HAVE £17k SAVINGS IN THE BANK, HOW CAN I MAKE THE MOST OF THEM!

ratty2601

Hi all MSE's
Me and my partner have £17,000 sitting in a Barclays bank account.
It used to be in a woolwich Branch Saver and we accrued some interest paid every year.
Now woolwich is no more the account has been ransferred to Barclays and we earn around £32 a month in interest.
Can I better this amount elsewhere?
Would I be better off starting an ISA and paying in regular monthly sums from these savings?
I am useless at Bank & Finance and would really like some help!
Your great advice would be most appreciated

Leighthal

Do you need access to the money or can it be locked away?

CLAPTON

if you dont have cash ISAs I would suggest you both open a cash ISA for £3k each... NS&I are a good bet at the moment.

That will leave 11,000

If you are happy with internet a/cs then Good paying a/c are Northern Rock at 6.2%, A&L direct saver 6.3% although with some restrictions ...

read martins article on saving

ratty2601

Leighthal wrote: »

Do you need access to the money or can it be locked away?

I would probably keep £2k in an emergency fund (that I am able to access whenever I like) and lock away the rest if it meant I would accrue more interest. I t seems that locking money away does give you more than if it is accessible, is that correct?

CLAPTON

ratty2601 wrote: »

I would probably keep £2k in an emergency fund (that I am able to access whenever I like) and lock away the rest if it meant I would accrue more interest. I t seems that locking money away does give you more than if it is accessible, is that correct?

Curiously its not really so now adays if you are prepared to use internet a/cs... many of these give instant access and very good rates.
Of course if you are prepared to get a fixed rate 1 year a/c you can currently get a better rate but then you are gambling that the bank rate won't go up.

ratty2601

CLAPTON wrote: »

if you dont have cash ISAs I would suggest you both open a cash ISA for £3k each... NS&I are a good bet at the moment.

That will leave 11,000

If you are happy with internet a/cs then Good paying a/c are Northern Rock at 6.2%, A&L direct saver 6.3% although with some restrictions ...

read martins article on saving

Thanks thats good avice!
Do I need to top up an ISA or can I just pay the money in and leave it?

CLAPTON

you are allowed to put 3000 in an ISA this tax year.
Most mini cash ISAs allow you to either make one payment of 3k or put in several smaller amounts but that rather depends upon the particular ISA you choose.

as I said read Martins articles on savings and ISAs

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/best-cash-isa

and on saving try

http://www.stoozing.com/savings.htm

although the web is awash with comparison sites and all the major banks and building socs have web sites.

rathernot

If you don't have ISA's already I'd dump £6k (one for you and your partner) in an ISA straight away, and put the rest, excluding your emergency fund, somewhere such as Icesave.

I know this sounds obvious but don't hang about, I've had around double your amount sat in Lloyds for several months whilst I debated who to go with and basically keeping it in the bank for a few months means you lose over a hundred quid vs. gaining maybe a tenner whilst forever waiting for an account with a better APR.

Tom_Jones

Jeez only £32 a month in interest, what a rip off Barclays are.

Some good advice above, and you could get hold of your money with Icesave in just a few days if you needed access to it.