How much in current account

MrFrugalFever

I leave the correct amount of money in my bills account plus £20 buffer (all cleared by 6th of each month) and transfer the rest - less money for fuel - to instant access highest % savings account then use CC for general spending. Transfer back what I need when statement from CC comes through to clear.

Fuel money, £300+, goes in to a Pockit prepaid account and generates me 3% Cashback.

bostonerimus

I'm retired and keep two year's spending in my current account as a buffer against bad times and as an emergency fund. 

pedrodelgado

christhesparky_2 said:

Hi

I couldnt decide whether to post this here or on the banking board 

How much does everyone keep in their current account, whether that is a fixed amount or a multiple of your monthly expenses, I appreciate everyone is different, 

I have accrued an excess amount in my current account, but I am in 2 minds whether to leave it as it is or transfer some into savings, the current account is non interest earning

I already transfer some wages into savings every week.

Thanks

Change your current account to a Virgin money account ,the fee free one. If you haven't had a switch offer from them before , open one and switch your existing no interest paying account into it. You will get 5% interest on £1k in the current account for a yr plus you automatically get a linked easy access saver account with 1.56% interest on up to £25k. Its really easy to set up in a few hrs they are open. Very quick and simple to switch money between the two. Oh yeah the switch bonus is 12 bottles of winw i think. don't ever leave money where it isn't earning.

toothdoctor

Barclays premier account. Fee free £500 overdraft. So keep MINUS £500 in the account. All money in savings accounts working as hard as possible. Spend on credit card not debit card to get cashback and set up transfers to cover direct debits. This means all my pennies are earning interest. This does take a bit of planning and discipline. Not for everyone but works for me.

Sapindus

I've got two current accounts which both pay interest up to a certain balance so I aim to get them down no lower than the threshold.  For the one which takes my salary that means £1500 by the end of the month and the surplus gets skimmed off into savings.  The other one is Virgin (2% on balance up to £1000) so I set up a monthly transfer to put the interest into the linked savings account and they look after themselves.  I see the Virgin current account as savings, but it's handy to think that if my wallet was stolen I've got a spare debit card for emergencies.

When I had a Halifax account and didn't need to think about interest thresholds, I still kept a "buffer" of a couple of thousand in there in case of unexpected large spend during the month.

Nebulous2

Not as much as I'd like. 

I have 5 current accounts and like to have around £300 spread across them. I'm on a pension and working part-time. I find myself with 3 regular savers, an additional pension contribution and some larger than usual expenditure - with more to come in the next 2-3 months. As a result I'm spending more than I'm bringing in and my current account reserves have dwindled. 

It hasn't helped that I've moved most of my expenditure from a 0.5% cashback credit card to a Chase debit card at 1%, meaning I had a one-off one months discretionary spending jump from being paid a month behind to being paid in the current month.  

I'm at a point where I need more money than I have, and have to decide where to take it from - with robbing one of the regular savers possibly being the best solution. 

I suppose I've had a good run. This is the first time I've had to dig into savings / capital since I retired in March last year. 

talexuser

ZeroSum said:

Errrrr
Many of us keep zero in that account & still get the £60 + the £75 for keeping same £5k in chase

Errrr... I don't use the debit card since still get cashback on my credit card so overall at the end of the year I'm better off.

noh

talexuser said:

ZeroSum said:

Errrrr
Many of us keep zero in that account & still get the £60 + the £75 for keeping same £5k in chase

Errrr... I don't use the debit card since still get cashback on my credit card so overall at the end of the year I'm better off.

You don't need to purchase anything with the debit card to get the £5 bonus you could cycle £500 through a savings account using the debit card. Still make purchases with your cashback credit card and gain interest on your £5000 by holding it in an interest bearing account.

RG2015

noh said:

talexuser said:

ZeroSum said:

Errrrr
Many of us keep zero in that account & still get the £60 + the £75 for keeping same £5k in chase

Errrr... I don't use the debit card since still get cashback on my credit card so overall at the end of the year I'm better off.

You don't need to purchase anything with the debit card to get the £5 bonus you could cycle £500 through a savings account using the debit card. Still make purchases with your cashback credit card and gain interest on your £5000 by holding it in an interest bearing account.

True, but you need to wait until your current option expires, up to one year away.

ZeroSum

talexuser said:

ZeroSum said:

Errrrr
Many of us keep zero in that account & still get the £60 + the £75 for keeping same £5k in chase

Errrr... I don't use the debit card since still get cashback on my credit card so overall at the end of the year I'm better off.

Neither do I, & also do all my spending on chase & cashback credit card, so overall I'm even better off