Regular Savings Accounts: The Best Currently Available List!

gt94sss2

Bridlington1 said:

I personally would rather do things manually myself largely because I do not want to have to faff around with setting up SOs then needing to cancel them when the regular savers mature/get closed.

You can set a standing order to automatically expire after a set number of payments/on a certain date - no need to manually cancel them.

Also, most bank accounts charge no overdraft fees if you are in credit but the end of the working day + try more than once to take a payment.

As such, I often receive a text message saying I am overdrawn on the day my standing orders start to go out.. with the remainder going once I have topped up my account.

clivep

I feed our regular savers from a Bank of Scotland a/c. I manually pay into this BOS a/c on the last day of the month with the SOs scheduled for the 1st. It loses a bit of interest but is more convenient and at least the BOS a/c does pay some interest.

The BOS a/c has a useful feature to view upcoming payments. I've just noticed that the payment to the NatWest regular saver that should be paid tomorrow is missing and no longer shows up in my list of SOs. I've not cancelled it so I've no idea what's happened there.

Doh! Just realised that the SO was set up when the high interest rate was only paid on £1,000 so I had put an end date on the SO to make sure I didn't overpay.

Eco_Miser

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

OceanSound said:

Yes, I'm not a fan of using SO's for feeding RS's either. Remember having a discussion about this some time ago with a forumite, and he had a chain of SO's even accounting for bank holidays and such so the SO's would deduct a few days before the 'due date' even during normal months (months without bank holidays). Used to swear by his system and seemed he had everything down to a T (apart from a bit of interest lost due to SO's deducting earlier than usual - here it would depend on the sums involved and number of RS's).  I guess it's what works best for you. 

S/O will never deduct before the due date, though DDs can and will do that with some.

I believe OceanSound meant that the SOs are set to deduct a few days before the funds are required in the destination account, so that even when they are delayed by Good Friday and Easter Monday and the intervening weekend, they still arrive at the destination in time.

Wheres_My_Cashback

Eco_Miser said:

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

OceanSound said:

Yes, I'm not a fan of using SO's for feeding RS's either. Remember having a discussion about this some time ago with a forumite, and he had a chain of SO's even accounting for bank holidays and such so the SO's would deduct a few days before the 'due date' even during normal months (months without bank holidays). Used to swear by his system and seemed he had everything down to a T (apart from a bit of interest lost due to SO's deducting earlier than usual - here it would depend on the sums involved and number of RS's).  I guess it's what works best for you. 

S/O will never deduct before the due date, though DDs can and will do that with some.

I believe OceanSound meant that the SOs are set to deduct a few days before the funds are required in the destination account, so that even when they are delayed by Good Friday and Easter Monday and the intervening weekend, they still arrive at the destination in time.

The SO process starts at the time funds are attempted to be sent, usually in the early hours of the set date. If no funds SO fails, but will be attempted to be taken automatically later in the day.

The DD process does start before the set date and is very different as it's a 5 day process. Funds will be taken even if there are no available funds. Then later in the day if still no funds in the account the DD will be reversed and fail.

pookey

flaneurs_lobster said:

pookey said:

flaneurs_lobster said:

ForumUser7 said:

liamcov said:

Re regular savers like Lloyds, BOS, NatWest, RBS - do you have a SO set up for 1st of the month (which when it falls on a weekend doesn’t transfer until the Monday) or is it possible to do a manual transfer into them so you know the money goes in on the 1st?

I hold the Lloyds MS, BoS MS, NatWest DRS and RBS DRS (among others). I pay into all manually with no SOs set up. IIRC, I had to cancel the NatWest and RBS SOs as these were automatically set up

I've got a dozen regular savings a/cs, plus some reward accounts that need funds flushed through them. Tried for a couple of months to get SOs in place to auto fund them all. 

All went to ratpoop over xmas/new year. Given up and now do everything manually, took about an hour this morning. Quite cathartic. 

Wow, that's very good dedication. I need to be more stricter and get in on this method 😊

A spreadsheet is definitely your friend. 

That's a very good idea thanks

Bridlington1

pookey said:

flaneurs_lobster said:

pookey said:

flaneurs_lobster said:

ForumUser7 said:

liamcov said:

Re regular savers like Lloyds, BOS, NatWest, RBS - do you have a SO set up for 1st of the month (which when it falls on a weekend doesn’t transfer until the Monday) or is it possible to do a manual transfer into them so you know the money goes in on the 1st?

I hold the Lloyds MS, BoS MS, NatWest DRS and RBS DRS (among others). I pay into all manually with no SOs set up. IIRC, I had to cancel the NatWest and RBS SOs as these were automatically set up

I've got a dozen regular savings a/cs, plus some reward accounts that need funds flushed through them. Tried for a couple of months to get SOs in place to auto fund them all. 

All went to ratpoop over xmas/new year. Given up and now do everything manually, took about an hour this morning. Quite cathartic. 

Wow, that's very good dedication. I need to be more stricter and get in on this method 😊

A spreadsheet is definitely your friend. 

That's a very good idea thanks

Whilst we're on the topic of spreadsheets I have one sheet of my spreadsheet in which I list all my regular savers, with minimum/max monthly deposit limits and day of month that they need to be deposited.

I copy this list at the start of each month and highlight in red the ones I am only paying the minimum deposits into. Once that has been done I highlight in green each monthly saver that I am paying the full amount into as and highlight in orange those that I've paid the minimum amount into. 

OceanSound

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

OceanSound said:

Yes, I'm not a fan of using SO's for feeding RS's either. Remember having a discussion about this some time ago with a forumite, and he had a chain of SO's even accounting for bank holidays and such so the SO's would deduct a few days before the 'due date' even during normal months (months without bank holidays). Used to swear by his system and seemed he had everything down to a T (apart from a bit of interest lost due to SO's deducting earlier than usual - here it would depend on the sums involved and number of RS's).  I guess it's what works best for you. 

S/O will never deduct before the due date, though DDs can and will do that with some.

It seems putting 'due date' in inverted commas didn't do the trick. 

If he needs the money in say Account B (e.g. a halifax current Account) on the 10th every month because there is an SO setup here to transfer money to a regular saver at Halifax, he would set the due date on Account A (A tsb Current Account) to 5th, so that the SO would deduct a few days before the due date (in his plan - not some due date for a bill).

So, even if there is a weekend or bank holiday around the 5th the money will always transfer by the 10th to Halifax and be there ready for the second SO (at Halifax) to transfer money (again via SO) to the Halifax RS.

A post on how SO's (of certain banks? or all SO's it's not clear) don't pay out on weekends (and bank holidays?):
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79580524/#Comment_79580524

Lloyds don't pay Standing Orders on weekends, not even if it's going to a Lloyds Savings Account.  I have a Standing Order from my Lloyds current account to a Lloyds savings account due out on 21st of every month.  In August, that was a Sunday, and the payment/transfer wasn't made until Monday 22 August.  

About SO Chain: 
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/76507567/#Comment_76507567

This is easily solved by setting up more SOs. For example, I set up a £250 SO to go from my main account (TSB) to my M&S current account. The date of the SO is 4 days before the M&S current account is due to drip-feed my M&S Monthly Saver. This way you do not need reminders on your smartphone.

Wheres_My_Cashback

IOceanSound said:

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

OceanSound said:

Yes, I'm not a fan of using SO's for feeding RS's either. Remember having a discussion about this some time ago with a forumite, and he had a chain of SO's even accounting for bank holidays and such so the SO's would deduct a few days before the 'due date' even during normal months (months without bank holidays). Used to swear by his system and seemed he had everything down to a T (apart from a bit of interest lost due to SO's deducting earlier than usual - here it would depend on the sums involved and number of RS's).  I guess it's what works best for you. 

S/O will never deduct before the due date, though DDs can and will do that with some.

It seems putting 'due date' in inverted commas didn't do the trick. 

If he needs the money in say Account B (e.g. a halifax current Account) on the 10th every month because there is an SO setup here to transfer money to a regular saver at Halifax, he would set the due date on Account A (A tsb Current Account) to 5th, so that the SO would deduct a few days before the due date (in his plan - not some due date for a bill).

So, even if there is a weekend or bank holiday around the 5th the money will always transfer by the 10th to Halifax and be there ready for the second SO (at Halifax) to transfer money (again via SO) to the Halifax RS.

A post on how SO's (of certain banks? or all SO's it's not clear) don't pay out on weekends (and bank holidays?):
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79580524/#Comment_79580524

Lloyds don't pay Standing Orders on weekends, not even if it's going to a Lloyds Savings Account.  I have a Standing Order from my Lloyds current account to a Lloyds savings account due out on 21st of every month.  In August, that was a Sunday, and the payment/transfer wasn't made until Monday 22 August.  

About SO Chain: 
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/76507567/#Comment_76507567

This is easily solved by setting up more SOs. For example, I set up a £250 SO to go from my main account (TSB) to my M&S current account. The date of the SO is 4 days before the M&S current account is due to drip-feed my M&S Monthly Saver. This way you do not need reminders on your smartphone.

I remember those threads and how posters were over thinking and overcomplicating the process. The OP who uses LBG has no need to set the SO up from the originating bank a few days early. 

The SO can be set to go from A to B and to the RS on exactly the same day without exception, but the OP is penalising him/herself by doing it a few days early. My earlier post highlights this.

The SO process starts at the time funds are attempted to be sent, usually in the early hours of the set date (LBG 0120-0230) If no funds SO fails, but will be attempted to be taken automatically later in the day (1630). 

By 1630 funds will have arrived from the originating a/c so the SO to the RS will not fail.

The OP could set up a DD of £1 to him/herself and then back again if further confirmation required.

Anyway this is detracting from the real purpose of this thread I think so may be better discussed elsewhere.

OceanSound

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

IOceanSound said:

Wheres_My_Cashback said:

OceanSound said:

Yes, I'm not a fan of using SO's for feeding RS's either. Remember having a discussion about this some time ago with a forumite, and he had a chain of SO's even accounting for bank holidays and such so the SO's would deduct a few days before the 'due date' even during normal months (months without bank holidays). Used to swear by his system and seemed he had everything down to a T (apart from a bit of interest lost due to SO's deducting earlier than usual - here it would depend on the sums involved and number of RS's).  I guess it's what works best for you. 

S/O will never deduct before the due date, though DDs can and will do that with some.

It seems putting 'due date' in inverted commas didn't do the trick. 

If he needs the money in say Account B (e.g. a halifax current Account) on the 10th every month because there is an SO setup here to transfer money to a regular saver at Halifax, he would set the due date on Account A (A tsb Current Account) to 5th, so that the SO would deduct a few days before the due date (in his plan - not some due date for a bill).

So, even if there is a weekend or bank holiday around the 5th the money will always transfer by the 10th to Halifax and be there ready for the second SO (at Halifax) to transfer money (again via SO) to the Halifax RS.

A post on how SO's (of certain banks? or all SO's it's not clear) don't pay out on weekends (and bank holidays?):
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79580524/#Comment_79580524

Lloyds don't pay Standing Orders on weekends, not even if it's going to a Lloyds Savings Account.  I have a Standing Order from my Lloyds current account to a Lloyds savings account due out on 21st of every month.  In August, that was a Sunday, and the payment/transfer wasn't made until Monday 22 August.  

About SO Chain: 
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/76507567/#Comment_76507567

This is easily solved by setting up more SOs. For example, I set up a £250 SO to go from my main account (TSB) to my M&S current account. The date of the SO is 4 days before the M&S current account is due to drip-feed my M&S Monthly Saver. This way you do not need reminders on your smartphone.

I remember those threads and how posters were over thinking and overcomplicating the process. The OP who uses LBG has no need to set the SO up from the originating bank a few days early. 

The SO can be set to go from A to B and to the RS on exactly the same day without exception, but the OP is penalising him/herself by doing it a few days early. My earlier post highlights this.

The SO process starts at the time funds are attempted to be sent, usually in the early hours of the set date (LBG 0120-0230) If no funds SO fails, but will be attempted to be taken automatically later in the https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/79964256/#Comment_79964256 day (1630). 

By 1630 funds will have arrived from the originating a/c so the SO to the RS will not fail.

The OP could set up a DD of £1 to him/herself and then back again if further confirmation required.

Anyway this is detracting from the real purpose of this thread I think so may be better discussed elsewhere.

The distraction is that now we've started talking about the merits of the SO Chain method and I had at no point said it is superior to what 'the OP' is doing now. I simply mentioned the chain SO method and said i was not a fan of it.

At least one forumite understood what I meant, so it's clearly not something I hadn't explained properly. Perhaps re-read the post before replying to prevent distractions?

chris_the_bee

Bridlington1 said:

It's manual transfers and a spreadsheet for me, the only exceptions being HSBC's regular saver and the Ecology regular saver (DD). I paid manually into 27 regular savers yesterday afternoon, and will be paying into another regular saver later in the month by manual transfer.

I personally would rather do things manually myself largely because I do not want to have to faff around with setting up SOs then needing to cancel them when the regular savers mature/get closed. I would also rather avoid having money sat in a current account earning no interest overnight as I do not have anywhere near a big enough OD limit to cover all the regular savers.

Plus if I am unfortunate enough to end up with a payment from my EA account held up for whatever reason I do not want to find myself having to take money out of the regular savers I've just paid into to avoid paying 40% on an arranged OD. At least with manual transfers if an EA payment is held up by a few days the worst that'll happen is I'll be paying into my regular savers a few days late, with SOs it could become a real pain as some will take me into unarranged ODs, others will bounce etc

Surprised you still have an Ecology RS. At 2.85% it must be nearly rock bottom and is easily surpassed by most other BS regulars and a number of short dated bonds.and even EA accounts.