Cash ISAs: The Best Currently Available List

aaj123

pecunianonolet said:

The YBS one is great but if you're not qualified due to membership I would look into Coventry. Flexible ISA with 3.25% from 4th April and you have 6 withdrawals there too. 

Or Skipton for their BOE - 1.25% (guaranteed for 24 months) easy access flexible ISA.

pecunianonolet

aaj123 said:

pecunianonolet said:

The YBS one is great but if you're not qualified due to membership I would look into Coventry. Flexible ISA with 3.25% from 4th April and you have 6 withdrawals there too. 

Or Skipton for their BOE - 1.25% (guaranteed for 24 months) easy access flexible ISA.

Yes, but that's still only 3% for now and at least until May when the next BOE meeting is. You could open the Coventry ISA today, open the Skipton ISA on the 6th and put a pound in and wait until May and if BOE goes up again you transfer in the funds from Coventry (if transfers are allowed at any time). The only real benefit I see is making use of the unlimited withdrawals but if a flex ISA is needed you can also go with Principality 3.1% straight away also offering unlimited withdrawals . Don't really see the benefit of the Skipton account to be fair....

aaj123

pecunianonolet said:

aaj123 said:

pecunianonolet said:

The YBS one is great but if you're not qualified due to membership I would look into Coventry. Flexible ISA with 3.25% from 4th April and you have 6 withdrawals there too. 

Or Skipton for their BOE - 1.25% (guaranteed for 24 months) easy access flexible ISA.

Yes, but that's still only 3% for now and at least until May when the next BOE meeting is. You could open the Coventry ISA today, open the Skipton ISA on the 6th and put a pound in and wait until May and if BOE goes up again you transfer in the funds from Coventry (if transfers are allowed at any time). The only real benefit I see is making use of the unlimited withdrawals but if a flex ISA is needed you can also go with Principality 3.1% straight away also offering unlimited withdrawals . Don't really see the benefit of the Skipton account to be fair....

The benefit is the guaranteed spread to the BOE. In a rising rate environment, such a tracker tends to become a market leader after a while and new products at the time tend to offer lower rates. Even Skipton for example until Feb was offering BOE -1.1%. So to get such a guarantee for 24 months is what is the USP here in addition to be flexi easy access. I wouldn't be surprised at all if the current Skipton product gets withdrawn in a month or two to be replaced by another issue that tracks at something like BOE - 1.5%.

pecunianonolet

aaj123 said:

pecunianonolet said:

aaj123 said:

pecunianonolet said:

The YBS one is great but if you're not qualified due to membership I would look into Coventry. Flexible ISA with 3.25% from 4th April and you have 6 withdrawals there too. 

Or Skipton for their BOE - 1.25% (guaranteed for 24 months) easy access flexible ISA.

Yes, but that's still only 3% for now and at least until May when the next BOE meeting is. You could open the Coventry ISA today, open the Skipton ISA on the 6th and put a pound in and wait until May and if BOE goes up again you transfer in the funds from Coventry (if transfers are allowed at any time). The only real benefit I see is making use of the unlimited withdrawals but if a flex ISA is needed you can also go with Principality 3.1% straight away also offering unlimited withdrawals . Don't really see the benefit of the Skipton account to be fair....

The benefit is the guaranteed spread to the BOE. In a rising rate environment, such a tracker tends to become a market leader after a while and new products at the time tend to offer lower rates. Even Skipton for example until Feb was offering BOE -1.1%. So to get such a guarantee for 24 months is what is the USP here in addition to be flexi easy access.

True about USP but are we expecting rates to go beyond 4.5%? It would become a real leading rate from 4.75% and up and I don't think we will see this. Of course, an escalation in the Ukraine war or any other external shocks could lead to a more urgent need to raise rates beyond any current forecasts but we are basically near the peak if we assume that such shocks are not happening. 

Inflation figures will come down sharply, as they are always about what was 12 months ago so we will see lower numbers rather soon. However, that only means prices go up a lot slower, therefore we need to prepare for a near 0 inflation figure in the next 12-18 months ( a0 inflation means stagnation of price levels, deflation that they go below the price level 12 months ago), maybe dropping into deflation. However, people need to say good bye to the illusion, that energy, food, etc. will ever be as cheap again as it was pre war. All the wage growth also will take time to filter through, company profit margins will remain stable and over time cost will be passed on. 

If you not get a decent wage rise now, means that you will have to deal with real term losses of salary and pensions, for a long time.

So for ISAs, probably best to fix if you can for long to lock those rates in. So the real term losses of today (10% inflation - 4% interest fixed = 6% real term loss of buying power), will be offset in part in the future when the picture changes (3% inflation - 4% interest fixed = -1). You make a real gain of 1% now, reducing your previous loss from 6% to 5%

Your individual tax situation needs consideration on top of that, so if you are a higher earner the benefits are obviously greater feeding into the overal P&L of your own balance sheet.

If cash isn't needed for a long time it's probably best to look into investments due to better yields in the long run (7-10 years plus I would say). 

Interesting read here: https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/isainvesting/article-11899691/Cash-Isa-rates-highest-2008-savers-invest-instead.html

Malchester

Or try Swansea Building Society at 3.25 % if you live in Wales. Great building society with superb customer service.

ForumUser7

Malchester said:

Or try Swansea Building Society at 3.25 % if you live in Wales. Great building society with superb customer service.

Re Swansea BS:

'Please note that as of Friday 31st March at 4.45pm, we will temporarily stop accepting new Cash ISA savings account applications. This will remain in place until 9am on April 6th 2023 when we will begin accepting new Cash ISA applications for the 2023/24 tax year.

(This does not affect existing society Cash ISA account holders who can continue to transact on their accounts.)'

pookey

pookey said:

So many ISA options that I'm not sure which to choose. I have 20k, I don't think I'll need it so happy to fix it with Santander at 4.15%. 
However tempted with Yorkshire BS variable which is going up to 4.25%, it allows 6 withdrawal per year. It has flexibility but the rate might drop so I'm trying to decide which is best. Realistically I wouldn't need to touch the money and if I did, Santander penalises with 120 days loss of interest.
Can anyone give me their thoughts please? 😊

Thank you so for your help 😊
You've all made some very valid points so I just need to bite the bullet and make an informed decision 😅

pookey

Nick_C said:

@Pookey

I went with Yorkshire because cash is there for emergencies.  (Money that I'm certain I don't need in the short term is invested.)

With YBS, I can get the money if I need it.  And because it is a flexible ISA, I can replace any funds that I withdraw.

Just to clarify, if I need the money I can spend it and top it up? Does that have to be within the same tax year pls? 

pookey

refluxer said:

pookey said:

So many ISA options that I'm not sure which to choose. I have 20k, I don't think I'll need it so happy to fix it with Santander at 4.15%. 
However tempted with Yorkshire BS variable which is going up to 4.25%, it allows 6 withdrawal per year. It has flexibility but the rate might drop so I'm trying to decide which is best. Realistically I wouldn't need to touch the money and if I did, Santander penalises with 120 days loss of interest.
Can anyone give me their thoughts please? 😊

Presumably that's the Yorkshire Six Access Saver eISA you're talking about ? You'd need to have been an existing member for a year to qualify for that one but if you do then that's a great deal, with a rate similar to fixing but with some access and flexibility. It's accounts like that that make me think it would be worth joining the Yorkshire now so that I'd qualify for something similar in a year's time.

Saying that - I do tend to favour fixed rate ISAs so that's probably the option I would choose now that interest rates seem to be topping off, but I only lock money away that I know I definitely won't need access to because the penalties for doing so are usually pretty severe. When going down the fixed route, I think it's important that you have enough accessible funds elsewhere to ensure you won't need access to the ISA money.

If you think there's even a small chance that you might need to access the money, then the Yorkshire ISA would seem to be the way to go. The only downside is, as you say, that the rate could drop but I don't get the impression that any big BoE rate decreases are on the cards just yet. If the rate did drop then you'd obviously lose out compared to fixing for a year, but you'll almost certainly be better off with that Yorkshire account than if you'd put it in another (instant access) Easy Access Cash ISA, the best of which are currently around 1% lower than the rate you say that Yorkshire Six Access ISA is due to rise to. 

It's a gamble whatever you do, so the key is just to make the best-informed decision you can at the time and accept there's no guarantee that it'll turn out to be the best one !

Thank you, 
I'm pretty sure I don't need the money but there's always that just in case scenario. I do have other funds I can access so it won't all be locked away. 
I think I'll sleep on it another night and make a final decision tomorrow 😅

pookey

Malchester said:

Or try Swansea Building Society at 3.25 % if you live in Wales. Great building society with superb customer service.

I'm in London but thank you