Instant Access Savings Accounts Article Discussion Area

jinkssick

Icesave are under the banking code, they pay 1% less at 5.95% which after typical tax is 4.76% on all balances up to 1 million.

murphydavid

There is a tendancy for banks to pay less interest on accounts that need extra administration by them. Having said that have a look at a Coventry Building Society Current Account. For a year that pays a very good interest rate and has the functionality of a current account (but no cheque book). You can set it up to pay your rent (and anything else) by D.D. or Standing Order and once it is set up you don't have to do a thing.

samuela66

Hi

I have sold my house and have £70,000 to save, I wont be needing it a.s.a.p so need to know where best to put it, I Have an Icesave account I have noticed it being said your bank my give the same interest as some savings accounts?????? Any help would be much appreciated.

thanks

sam

armcurl

murphydavid wrote: »

have a look at a Coventry Building Society Current Account. For a year that pays a very good interest rate and has the functionality of a current account (but no cheque book). You can set it up to pay your rent (and anything else) by D.D. or Standing Order and once it is set up you don't have to do a thing.

But unfortunately not really of much use in my situation:

"To earn the advertised rate of interest including the bonus and guarantee you need to deposit at least £1,000 each month"

I want to invest a lump sum in excess of £100K and be able to transfer generated interest into my current account each month.

TomJ

armcurl wrote: »

But unfortunately not really of much use in my situation:

"To earn the advertised rate of interest including the bonus and guarantee you need to deposit at least £1,000 each month"

I want to invest a lump sum in excess of £100K and be able to transfer generated interest into my current account each month.

Assuming you don't have a thou a month to put in, you could always set up a seperate current account with another bank and set up standing orders to transfer £1000 out of the Coventry on, say, the first of the month and back a few days later. Granted, this will mean your not earning interest on the thousand while the cash is in the inter-bank limbo, but as their interest rate on the Coventry First account should rise to 6.1% within the next couple of weeks to stay ahead of the base rate (see http://www.coventrybuildingsociety.co.uk/savings/ProductFeatures.aspx?ProdCode=CA3, noting note 3) it may still be worthwhile even allowing for not earning interest on less than 1% of you total investment for less than half the month. (99.5% of 6.15 is 6.0695%; I realise this isn't an accurate reflection of the interest rate because of AER compunding effects, but given I'm slightly overestimating the time the cash will be between accounts and using £100K for a sum "in excess of £100K", it's a reasonable estimate.)

The interest you earn can be used directly to pay the rent from the First acct as noted by murphydavid. If you really want the interest paid elsewhere, note that the page I linked to says:

Interest can be added to your account, transferred to another Coventry account or paid away to a bank or building society account. Where interest is paid away it normally takes three to four banking days to reach its destination.

Of course, after the first year you lose the bonus and go to an oddly tiered rate, but I'd imagine most people hereabouts plan on changing accounts at least annually to follow the best deal.

TomJ

The Coventry First rate has gone up to 6.1% AER (including the first year bonus of 0.85%) today, June 1st.

Fellow_2

Just sold my house and put all the money into a 5.95% ICESAVE account which took only 4 days to set up.

The rate is guaranteed to exceed the BOE Base Rate by at least 0.25% until 1 October 2009 and thereafter not to be lower than the Bank of England Base Rate until 1 October 2011.

Great for when the rates hit 8% next year, followed by the biggest house price crash in history, and I can buy a house mortgage-free!

Jonbvn

Fellow wrote: »

Just sold my house and put all the money into a 5.95% ICESAVE account which took only 4 days to set up.

The rate is guaranteed to exceed the BOE Base Rate by at least 0.25% until 1 October 2009 and thereafter not to be lower than the Bank of England Base Rate until 1 October 2011.

Great for when the rates hit 8% next year, followed by the biggest house price crash in history, and I can buy a house mortgage-free!

Can I borrow your crystal ball please?

brian57

Just had a completely unsatisfactory experience with ICESAVE, who not only seem unable to cope, but show no sign of knowing what coping would look like. An account was set up with a small sum in order to make transferring larger sums easier.
That first step went fine. However, when it came to the larger transaction, the online account was inaccessible. Repeated phone calls elicited half-complete emails and days of delay.
Eventually we were told by a supervisor that they were reduced by "volumes" to conducting our account by phone.
This is a familiar story - and you should recall that the volumes are tiny by computing standards. There is no point in this website referencing offers on the basis of headline rates without any check as to the offeror's ability to cope.
In this case, a small measure of success reveals a threadbare business model.
Incidentally, I should mind your eye with ICICI, which begins to look like it's going the same way - just had two transaction refusals.

Crabman

Alliance Leicester's Direct Saver User Guide:

No interest is payable on any balances outside of the minimum (below £5,000) and maximum (above £100,000) limits.



However, their savings pagesaysthe minimum is £1000

Simple error on A&L's part, I hope