the begining then there would be a chance that, over time, a payment might occur in the different month (e.g. the 31st of prev month) due to weekends/bank holidays etc. In this case it would not be classed as 1 payment per month because one would have been missed, so I would have lost the Regular Payment bonus.
Of course this may not apply to all banks but I was glad that the person behind the counter knew all about this and offered good advice.

tim_n

jimclark1967 wrote:

1. I seem to remember the £50 offer was withdrawn a couple of months ago.

2. You can make a one-off payment of up to £500 in to the Monthly saver within 7 days of account opening. This is in addition to the regular standing order payments.

3. I would imagine the usual passport/driving licence and a recent utility bill will do the trick

JC

Cheers JC - shame about the £50 makes it doubly worth it. Perhaps I'll wait about a bit with what I've got rather than mucking about with my accounts at present! Smile started offering 12 bottles of wine and I've been with them for years and got no incentive at all :- (

KTF

If I wanted to open one of these at the end of the month ready for August, when would be the best time to open one and pay the cash in (I dont have any accounts with Lloyds TSB at the mo).

Can I go to a branch on July 29 or 31 and open a current and savings account, pay the initial £500 into the savings account then £250 into the current account (to be transfered by standing order on 31/7). There would then be £750 in the savings account.

Then put another £250 into the current account, change the standing order online and pay the deposit into the account on August 1 so there would then be £1000 ready to start earning interest from August 1.

Would this work or are my dates too close?

Kazza242

KTF wrote:

If I wanted to open one of these at the end of the month ready for August, when would be the best time to open one and pay the cash in (I dont have any accounts with Lloyds TSB at the mo).

Can I go to a branch on July 29 or 31 and open a current and savings account, pay the initial £500 into the savings account then £250 into the current account (to be transfered by standing order on 31/7). There would then be £750 in the savings account.

Then put another £250 into the current account, change the standing order online and pay the deposit into the account on August 1 so there would then be £1000 ready to start earning interest from August 1.

Would this work or are my dates too close?

When I opened my LTSB current account and monthly saver:

I did so on the 24th May paying in £500 to the monthly saver and £250 into the current account to meet the first standing order on the 30th May. After the first SO payment went in, I changed the SO date to the 1st June. This is the 'quickest' way I could get this done without having an SO bounce because of the dates being too close together.

Therefore, you should be able to open your accounts on Monday 24th July with £500 and £250 into the current account to meet the first SO on say 27/28th July. You should then be able to change the SO to the 1st of August or to be doubly cautious the 2nd August.

It seems that LTSB penalise those that attempt to deposit more than £750 within 7 days of opening the account. If you can't open your accounts on 24th July, then I think it may be too late to try and get £1,000 in quick by early August without them bouncing one of your SO's. Of course, you could organise it so that the SO payment that makes your balance £1K, doesn't go in within 7 days of your opening the account.

Riviera_Kid

Hi all, my first post so hope this works ok :hello:

I travelled to my local(ish) branch on Saturday aiming to set up this account. This nice lady called Kim read out all the main points of the Monthly Saver and then started the process off. So far, so good.

But then we got to the ID part. Despite living at the same address since I was 1-2 years old and banking with Lloyds since I was a baby, they couldn't verify who I was and needed two lots of ID. I only had my driving license on me, d'oh!

So Kim saves where we have got to and says if I come back with another Lloyds customer who can identify me then that will be ok. So today at lunchtime I drag my mum up to the bank and this other lady sees to us. Unlike Kim this lady was pretty useless - she couldn't find the paperwork I had already signed, and couldn't even find the information on the computer for what I had done on Saturday! But then she finally "found" it and we started the process again. Things all went smoothly, I signed more forms and filled out the STO form so that it would go through at the end of the month as you guys/girls suggested. So I went back to work 20 mins late but happy with the knowledge my account is now set up.

So this evening I logged into internet banking and I see my new account, but the title of it is "GUARANTEED TRACKER"!! I'm guessing this means they have given me the wrong account?

I'll now have to wait until next month to start the account, as otherwise I won't be able to get the STO in on time :rolleyes:


Hope this story hasn't bored anyone, and thanks for all the tips I've been reading on this forum over the last few weeks! It's really made a difference to how I approach my finances :beer:

lipidicman

Riviera_Kid wrote:

So this evening I logged into internet banking and I see my new account, but the title of it is "GUARANTEED TRACKER"!! I'm guessing this means they have given me the wrong account?

:rolleyes: It shouldn't say "GUARANTEED TRACKER", no! Go and see them and give them a stern telling off. They have been opening these accounts for two months now, there is little excuse for such muppetry!