Joint Bank Accounts

tiggeroo1981

Hi

Does anyone have any advice on Joint bank accounts.

My partner and I want to open a joint bank account for us both to put money in from our separate accounts each month for bills, food, joint ventures (holidays, meals out).

As it will not be our full income going in, (under £1000 each month). Also I have had some bad history with my bank account so don't want to open one with HSBC (where I currently bank).

Anyone got any advice? I would really appreciate any help!

tiggeroo1981 x

sharloid

Me and the boyfriend decided to open two joint accounts last autumn. We refer to one as the bill account, which we both have a standing order set up to and all reoccuring bills come out of this. Our second account is our everyday account, in which we just transfer some money over when needed and is used for food/joint treats/holidays/trips to Ikea/paying builders and whatnot.
We decided to go with Halifax as it made sense to go with a bank that one of us were already with.
Is there anything specific you want to know? I'll help if I can!

tiggeroo1981

You know how bank accounts these days say that they need a certain amount of money going in to an account, and obviously we are not going to be putting our whole earnings in there, however using the account exactly how you and your boyfriend use it. So I guess the decision of whether one of us opens the account and the other becomes a secondary user of the account or whether we open a joint account. I don't know what is best! Any thoughts?!

sharloid

I've never heard anything about needing to put a certain amount of money away on a regular joint account so you should have no problem with this! About £600 gets paid into one of our accounts and about £200 into the other. We do have the account that gives you £5 a month if you pay in £1000 so we don't usually get this but there's no penalty inccured if you don't. I'd say if trust isn't an issue then there's no reason not to get a normal current account in both of your names.

tiggeroo1981

I guess it is also that if you have a joint account you impact on the other persons credit and I have dreadful credit score but my boyfriend has a very good credit rating, I don't know what it for the best really. I think the aim would be to put in about £700 each per month. But I am worried about the inpact on his credit rating as well as there are so many accounts out there, but none really talk about join accounts or secondary users on accounts!

I shall look into Halifax now x

usedandabused

You’ll be financially linked, so If one of you has a flawless credit file and the other doesn’t, you can bring down the better person’s report, so just beware!

tiggeroo1981

Would we still be 'financially linked' if I was a secondary account user?

usedandabused

tiggeroo1981 wrote: »

Would we still be 'financially linked' if I was a secondary account user?

Yes i believe so as you'll have a financial link between the two of you

Joby_2

just be careful re Joint Bank accounts . I split up with my ex 5 years ago & there is still a default on my credit file coz he ran up 1.3K of debt & I am jointly liable for it!

JA1000

Does anyone know of a joint bank account which will always require two signatures to remove money?

tiggeroo1981

Thanks for all this, I really appreciate it. I am still undecided how to do this as it would be convenient for both of us to have access to one account that has a certain amount of money put in by both of us each month for food, going out for meals, holidays, new furniture, but i'm going to see if i can find anything.

Thank you so much guys