Regular Savings Accounts: The Best Currently Available List!

Woodyrocks

I opened my YBS reg saver in April 2007. Does anyone know if this was an issue 1? I normally pay in £500pm but I now see that this amount has been reduced to £250 but do not know if this is applicable to the account I have.

YorkshireBoy

Woodyrocks wrote: »

I opened my YBS reg saver in April 2007. Does anyone know if this was an issue 1? I normally pay in £500pm but I now see that this amount has been reduced to £250 but do not know if this is applicable to the account I have.

You have 'Issue 1' (although they don't call it that), so can continue to deposit £500 per month.

steveteach

Hi Abbey never got back to me regarding their regular saver (see post 420) but my Principality regular saver is now up and running.

Special_Saver2

Hi Everybody,

Well, I have double checked everything and there is nothing to add for this weekend's update.

I will say however that 4% interest will be looking good by this time next month! The top three picks on Martin's Savings Accounts thread are no longer too good - the Anglo-Irish Easy Saver 2 account has been withdrawn and replaced with an account paying only 2.5%. The ICICI HiSave account has dropped its interest rate to 3.55% already. The A&L eSaver Issue 2 has been replaced with Issue 3 paying 3.6%. I will not start adding or deleting accounts from this thread though until all the interest rate cuts have filtered through.

Fella wrote: »

I opened three of these on 23/1/08 thanks to this excellent thread

I opened each with £250 & have paid £250/month each month. This month's payments haven't gone in yet but will do so in a day or so.

Am I correct in thinking that interest will be credited & this will convert to an instant access account on 23/1/09 therefore I may as well close these & withdraw on or after that date?

thanks
Fella

Fella, did you think about opening a Skipton BS Christmas Saver at the same time? If you want to, you can open one online.

I have just gone back and added a comment to my entries on the Skipton BS Special Saver and Christmas Saver accounts to point out that you can open these accounts at the same time. This will let you save up to £1,000 per month if you want to. Don't forget that this is a variable interest rate. It has fared pretty well though - Skipton have been keeping the interest rate pretty competitive for a variable rate account plus you can close the account without penalty if they ever do drop the interest rate too much. If you do not need penalty-free access, you would probably better off trying to fill up the fixed interest rate offerings first as they are currently offering 5-6% for 12 months (see post 4).

As knights has already commented, the Skipton accounts will convert to instant access accounts upon maturity that pay a pretty poor interest rate.

As for closing the accounts, in November I happened to have a great opportunity to pop into a branch the day before my accounts were due to mature. They let me close all 4 accounts (3 Special Savers and a Christmas Saver account) without penalty and open up 4 new accounts. I checked the interest calculation and it was the full interest rate. They gave me a cheque for the balance (actually 4 cheques!). It was pretty easy and straightforward. I imagine that the new online versions of these accounts will be just as easy to open and close.

As a matter of interest, has anybody here opened the online versions of the Skipton BS Special Saver and Christmas Saver accounts? Was it pretty easy and straightforward? Is it easy to close the online version?

sdooley, thanks for mentioning the First Direct regular savings ISA. In case you wonder why I do not have that account in this thread, it is because Kazza's excellent ISA thread already covers regular savings ISAs and I did not want to duplicate information. If people want me to add the regular savings ISAs to this thread then I could do that too.

All the best,
SS2

Woodyrocks

Thanks YB. I popped in in person today and they confirmed exactly as much.

mary

Special_Saver2 wrote: »

As a matter of interest, has anybody here opened the online versions of the Skipton BS Special Saver and Christmas Saver accounts? Was it pretty easy and straightforward? Is it easy to close the online version?

SS2

Yes I opened an online Xmas Saver back in November. It was quick and easy. You log on using a Grid Card (just a card similar to a credit card but no gadget needed to put it in). Couldn't understand why mine wasn't working and eventually they had to send me a new one, as presumably the combination of letters anad numbers on it were not working for my account. Otherwise no problems.

Can't tell you about closing an account, not got to that point yet.

mary

Just seen this on emoneyfacts
https://www.emoneyfacts.co.uk/news/savings-news.aspx?newsarticleid=180817
Issue 7 will open 13/1/09 at lower rate of 5%. Same details as before

steveteach

Thanks Mary
Just completed my 5% application ready for the morning's post.

Special_Saver2

I have updated the appropriate post on the first page to reflect this change. Don't forget that if you miss a payment or make a withdrawal then you only get 0.1% interest for the whole term.

SS2

Special_Saver2

Hi Folks,

Thanks to a post by lr1277 on another thread, I have a new regular saver account to put on the list. I have just put the details of the Scottish Building Society Regular Saver Account in post 2 as this is an account with no maturity date. The limit is £250,000 although I am sure most people would want to avoid depositing more than £50,000 in the current climate. The account pays 4% gross variable on £25 or more per month (no maximum on the monthly deposit) and allows 1 penalty-free withdrawal per year. You can miss 1 monthly payment per year.

I should point out that the interest rate has not been reduced following the January base rate cut so it is possible the rate will drop. The rate is still current though according to the Scottish BS website and other websites, e.g. moneysupermarket. The bonus interest is credited on 31st March, so I suppose that if the interest rate does drop badly over the next few weeks or months, you could close the account on 1st April and not lose out on the bonus interest (and perhaps even have a penalty-free withdrawal before then).

Thinking about it, you could use this account to deposit a lump sum and just keep the account going by depositing £25 per month. For that purpose, 4% is a decent interest rate provided you don't need more than one withdrawal per year, e.g. you need to stash some money somewhere for a house purchase or something else later this year and will only need a single penalty-free withdrawal.

I think the usefulness of this account will depend on what happens to the interest rate over the coming weeks to months. Most variable interest rates on general savings (and ISA) accounts have been difficult to predict recently! I was just looking at the past interest rates of Scottish BS for a clue to their behaviour. If I am reading this right, before the latest interest rate change on 4th December, the last time they adjusted their interest rates was back in May 2008!

I think that for most people the fixed rate regular saver accounts paying 5-6% will be more suitable than this account but maybe somebody here will find the above account useful.

Anyway, I shall stop reflecting on this new find!

Apologies in advance if my updates to this thread for the rest of this month are a little irregular - I am travelling at the moment.

All the best,
SS2