Bank accounts for children (infants)

datimms

Hi!
I'm looking at opening a bank account for my 9 month old daughter but the only information I can seem to find is about child savings accounts. We just want an account that can act as a landing account for any incoming money she may get, so we can then pay into other accounts such as regular savers or a stocks and shares JISA (if she gets enough  ). We feel doing this is better than having to notify people of new account details every time we chase a better rate.
Anyone know if it's possible to just have a basic bank account in her name controlled by us, that we and wider family can pay in to, and then pay money into various savings or investments from there by standing order etc? Or anyone have any better advice on the matter?
Thanks in advance!
David

xylophone

She is too young for a current account.
https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/saving/article-1583863/Best-savings-rates-Junior-Isas-children-s-accounts.html
You could choose a suitable savings account and have people make faster payments into it.

It is possible to manage some of these accounts on line.

https://www.gov.uk/junior-individual-savings-accounts
https://moneytothemasses.com/quick-savings/parents/best-junior-stocks-and-shares-isa

datimms

Ah, that's a shame. It would have been so much easier to distribute one set of account numbers to family and manage everything from there going forward. Just creates more admin for everyone! 
Will have to look whether there are any savings accounts that offer similar functionality to a bank account like outgoing payments to non-pre-designated accounts, standing orders etc. 
Alternatively, if we set up an account in one of our names as parents, that we then pay into savings in my daughter's name does that cause tax problems in case she ever earns enough interest to make that relevant as the money will look like it's coming from us? I read that if the interest is over £100 it would be taxed as if it's our own money.
Thanks for the links.

jonesMUFCforever

I don't really see the problem here, kids are either given money or cheques - you can pay them into any account in their name that you want.

WillPS

jonesMUFCforever said:

I don't really see the problem here, kids are either given money or cheques - you can pay them into any account in their name that you want.

That's far from universally true.

xylophone

Alternatively, if we set up an account in one of our names as parents, that we then pay into savings in my daughter's name does that cause tax problems in case she ever earns enough interest to make that relevant as the money will look like it's coming from us? I read that if the interest is over £100 it would be taxed as if it's our own money.

The £100 rule applies separately to each parent.

https://www.thepfs.org/learning-index/articles/investing-for-children-part-2/57447

It is possible to have both a stocks and shares element and a cash element within a JISA.

Unless you anticipate  friends and relations wanting to give large sums for Christmas and birthdays, you might use the cash element for presents from friends and family and the stocks and shares element from you and your wife?

A total of £9000 a year  across the two elements is quite generous for a child and should suffice?

[Deleted User]

I’m afraid there is no such thing of an ‘infant current account’ as most kids current accounts have opening ages of around 11. I don’t see what you actually need a current account for, you can pay money into savings accounts (or JISAs) and you earn interest. I don’t think standing orders are an option on savings accounts but Faster Payments (from other people) is.

colsten

GabiB said:

I’m afraid there is no such thing of an ‘infant current account’ as most kids current accounts have opening ages of around 11. I don’t see what you actually need a current account for, you can pay money into savings accounts (or JISAs) and you earn interest. I don’t think standing orders are an option on savings accounts but Faster Payments (from other people) is.

Are you conflating paying in and paying out? You are right to say that savings accounts don‘t normally offer SOs for paying out (one or two do pseudo-SOs), but obviously you can deposit into all of them by bank transfer - one-off or regular (i.e. SO). Increasingly, savings accounts will only take deposits from a nominated account, which must be in the account holder‘s name(s). This nominated account is also then the only account withdrawals can be made to.