Barclays Tax Beater Cash ISA - experiences so far (merged)

TrickyDicky

I applied for a tax beater ISA on saturday. Process seemed to go quite smothly and they said it should be opened by the end of april and they will backdate the interest to the date I applied. In the mean time the money is sitting in my 6.17% (although only on the first £2.5k) halifax current account.

My only problem was the long wait time (about an hour) but thats my fault for doing it on a saturday. I hope it doesnt take forever to sort, but with the money already earning decent interest, plus the interest in the ISA being backdated, Im not too worried.

Ladygrim

Ladygrim wrote: »

Suze,

Me and My husband filled in the online form and took our documents to a local branch in Newquay. We had no trouble at all in buying the ISAs. We are not existing customers of Barclays, so I had to write out cheques to them. However, my husband doesnt have a chequbook account with any banks and I thought this would be a problem. But no, all I had to do was write out the cheque to him, and then he endorsed the back. The only drawback, of which I am fully aware, is it will take a couple of weeks to be processed due to high demand.

Total time spent in bank = less than 10 minutes. :T :T

We then went onto local cafe for late breakfast and enjoyed the rest of the sunny day in the pub together!!!

LG

Guess what - Im a typical customer. Ive changed my mind on the ISA that I wanted. Kazza242 has been really helpful on this thread

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/....html?t=401374

so today I have phoned Barclays and cancelled with them, and applied online for A+L Premier direct current account and ISA!

All done over the phone/internet, no hassles whatsoever (or am I tempting fate?)

Anyway, will let you all know how I get on.

LG

P.S. The girl from Barclays admitted that the Glasgow centre dealing with the Mini Cash Taxbeater ISA's is still only dealing with applications from 1st April because they are so busy!!

miniharry

my cheques were cashed this week. Just waiting to find out my account number to check that interest was back dated as it all goes to my paren't address. Fingers crossed though

kingsand

I have managed to open a Tax beater ISA but now find that I cannot just pay in cash over the counter despite being told I could by the ISA helpline. Is this true or are they just trying to make me open an account. Surely if I have a sort code and account number, cash is as good as a cheque. I have previously paid cash into my son's building society ISA so what is the problem with a Barclays one?

bintheredunthat

Having waited since 16th March, my wife's cheque was cashed Monday 23 April ! I rang on the same day and was told my account had been opened on the 20th April, although my cheque has still not been cashed. No paperwork for either account yet.
On a positive I rang and complained and received £25 as compensation the next day !! :beer:
The Guy I spoke to had never heard of anybody being allowed to receive the interest, and then cancel the ISA ?
Very shoddy service though and waiting to see if the interest will be backdated. Big row if it isn't.:mad:

jointheclub

I've noticed a lot of people are opening other ISAs online, if you haven't got an account with them how do they verify your details for security. seems a bit strange that you don't have to confirm your personal details. Anyone could open an account by pretending to be someone else.

jointheclub

I know someone who works for the ISA dept at Barclays and she reckons all the apps for 06.07 have been completed now, apart from ones that were returned to the customer for whatever reason. Apparently they have started working on this tax years so that's wrong about them being on the 1 April. I believe the interest is going to be backdated for all the acounts automatically by the computer systems if there was a delay opening them.

joe13

Cheque finally cashed today. - Still not received anything in writing from Barclays.

Cobertizo

kingsand wrote: »

I have managed to open a Tax beater ISA but now find that I cannot just pay in cash over the counter despite being told I could by the ISA helpline. Is this true or are they just trying to make me open an account. Surely if I have a sort code and account number, cash is as good as a cheque. I have previously paid cash into my son's building society ISA so what is the problem with a Barclays one?

How did you go about trying to pay it in? You certainly can pay in cash over the counter once the ISA is open, since I did it a few weeks ago. I just filled out a paying in slip in the branch with the account number and sort code as usual, walked up to the counter and let them get on with it. I have read a few comments from people suggesting that if you ask the cashier whether you can pay in money to your ISA then they get all confused and have to check/say no, so it might be worth trying the confident sneaky approach and just giving them the money and a paying-in slip without a word...


@ jointheclub - when I applied online, all it did was to generate a form which I had to print off and sign. Since I have an old Barclays current account, I could send the form off by post, but I understand that if you are a new customer then you need to take the form you have printed off into a branch with some ID.

MiserlyMartin

The good news: Looking at the Barclays online banking, they 'credited' my cheque for £3000 today.

Bad news: - shows credited 24/4/07 - NO BACKDATING OF INTEREST!

It hasn't cleared yet - so the actual balance is zero, but its the date of the credit that annoys me most. I just phoned india to complain - lucky for the guy on the phone he couldn't deal with it because the ISA dept is shut. I will phone tomorrow and give them HELL!
grrr

I suggest other moneysavers go online and check the date credited too.