Getting first direct switch bonus & savings rate without changing my main current account

Silverfin2805

Hi all

Currently I'm with Halifax with their rewards current account getting my £3 a month rather happily for now. I'm looking at opening a regular saver to get the ball rolling for any big purchases later in life (such as a house), at the moment I have a Tesco instant access saver with about £1500 in it, at %1.36, interest as a quick grab emergency fund. Everything after this I want to get better interest on and seen the first direct savings account at 5% for their current account customers.

My question is this is there any bank accounts I can open as a secondary current account to my Halifax, and then (hopefully) quickly switch to the first direct current account to nab their £125 switch incentive and get the better rate on their regular saver account?

Haven't really seen anything on this yet and figured it might be worth asking

Thanks

Willing2Learn

Why not open another Halifax current account and then switch using that?

EarthBoy

Silverfin2805 wrote: »

Currently I'm with Halifax with their rewards current account getting my £3 a month rather happily for now.

It's only £2 now, it was reduced in October, I think.

colsten

Silverfin2805 wrote: »

Currently I'm with Halifax with their rewards current account getting my £3 a month rather happily for now.

Are you sure you get £3?

Silverfin2805 wrote: »

I have a Tesco instant access saver with about £1500 in it, at %1.36, interest as a quick grab emergency fund.

For that amount, you'd do better with a Tesco current account. Although it is possible that the current rate of 3% will drop in the next few months.

By far the best option for £1,500 is currently TSB, who pay 5% on that amount. Nationwide also pay 5% for 12 months, also have a 5% RS, and also offer a switching bonus (referral offer), albeit for £100 only.

If you cba with the current accounts, there are still a better place than 1.36% for instant access. Even Tesco themselves have a 1.45% savings account, and Marcus pays 1.5%.

Silverfin2805

Halifax has a Basic account but you can't apply for it directly because its for customers who cant meet the requirements of the other current accounts. And I'm unsure about opening another rewards current account (which the next level up I can get) because you need to pay in £750 each month and have 2 direct debits.

Think it would be maybe easier getting and account like the one B Current are doing where its free to open with no requirements to keep the account open. Unfortunately I cant post the link to it because my forum account is new.

That way I can just open it and not have to worry about shuffling money and direct debits about to meet the requirements and then swap it over.

Silverfin2805

colsten wrote: »

Are you sure you get £3?


For that amount, you'd do better with a Tesco current account. Although it is possible that the current rate of 3% will drop in the next few months.

By far the best option for £1,500 is currently TSB, who pay 5% on that amount. Nationwide also pay 5% for 12 months, also have a 5% RS, and also offer a switching bonus (referral offer), albeit for £100 only.

If you cba with the current accounts, there are still a better place than 1.36% for instant access. Even Tesco themselves have a 1.45% savings account, and Marcus pays 1.5%.

Yeah just realised there it did drop to £2 a few months ago. Might be worth moving the Tesco saver to a current account, the one issue I've found with those is that they normally require about £600+ going into them each month and at the moment I put away at least £400 into savings so I don't always hit the top current accounts with a good interest rate.

Though Ill definitely have a look at the ones mentioned there.

Katiehound

The 5% RS with Nationwide, M&S & HSBC have a max of £250 pm

If you want to keep the Halifax then you might have to open a basic a/c with another bank and then switch that.

Remember you don't have to 'earn' the minimum pay-in per month and the money does not need to remain. It can come from another external bank a/c by standing order or be made up from multiple pay ins.So with funding of say £500 it could be sent from your existing bank a/c and then sent back, or it could be £125 in and out x 4.
Most of the current a/cs also require DDs for thr bonus to be paid.

You can open a new Tesco saver at the better rate and transfer funds from the old one (then close it)

Your money could go into the current account, stay for a few hours / days and then go to the savings.......

EarthBoy

Silverfin2805 wrote: »

Halifax has a Basic account but you can't apply for it directly because its for customers who cant meet the requirements of the other current accounts. And I'm unsure about opening another rewards current account (which the next level up I can get) because you need to pay in £750 each month and have 2 direct debits.

You don't have to pay in £750 and have two direct debits to open a Reward account. You only have to do that to get the £2 monthly reward. If you don't pay enough in, or have no direct debits, you just don't get the rewards, that's all.

The bad news is that Halifax's rules state you can't have two Reward accounts unless one of them is in joint names. See page 19 here:

http://static.halifax.co.uk/assets/pdf/bankaccounts/pdf/bank-account-guide.pdf

The good news, however, is that Halifax's systems aren't programmed to enforce that rule, and I managed to open a second Reward account in my sole name about 3 or 4 months ago. Strangely, though, although the online system gave me the new sort code and account no., it insisted I went into a branch with ID before the account was activated. Even then, they never sent me a debit card for the second Reward account, but I never chased that up as I didn't need one.