account for gf

evenasus

Banks/Building Societies tax savings interest at 20% as normal.

If your girlfriend doesn't earn above £8105 this tax year, then she would be able to claim the tax back from HMRC.

psychic_teabag

The best regular savers pay more than you can get from an ISA, even though tax is deducted. 5% from a reg.saver is 4% after basic-rate rate, which is more than the best ISAs at the moment. When it matures in a year, can move the balance into an ISA and start again.

There was one isa regular saver, paying 5% tax-free IIRC. Nottingham perhaps (branch based). Don't know if it's still available.

Note however that reg.savers tend to put restrictions on withdrawals. Some allow one, but with some if you many any withdrawal you lose the good rate (on everything).

john0

I thought that with a regular saver you pretty much halved the rate? So you would need an account offering around 6% to get around 3%?

Although I guess if you can only save a little each month then it doesn’t matter?

evenasus

Saving into a regular savings account @5%, say £500 per month. You would, at the end of 12 months, at basic rate tax, have achieved interest of £129.22.

Saving £500 per month into a 3% ISA for 12 months, you would have achieved interest of £97.06.

pqrdef

john0 wrote: »

I thought that with a regular saver you pretty much halved the rate? So you would need an account offering around 6% to get around 3%?

The issue is the same for all monthly savings, irrespective of what kind of account you use. Point being, the interest is calculated on the average balance over the year, not on the final balance at the year end. You knew that, but there are people who don't.

pqrdef

evenasus wrote: »

Saving into a regular savings account @5%, say £500 per month.

If only. But how long has it been since anybody paid 5% on £500pm? The regular saver market is dead at present. Nothing worth having except the HSBC/FD accounts, and they come with too much baggage.

evenasus

pqrdef wrote: »

If only. But how long has it been since anybody paid 5% on £500pm? The regular saver market is dead at present. Nothing worth having except the HSBC/FD accounts, and they come with too much baggage.

I know there is nothing like this available.
I personally have never, nor would ever use a regular saver.

I was responding to the psychic teabag post.

As pointed out by pqrdef, there seem to be many people who see the % rate of a regular saver but don't understand how they work - interest wise.

Andystriker

pqrdef wrote: »

But how long has it been since anybody paid 5% on £500pm?

I opened one only yesterday at The Derbyshire Building Society.

The Cheshire Building Society also has the same account available.

psychic_teabag

Unfortunately, they do seem to be increasingly branch-only : presumably a loss-leader to get you in the door so they can sell you additional products.

See also the 'Don't believe the bad press' section above http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/best-regular-savings-accounts#dripfeed

Grabs39

The 5% Nottingham isa is branch only... But they opened it when I posted the forms, faster payments go through from my current account okay, and they tell me the balance when I ring up and ask.