MSE News: Savers told to look elsewhere as Intelligent Finance cuts ISA rates

Former_MSE_Helen

Anyone who has (N)ISA savings with Intelligent Finance should consider moving their cash as it cut interest rates today

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Savers told to look elsewhere as Intelligent Finance cuts ISA rates




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jimjames

Maybe to interest paying current accounts?

Pricy147

All part of their game plan to get customers off their books due to the eu ruling and costs of continuing to offer the product.

Been a customer since around 2004 and nothing that i know on the market today compares with what they originally offered. Real shame.

Still keep my account going as like ability to have multiple savings jars. Not so easy elsewhere.

Remember have a 15k loan for a car aroung 8% apr which was competitive at the time. Then stoozing credit cards at 0% into the savings accounts to offset. No balance transfer fees back then either. Barely paid any interest on loan over 5 yrs.

Cap_Hero

I had to move my NISA investments earlier this year due to under performance, checked out the usual suspects like Nutmeg.com, HL and Barclays and chose the former in the end. It is easier to move your savings these days at least thanks to recent rule changes.

I think you should always shop around every year for the best NISA deal as they are all forever moving the goalposts, a bit like they do with mobile contracts but perhaps with more serious implications for your pocket in the long run!

Thrugelmir

Pricy147 wrote: »

All part of their game plan to get customers off their books due to the eu ruling and costs of continuing to offer the product.

Little point in operating it as a separate brand. Makes no commercial sense. Given the New World that lies ahead in the future for retail banks.

Pincher

I take solace from Joseph and the Amazing Technicoloured Dream Coat. Seven lean year followed seven years of plenty.


So if you consider 2001 to 2007 as fat years, and 2008 to 2014 as lean years, the misery should be over, and we'll get some decent interest rates at last.

minislim

can somebody in moneysavingexpert please investigate the current situation on fixed rate nisa's?

almost every single one on the market is technically not a savings account!
its a investment fund!
even though its called New Individual Savings Account you can only invest your money in and pay into it in a short duration. then its locked for the fixed duration and no further investment is allowed.

so how can you continue to save into your nisa?

bowlhead99

minislim wrote: »

can somebody in moneysavingexpert please investigate the current situation on fixed rate nisa's?

It stands to reason that if you are going to hold them to paying you a fixed rate of interest, you can't keep giving them more and more money over time and expect them to continue to pay that same guaranteed rate. Especially as market interest rates change all the time, they can't give you a guarantee if they don't know how much they might need to set aside to pay out and when.

So, all the fixed rate deposits are still savings accounts. You can save a fixed amount of money for a rainy day and get it back in a fixed amount of time to re-invest, re-save, or move somewhere else entirely. But they are not for ongoing increasing amounts of savings where you give them more each day or week or month. You put in what you have saved at the beginning and then they go and achieve a return on it somewhere and pay their running costs and hopefully some profits to make it worth their while, and then they guarantee to make the money that's left over, available to you whenever they said you could have it. Maybe 1 year, 2 year etc. The longer you agree to leave it without touching it, the more uses they would have for it internally at the bank, so the more they will pay.

I don't see what MSE has to 'investigate'. Fixed interest, fixed term ISAs have existed since ISAs (and TESSAs before them) were invented. Variable interest products also exist. You could get one of those and put in whatever you like whenever you like up to the limits of the product.

There are loads of non-fixed rate accounts which are instant access or have limitations on deposits (£x per month) or withdrawals(y times a year, z days' notice) etc.

Also there are oodles of promotional offers with high interest current accounts which offer better rates than ISAs anyway if you have not already used them up.

colsten

Fixed term and fixed rate savings accounts have been around since pre-ISA times, i.e. since the last millenium. The ISA-incarnation of these accounts are just about the tax treatment.

A fixed term / fixed rate savings account, ISA or not ISA, is a totally different product from an investment fund.

If you are not happy with locking your savings away for a fixed period of time, you have a vast choice of instant access or short term notice savings accounts, ISA and non-ISA. You will always get less interest in these accounts, as the provider cannot lend your money out longer term because you can ask for it back any time you wish.

Having said this, Lloyds (and possibly also TSB) do have an ISA product with a fixed rate that allows ongoing deposits. Of course the interest rate of 1.7% to 1.75% is not terribly exciting and can easily be bettered in instant access current accounts.

Not sure what MSE would "investigate" and why.

Pincher

Regular Saver NISA?


Anyway, with interest rates expected to creep up, why would you want to add to a lower fixed rate from this year?

poppy10_2

Pincher wrote: »

Anyway, with interest rates expected to creep up...

People have been saying that for five years now, still hasn't happened. The European Central Bank has just cut its interest rate - the trend is still downwards rather than upwards.