Regular Savings Accounts: The Best Currently Available List!

Bridlington1 · 7 August 2024 at 10:22PM

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

One other angle to consider though is that regular savers are at their most profitable towards the end of their terms. If you refresh now, who's to say that in a 6 months time they won't reduce the rates again, and leave you pondering the question of whether to refresh again to lock in the new rate to prevent being lumbered with a lower rate later on. If you do that a few months later they could reduce again, then where would you be?

If this happens you could find yourself stuck in a loop of refreshing to get lower rates without having much in the accounts and may find you'd've been better off just letting your regular savers run to maturity and opening whatever rate is available at the time.

FWIW I'd probably be inclined to let them run to maturity, though it would depend on their rates in comparison to my other accounts (if they were close to being emptied to feed other regular savers I'd probably be more inclined to refresh at the end of the month, if they were well worth the funding I'd be more likely to hold out till maturity)

Without a crystal ball I can't say for sure though, but I'd lean against refreshing now to be honest.

35har1old · 7 August 2024 at 10:51PM

kaMelo said:

schiff said:

Has anyone got an email address for Virgin customer services? I'm struggling to log on - I know my customer number and password but they aren't accepted. Severe deafness restricts using the phone. TIA

The current account login portal is a username, try your email address as the username.

The customer number login is for the savings version of Virgin Money.

Not everybody can remember a email address from a number of years back given you could have numerous email addresses I never used one for Virgin Money
Or for Virgin Money they use what was the Clydesdale platform and user ID is a 10 digit number.
The old Virgin Money platform for some products the user ID is a 7 character format which can be all letters or mixture of numbers and letters

35har1old · 7 August 2024 at 10:56PM

financialbliss said:

RosieRooBear said:

@DJDools, I did the same a month ago with a joint account. Opened two single current accounts yesterday for both myself and my husband so we can both have a regular saver each, and all went smoothly. Apparently you can only have one regular saver on a joint account which is why we went for a current account separately, so will be interesting if @financialbliss is able to open both.

Quick update. Despite "technical issues" yesterday, I've received an email this morning confirming the RS is open. My other half has also received a similar email. Checking both accounts, the account numbers are some way apart and are both showing as individual accounts, depite the current account and M+ saver showing as joint.

Note that under ithe VM additional info it says "You can only have one Regular Saver Exclusive at any time, this includes joint accounts" - wonder if that means that each individual can only have one RS, rather than you can only have one RS per current account.

https://uk.virginmoney.com/savings/products/regular_saver_exclusive_issue_1/#additional-information.

Time will tell - inclined to leave for now. Haven't funded either RS yet - going to do so shortly.

It means if you open a joint regular saver you can't open another in sole mames

easyasonetwothree · 8 August 2024 at 8:19AM

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

For Lloyds at least they say you can't open another regular Saver until the 12 month anniversary anyway. So I don't think the renew trick works with them?

flaneurs_lobster · 8 August 2024 at 8:24AM

easyasonetwothree said:

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

For Lloyds at least they say you can't open another regular Saver until the 12 month anniversary anyway. So I don't think the renew trick works with them?

It does. However the consideration might be what to do with the money removed from the (say) Lloyds Club RS currently earning 6.25%.

PRAISETHESUN · 8 August 2024 at 11:35AM

Bridlington1 said:

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

One other angle to consider though is that regular savers are at their most profitable towards the end of their terms. If you refresh now, who's to say that in a 6 months time they won't reduce the rates again, and leave you pondering the question of whether to refresh again to lock in the new rate to prevent being lumbered with a lower rate later on. If you do that a few months later they could reduce again, then where would you be?

If this happens you could find yourself stuck in a loop of refreshing to get lower rates without having much in the accounts and may find you'd've been better off just letting your regular savers run to maturity and opening whatever rate is available at the time.

FWIW I'd probably be inclined to let them run to maturity, though it would depend on their rates in comparison to my other accounts (if they were close to being emptied to feed other regular savers I'd probably be more inclined to refresh at the end of the month, if they were well worth the funding I'd be more likely to hold out till maturity)

Without a crystal ball I can't say for sure though, but I'd lean against refreshing now to be honest.

I recall a discussion from a while back where someone was pondering a similar issue, although I think this was when rates were on the way up. The rough break even point from what I remember (based on the numbers at the time) was that it was better to do nothing and let accounts run to maturity if they had less than 5-6 months left to go, given that by breaking the RS early the bulk of the money ends up going into lower rate account

twadds123 · 8 August 2024 at 1:26PM

Bridlington1 said:

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

One other angle to consider though is that regular savers are at their most profitable towards the end of their terms. If you refresh now, who's to say that in a 6 months time they won't reduce the rates again, and leave you pondering the question of whether to refresh again to lock in the new rate to prevent being lumbered with a lower rate later on. If you do that a few months later they could reduce again, then where would you be?

If this happens you could find yourself stuck in a loop of refreshing to get lower rates without having much in the accounts and may find you'd've been better off just letting your regular savers run to maturity and opening whatever rate is available at the time.

FWIW I'd probably be inclined to let them run to maturity, though it would depend on their rates in comparison to my other accounts (if they were close to being emptied to feed other regular savers I'd probably be more inclined to refresh at the end of the month, if they were well worth the funding I'd be more likely to hold out till maturity)

Without a crystal ball I can't say for sure though, but I'd lean against refreshing now to be honest.

thank you, thats a massively useful post and clarified my thinking.

Bridlington1 · 8 August 2024 at 3:32PM

Stafford Railway BS have announced some of their savings rates will reduce on 1/9/24.

Of note is that their Regular Saver – Issue 1 is not included in this so will remain at 5.15% for the time being.

pecunianonolet · 8 August 2024 at 5:06PM

twadds123 said:

Bridlington1 said:

twadds123 said:

Lloyds, BOS, Halifax regular savers.

I have all these due to end in a few months time, just wondering if any one feels it is worth using the "renew" trick to start them again now to lock in the interest rate for another 12 months?

With the base rate coming down just wondering if they will drop their rates in the coming months?

One other angle to consider though is that regular savers are at their most profitable towards the end of their terms. If you refresh now, who's to say that in a 6 months time they won't reduce the rates again, and leave you pondering the question of whether to refresh again to lock in the new rate to prevent being lumbered with a lower rate later on. If you do that a few months later they could reduce again, then where would you be?

If this happens you could find yourself stuck in a loop of refreshing to get lower rates without having much in the accounts and may find you'd've been better off just letting your regular savers run to maturity and opening whatever rate is available at the time.

FWIW I'd probably be inclined to let them run to maturity, though it would depend on their rates in comparison to my other accounts (if they were close to being emptied to feed other regular savers I'd probably be more inclined to refresh at the end of the month, if they were well worth the funding I'd be more likely to hold out till maturity)

Without a crystal ball I can't say for sure though, but I'd lean against refreshing now to be honest.

thank you, thats a massively useful post and clarified my thinking.

Alternatively, also consider your tax situation. I stopped feeding some regular savers, even the high 7 and 8% Monmouthshire ones as the interest falls within this tax year and I get taxed 40% on it. I instead started to open some lower paid ones, which mature next tax year so even if the % rate is lower my total return is higher due to tax.

Also, I haven't maxed out my ISA allowance yet for this year and operate with the Chip Easy Access ISA and melt down from there for my various stoozing repayments I've got this year so whenever I can I replace previously withdrawn funds from my ISA as I don't have to worry about tax vs. having to monitor potential returns for next tax year already.