Best alternative to ThinkMoney / budgeting account

Zanzibar28

Hello,

My partner and I currently bank with ThinkMoney. I like the fact that they take all the money for bills out of our pay and manage that side of things but we're sure we could do this ourselves with two accounts (one for bills and one for living expenses) and save ourselves the £21.25 a month.:eek:

I am on a DMP so my credit rating is probably awful. My partner's credit is probably poor to fair (no idea!). The key features of any new account would need to be as follows:

- Joint account required for bills and card account
- Online account management is a must
- Debit cards required / ability to use the card online
- Must be able to set up direct debits
- Text banking is a definite plus but optional
- We don't want an overdraft at all

I've looked into basic bank accounts but I'm not sure they can do everything above? We'd like to avoid Clydesdale and Bank of Scotland (previous bad experiences).

Are there any banks that could offer two accounts in the same place? Ideally we'd want two joint ones.

Sorry if I've not posted this in the right place...Thanks in advance!

enthusiasticsaver

I would have thought any high street bank would do all of these - except text banking - what is that?

enthusiasticsaver

Also £21.25 per month to organise your money into separate pots is extortion, that is more than £250 over the year. Definitely move banks.

solentsusie

Zanzibar28 wrote: »

Hello,

My partner and I currently bank with ThinkMoney. I like the fact that they take all the money for bills out of our pay and manage that side of things but we're sure we could do this ourselves with two accounts (one for bills and one for living expenses) and save ourselves the £21.25 a month.:eek:

I am on a DMP so my credit rating is probably awful. My partner's credit is probably poor to fair (no idea!). The key features of any new account would need to be as follows:

- Joint account required for bills and card account
- Online account management is a must
- Debit cards required / ability to use the card online
- Must be able to set up direct debits
- Text banking is a definite plus but optional
- We don't want an overdraft at all

I've looked into basic bank accounts but I'm not sure they can do everything above? We'd like to avoid Clydesdale and Bank of Scotland (previous bad experiences).

Are there any banks that could offer two accounts in the same place? Ideally we'd want two joint ones.

Sorry if I've not posted this in the right place...Thanks in advance!

You could easily save yourselves £21.25 a month just for the sake of having two accounts and putting your bill money into one of them - I do this and so do many other people.

You say your credit rating is 'probably awful'. Have you and your partner actually checked your credit files with all three agencies? Noddle (Callcredit) is free online and you can just get your £2 statutory reports from Experian and Equifax. I would definitely suggest doing this before applying for anything else if you are unsure of you financial situation. Best not to keep your head in the sand on these things and bite the bullet.

I had 5 defaults on my credit file 18 months ago and still managed to get a full FlexDirect account with Nationwide. Some banks are fussier than others depending on your personal circumstances and what they see on your credit files. RBS and NatWest also seem to accept people with a less than perfect record, when I was at my lowest point both of these banks accepted me.

Most online banks offer all of what you require above. Although I also don't know what you mean by 'text banking'. Do you mean text alerts when you account gets to a certain level?

I would certainly ditch ThinkMoney and use that £255 a year saving to pay off some of those debts!

Good luck.

Zanzibar28

solentsusie wrote: »

You could easily save yourselves £21.25 a month just for the sake of having two accounts and putting your bill money into one of them - I do this and so do many other people.

You say your credit rating is 'probably awful'. Have you and your partner actually checked your credit files with all three agencies? Noddle (Callcredit) is free online and you can just get your £2 statutory reports from Experian and Equifax. I would definitely suggest doing this before applying for anything else if you are unsure of you financial situation. Best not to keep your head in the sand on these things and bite the bullet.

I had 5 defaults on my credit file 18 months ago and still managed to get a full FlexDirect account with Nationwide. Some banks are fussier than others depending on your personal circumstances and what they see on your credit files. RBS and NatWest also seem to accept people with a less than perfect record, when I was at my lowest point both of these banks accepted me.

Most online banks offer all of what you require above. Although I also don't know what you mean by 'text banking'. Do you mean text alerts when you account gets to a certain level?

I would certainly ditch ThinkMoney and use that £255 a year saving to pay off some of those debts!

Good luck.

That's really helpful to know! Also had forgotten you can pay £2 to get your report - had it in my head we'd need to sign up to Experian at the £15/month rate to see it.

I moved to ThinkMoney when I was looking at debt solutions with Wilson Andrews who recommended them and wanted us to pay them a fee for managing a debt solution when StepChange can do it for free. I had a single account for 18 months, paying £14.50 a month for them to 'manage' my money then we got a joint account this time last year so in total have paid them £516 in total. :eek::eek::eek:

I reasoned it out though that I'd prefer paying a fixed fee than the bank charges I was getting myself into trouble with before which totalled more than what we've paid TM (but probably over a longer period).

Anyway, that's by the by, I think we have a far better idea about budgeting now and would manage with two accounts. Is it possible to get these with one bank? I seem to remember someone saying Santander do this?

Text banking is maybe just something TM do as part of the service you pay for. You can text for your balance (which we relied on a lot because you can't check your balance on any cash machine), they text when a payment is received (always nice on payday), you can text to set up a new direct debit, to check your last 5 payments on your card account or salaries account and so on...quite handy but presumably, with some of the banks having apps now, you'd be able to do this through them.

Thanks for your help.

Archi_Bald

Take some of the money you will save and get yourself YNAB http://www.youneedabudget.com/ which is occasionally available for a mere tenner. But even at the regular $60 it is amazing value as you can keep it for life, and it helps you to stay completely on top of your finances.

Search the forum for YNAB to read some of the user experiences.

al25

Have you tried https://www.mycashplus.co.uk
It costs £4.95 per month and you can set up direct debits make payments and receive payments.

Also anyone near London in a similar situation can open a Metro Bank Cash Card account.

Archi_Bald

mycashplus is a last resort for somebody who can't get even a basic account. I don't think Zanzibar28 has exhausted the free accounts yet.

solentsusie

Zanzibar28 wrote: »

That's really helpful to know! Also had forgotten you can pay £2 to get your report - had it in my head we'd need to sign up to Experian at the £15/month rate to see it.

I moved to ThinkMoney when I was looking at debt solutions with Wilson Andrews who recommended them and wanted us to pay them a fee for managing a debt solution when StepChange can do it for free. I had a single account for 18 months, paying £14.50 a month for them to 'manage' my money then we got a joint account this time last year so in total have paid them £516 in total. :eek::eek::eek:

I reasoned it out though that I'd prefer paying a fixed fee than the bank charges I was getting myself into trouble with before which totalled more than what we've paid TM (but probably over a longer period).

Anyway, that's by the by, I think we have a far better idea about budgeting now and would manage with two accounts. Is it possible to get these with one bank? I seem to remember someone saying Santander do this?

Text banking is maybe just something TM do as part of the service you pay for. You can text for your balance (which we relied on a lot because you can't check your balance on any cash machine), they text when a payment is received (always nice on payday), you can text to set up a new direct debit, to check your last 5 payments on your card account or salaries account and so on...quite handy but presumably, with some of the banks having apps now, you'd be able to do this through them.

Thanks for your help.

You definitely don't want to sign up to the £14.99 a month for your credit report. Just the £2 statutory report will do just fine. You don't need to look at the 'credit scores' these companies provide as they are irrelevant as I am sure many other people will happily tell you on here!

The banking Apps you can get are pretty good and will help you keep on top of your money, as will regularly checking your online banking.

I had two RBS accounts and used one to have my salary paid into and my direct debits taken out of. I used to leave enough money in there to cover my direct debits and bills and the other I used as my 'spending money' account. It was a very basic and simple way of doing things but it worked well for me. And no paying any fees to anyone! Both accounts had debit cards on them, even their basic accounts have this facility, and the online banking is easy to use. But I expect you will have the same facilities with any bank.

I don't use text alerts personally but this sounds like the service you are describing with ThinkMoney.

There is absolutely no reason, with a little bit of initial organisation from yourself, that you need to pay anyone to manage your bills.

All you need to do is find a bank that are happy to offer you an account.

Good luck.

System

Probably RBS Select Account(s) with Overdraft Control.
Otherwise, M&S bank as you've already rejected Clydesdale.

pmduk

A Basic account with most of the high street banks will meet your needs except text banking. NB IIRC Santander don't offer a debit card on their basic account. RBS/Natwest and Barclays seem pretty amenable to those with less than perfect credit records