The Top Easy Access Savings Discussion Area

Nienna_7

Noted that WB has been listed as having one of the best Savings Accounts but as there seems to be an abundance of negative news (albeit from 2009) about WB, am wondering whether it's safe to open an account with them?

diysaver

Thanks for all the info - I want to get an savings account for monthly interest. I looked at the AA too - looks great but seems to be yearly interest? Does anyone know any decent % rate ones out there which give out monthly interst?

Thanks.

10_66

Nienna_7 wrote: »

Noted that WB has been listed as having one of the best Savings Accounts but as there seems to be an abundance of negative news (albeit from 2009) about WB, am wondering whether it's safe to open an account with them?

If they were to go under, your savings would be protected by the FSCS up to £50,000.

10_66

diysaver wrote: »

...I want to get an savings account for monthly interest. I looked at the AA too - looks great but seems to be yearly interest? Does anyone know any decent % rate ones out there which give out monthly interst?

If you just want variable rate with instant access, there's Birmingham Midshires Telephone Extra (issue 2), 2.75% AER, monthly 2.72%. There are other slightly higher rates if you want to go for notice or fixed rate accounts.

.

Mickygg

10_66 wrote: »

If you just want variable rate with instant access, there's Birmingham Midshires Telephone Extra (issue 2), 2.75% AER, monthly 2.72%. There are other slightly higher rates if you want to go for notice or fixed rate accounts.

.

Also ING Direct have just upped their rate to 2.75% - they pay monthly interest, fixed at that rate for 12 months. Very easy to join up, takes a few minutes on line.

diysaver

Mickygg wrote: »

Also ING Direct have just upped their rate to 2.75% - they pay monthly interest, fixed at that rate for 12 months. Very easy to join up, takes a few minutes on line.

Thanks for the info - will check them out!

powned

a&l are a complete pain imo!

Lieutenant_Thrift

I need advice from my generous fellow money savers please.

Currently:

I have a Halifax Reward account (£5 a month);

a 3% Halifax ISA from 2009/10 which has matured and now is at 0.5%. I opened it with £3600 last year and now have £3705 in it.

a 2.72% ING savings account which will drop to 0.5% on 28th April. I used this for savings in addition to the ISA.

For the future:

I have applied for a First Direct 1st Account, switching from the Halifax to get the £100 bonus and £100 switch after six months. However, I am thinking of ditching the First Direct application and going to the A&L 5% premium account as you can get £45 cashback from topcashback: keeping up to £2500 in it and not letting the balance fall below £1500.

I am thinking of opening the Santander 3.2% ISA with about £4000 and gradually building it up to £5100

I am thinking of opening the AA's 2.8% savings account for savings over the ISA allowance

I am shopping around for places to transfer last year's ISA but Yorkshire Bank who seemed to have the best deal for transfers no longer offer this.

To complicate things further, I have a partner with a few thousand saved which she currently keeps with Lloyds TSB in a current account and an ISA which I'm sure will be on 0.5% now. I've wondered if it would be better to have a joint account of some sort.

What do you think I should do?

Many thanks,

LT

boobbby

Just a quick update about transfering within Alliance and leicester. Like many other provider their rates drop dramatically after 12 months. So I opened up a new ISA account (2.75%) with them over the Internet and next day was given an account number by email. Last Friday I sent off the transfer form to move all the money in my previous ISA to my new ISA. I assume A&L received the transfer form yesterday (Monday) and today the money was in the new ISA. I also have their 3.2% ISA for this years allowance.

curlygirl1971

Lieutenant_Thrift wrote: »

I need advice from my generous fellow money savers please.

Currently:

I have a Halifax Reward account (£5 a month);

a 3% Halifax ISA from 2009/10 which has matured and now is at 0.5%. I opened it with £3600 last year and now have £3705 in it.

a 2.72% ING savings account which will drop to 0.5% on 28th April. I used this for savings in addition to the ISA.

For the future:

I have applied for a First Direct 1st Account, switching from the Halifax to get the £100 bonus and £100 switch after six months. However, I am thinking of ditching the First Direct application and going to the A&L 5% premium account as you can get £45 cashback from topcashback: keeping up to £2500 in it and not letting the balance fall below £1500.

I am thinking of opening the Santander 3.2% ISA with about £4000 and gradually building it up to £5100

I am thinking of opening the AA's 2.8% savings account for savings over the ISA allowance

I am shopping around for places to transfer last year's ISA but Yorkshire Bank who seemed to have the best deal for transfers no longer offer this.

To complicate things further, I have a partner with a few thousand saved which she currently keeps with Lloyds TSB in a current account and an ISA which I'm sure will be on 0.5% now. I've wondered if it would be better to have a joint account of some sort.

What do you think I should do?

Many thanks,

LT

Wow, almost the same set up as me.

I have the Halifax Reward account and last year recieved an offer from NatWest to switch to their current account for an incentive of £150 (It wasn't an offer they advertised - I was sent it by letter and even the branch had never heard of it). But I went ahead with it and got my £150 and then also asked the Halifax to keep my reward account open once all the DD's had been transferred across. With the reward account I still cycle through the obligatory £1k per month to get my £5 per month. So you could consider keeping open your Reward account? If you've never switched before then keep an eye on whats happening........they didn't switch my mortgage payment and If I hadn't noticed I would have defaulted

My ING also 'matures' soon and am looking at the AA - this seems to be the best instant access around at the moment

I've just opened the Santander - I did so just before it dropped from 3.5%. There is a lot of talk on various places on this forum about poor service and indeed I've already experienced it from them - 2 phonecalls and a branch visit later and my name is still spelt incorrectly on my account! But hopefully this will settle down. I don't know if I would go as far as to recommend Santander and group......

With regard to getting cashback for opening the A&L account - I've also been tempted by this (they are running an offer also on a savings account) but I've heard that getting the cashback is quite difficult and lengthy.......so perhaps don't base your decision solely on this. Have you seen the Lloyds Vantage Account? That offers rather tasty rates but again you have to cycle through £1k per month. My partner has recently upgraded his bog standard Lloyds CA to a Vantage one - it was easy

I think the Cheshire BS is a good transfer-in ISA at the moment (3%?) but am not sure if it can only be opened via branch - have a look at it and also, if you've not already done so, check out Kazza242's thread on the best ISA rates (Look at post no. 1)

HTH