Regular Dis-saver

Milarky

Who said savings were boring?

Here's an idea for a product: instead of a bank asking you to save £250 (say) per month for 12 months for a fixed interest rate and then you have to remember to withdraw the balance on the anniversary because the rate is now 0.1% (say) why can't this be reversed?

So you pay your £3000 up-front. The bank pays then interest on this balance at the fixed rate for one month. Then a month later it transfers £250 (plus your interest) to your nominated current account (reversing the usual 'standing order')... an so on.

The amount of interest you will earn from this product is exactly the same as you will from a standard regular saver. You appear to get a reducing amount of interest every month but it still comes out the same at the end of the year.

Then there's the Regular Dis-saver/Regular saver combo: otherwise known as a DIY fixed term bond. This allows the saver to split their £3000 between the two types of account (not necessarily at the same rates).

opinions4u

One common complaint about banks is that they make their products too complex.

bigadaj

The banks ' good' reason for. A regular saver is that it promotes eh idea of regular saving and so teaches people the value of saving, it's obviously also a loss leader used to promote other services, which is why the limits are comparatively low.

No reason why someone couldn't try the OPs idea but there would be an extremely limited Market. It's also the savings equivalent of equity release, and so would be a bad idea for most people as they are taking a lump sum they already have, Turning this into income that the average person is more likely to fritter away on every day crap.

Also people generally get paid monthly so taking a Regular sum from salary before they can spend it is also considered a good discipline.

oldvicar

Great idea ! Ideal for those who have finished their working career - can't think why bigadaj is thinking mainly about those who have earnings - they are a minority and tend to have fewer assets to save/invest.

bigadaj

It's a sad day if the people working are a. Minority

oldvicar

Very roughly the working population is about one third of the total UK population.

Exclude those under 16 (who mostly have no significant assets) and its still less than half.

bigadaj

Last time I checked I recall we had 29 million ish in work with a. Total population of say 62 million. As you say exckudingchildren this should put employed at around sixty per cent.

I just can't see how you can have a sustainable economy with so may people economically inactive.