Halifax RS the account they dont want you to open

lipidicman

Take care with the anniversary!

my final (13th payment) went in on the 5th of march, account emptied on the 10th. So I paid (by SO) in on the 11th. BUT this was counted as two payments in one month and they held the money in clearing (no notice, nothing. My money just disappeared).

What you should do is cancel that last SO (the 13th) and do it the day after maturity. However in branch they told me to leave it alone. If you do that your RS sits empty for nearly a whole month, which is a bad idea (effectively cuts the interest rate by a twelth)

Oh well, sorted in the end by closing the account and opening a new one!

bluesnice

i had trouble with my account. Setting it up was easy - no problems. My £250 left my bank every month and then on the 3rd month I got a statement for the regular saver account saying 'account closed' The muppets in the branch had only set up my monthly standing order for the wrong account and my £250 was going into my web saver not reg saver. They had not sent me any paper work or i'd of checked this myself.

Anyway after a phone call, they reopened my reg saver, transfered the funds back and back dated the interest. Mind you, I've yet to have confirmation of this in writing!! I'm sure something else will go wrong. But if you've just opened two accounts its worth checking your 250 is going into the right one!!

Milarky

It only occurred to me today that I had set up a standing order to credit the RS account on the first of each month - starting next month [1st June]. Now my account matured on 6th May [the anniversary of the first payment made]

I realised that this excluded the first month - May - and therefore if I didn't do something about it quickly I would fall at the first hurdle - which is to make a single credit to the account every calendar month.

I contacted Halifax [via 'call me back', so it takes time to speak to someone who knows what their taking about but costs you nothing] and they confirmed I had to make an initial credit before Tuesday. Also this has to be via Standing order [or a 'disguished' manual payment from a non-halifax account, of course] if coming from a Halifax current account - they wouldn't move the money from my websaver for instance.

He ho! Anyway, the way to fix this is set up a SO start date in May [tomorrow] wait for the first payment and then amend for subsequent payments to the 1st of each month.

I can't believe how difficult Halifax have made the operation of this one account! As I said above they really do want people to put the proceeds into a non Halifax account and post it to the RS from there rather than try to accommodate customers with any kind of flexibility or common sense. If it was not for the 7% I would not be repeating the exercise and would regularly save somewheres else.

lipidicman

Milarky. Be careful. I assume your last payment into the first year went in on the 1st of May. If you pay into the account again in may then this will count as two payments in one month and it will be rejected and the money goes into clearing (this is what happened to me. Beware the phone staff do not know what they are talking about!). Your plan will be OK if you stopped the 1st of may payment (which would have been the 13th payment if you opened the account on the 6th of may last year with a deposit)

Milarky

Thanks lipidcman,

My FIRST monthly payment after the anniversary [for May] was takentoday by Standing Order from Halifax current account - and I just topped up the current a/c from the Websaver a/c by the same amount.

I then amended the next date from 27th June to 1st June [still counting as a different month, of course] and 1st of each month thereafter

What I should have explained before was that my original 12th payment [from a non Halifax source] was on 1st April and there was no payment set for 1st May as I expected the account to be closed down on maturity. I couldn't make the original payment any earlier than 6th May last year, you see.

My intention is to leave the SO set to the 1st until next April and then reset to 7th May [i.e. just after the second anniversary] and leave it like that. Then I only have to top up the current a/c from the websaver monthly [unless that can be 'automated' in some way?]

lipidicman

Milarky wrote:

Thanks lipidcman,

My intention is to leave the SO set to the 1st until next April and then reset to 7th May [i.e. just after the second anniversary] and leave it like that. Then I only have to top up the current a/c from the websaver monthly [unless that can be 'automated' in some way?]

Yeah thats exactly what you should do. The staff told me to leave mine on the first and the last £250 would stay in the account! well that didnt happen and when I put it back myself it was rejected. If I didnt do this the account would sit empty for nearly a whole month (kind of like your original point)

The websaver can do some pretty cool things. Maybe you can set up a SO from the websaver (I think I read that it handles SO's and DD's, can anybody confirm this?)

Hobo_2

Boy this is confusing! reading back the thread HFX do not allow the RS to be funded from the websaver or any savings acc of theirs,does this apply to their current acc also

Milarky

Hobo wrote:

Boy this is confusing! reading back the thread HFX do not allow the RS to be funded from the websaver or any savings acc of theirs,does this apply to their current acc also

Yes, it looks like this is finally going to work!...

1) Money is currently held in Websaver [having been swept on maturity plus interest]
2) SO into RS allowed from Halifax Current Account
3) SO into Halifax Current Account allowed from Websaver [at least, it's now set up!]

Therefore money will now trickle back from Websaver to the RS via an intermediate SO [through the current account] over the next 12 months: 7.0% (fixed) 'going in' and 4.9% (variable) 'coming out'.

[It's silly that you have to open a bank account to accomplish this when the Websaver is almost the same thing but it does have its advantages]

[Hope that overdraft given will remain if I only use the account in this way!]

In 12 months, the funds will be swept back plus interest, and the following day it starts all over again [but no further intervention should be required]

Paul_Varjak

Halifax will not a fund a Regular Saver from their Websaver Account. That is why I have an automated transfer from Websaver on 23rd of each month to Halifax Current Account. Actually I transfer more than I need to fund the Regular Saver with so as to ensure that my Halifax Current Account earns the top 3% interest rate!

On the 24th of each month automated transfers move money from Current Accounts to Regular Saver, Websaver and the government-backed Halifax Saving Gateway accounts.

In summary:

23rd: £700 from Websaver to Current Account
24th: £250 from Current Account to Regular Saver
24th: £200 from Current Account to Websaver
24th: £25 from Current Account to Saving Gateway account


Actually, although you cannot fund the Regular Saver from a Websaver account, when the Regluar Saver ends, the funds can be paid into a Websaver account! I think you can fund the Regular Saver from an external account - in that case I assume that if you can set up standing order from that external account, that external account would not, necessarily, have to be a current account.