POA - NS&I or multiple accounts ?

Bobziz

Hi,

So my sister's and I have POA for my mentally incapacitated mother. Looking for views on managing her 7 figure savings. Currently all in Nationwide BS at 0.8%.

Realistically she may have another 3 years max left being inflicted with the evil disease that is Alzheimer's.

Clearly the only completely safe options are 10+ individual savings accounts, if indeed there are that many available that allow POA accounts (seems unlikely), or all in the NS&I at 0.5%. 

Setting up and managing 10+ accounts will take considerable time and effort. We've tried the NS&I before and they were a nightmare to deal with. 

NW seems to be in a good financial health and is managed conservatively, but who knows what the future holds.

Thoughts much appreciated.

Many thanks, Bobziz.

El_Torro

I think you’re right to try to keep the money as safe as possible, while at the same time not over complicating things. For such a large sum NS&I Is the obvious choice. 

I don’t know what issues you’ve had with NS&I in the past. All I can say is that I’ve used them on and off for decades and have had no issues. Especially if you do things online (don’t know if this is possible with POA) they’re usually ok. 

If you do go with NS&I I’d put £50k in Premium Bonds. Why not?

cheerfulcat

Hargreaves Lansdown offer an account they call Active Savings, where you can open and manage accounts with various institutions in one place - https://www.hl.co.uk/investment-services/active-savings. AJ Bell have a similar service https://www.youinvest.co.uk/cash-savings#list .

Bobziz

cheerfulcat said:

Hargreaves Lansdown offer an account they call Active Savings, where you can open and manage accounts with various institutions in one place - https://www.hl.co.uk/investment-services/active-savings. AJ Bell have a similar service https://www.youinvest.co.uk/cash-savings#list .

Thanks, that would be great to be able to use a service like that but looking at their websites it appears that a POA can only act for existing account holders rather than open a new account. Looks like we'll need to accept a £10k+ loss of annual interest at NS&I or put in the leg work to open multiple accounts.

If we go NS&I then £50k in PB's would make sense too. When we tried to open an account previously it took months to get the original POA document back and then we couldn't access the account online because they hadn't set it up properly. In the end we gave up having spent hours and hours on the phone to various advisors.

Thanks @JamesRobinson48, glad you got sorted in the end. Our financial institutions don't exactly make it easy to manage large sums of money on behalf of others. 

Vortigern

I found NS&I quite easy to deal with via POA. This was a "jointly and severally" LPA so only one attorney was needed to operate the account.

First open an NS&I account for yourself - to get online access and an NS&I number.

Then apply, by post, for the POA account.

Once opened, it can be operated online.

phillw

Bobziz said:
Thanks, that would be great to be able to use a service like that but looking at their websites it appears that a POA can only act for existing account holders rather than open a new account. 

If it's all online, then maybe you could help your mother sign up. Maybe she needs help with typing.

Keep_pedalling

phillw said:

Bobziz said:
Thanks, that would be great to be able to use a service like that but looking at their websites it appears that a POA can only act for existing account holders rather than open a new account. 

If it's all online, then you should be able to help your mother sign up. Maybe she needs help with typing.

I think the OP is looking for helpful suggestions of an honest nature rather than fraudulent ones.

Keep_pedalling

I think you would be wise to split the money over a number of accounts.

Account one - instant access with enough in it to cover her expenditure for one year

Account two - 12 month fixed interest with enough in it to cover the following year’s expenditure.

Account three - 2 year fixed interest with enough to cover her 3rd year in care.

Account four - NS&I for the rest.

The first three should be with different financial institutions for maximum protection.