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Any serial switchers?

REDDOG
Posts: 16 Forumite

Im interested to know if any of you switch your accounts just for the purpose of the switch incentive? Ive no intention of staying with that bank, just using a sacrificial account to keep it moving. I know ill eventually run out of options but between my and the wife ive made us about £1300 with the new Santander £175 offer.
What kind of totals are other people getting?
What kind of totals are other people getting?
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Comments
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REDDOG said:Im interested to know if any of you switch your accounts just for the purpose of the switch incentive? Ive no intention of staying with that bank, just using a sacrificial account to keep it moving. I know ill eventually run out of options but between my and the wife ive made us about £1300 with the new Santander £175 offer.
What kind of totals are other people getting?0 -
Yep. Co-op Bank, Yorkshire Bank, First Direct, Triodos, Ulster Bank all switched in to with no intention other than taking the bonus and moving on. HSBC, Barclays, Nationwide (x3 bonuses) and TSB I kept while there was a reason to do so before eventually designating them as donor accounts as account benefits were eroded.
Lloyds (x2) and RBS were both opened for switching bonuses but have perks that continue to justify them being used.
Halifax (x3, hopefully will be eligible again next time around too), Santander and Natwest were all accounts I had open already before taking bonuses.
I can't be bothered to add it all up but I suspect I've had somewhere around £3000 worth of switching bonuses now.
There are probably some who have made 5 figures now. The original Yorkshire Bank offer didn't forbid you from switching multiple times and getting a payment each time, ISTR there was a user on here who did that 10 times or something daft. There was also a rinseable Santander offer which I missed out on a few years back.1 -
Daliah said:REDDOG said:Im interested to know if any of you switch your accounts just for the purpose of the switch incentive? Ive no intention of staying with that bank, just using a sacrificial account to keep it moving. I know ill eventually run out of options but between my and the wife ive made us about £1300 with the new Santander £175 offer.
What kind of totals are other people getting?0 -
grumiofoundation said:Daliah said:REDDOG said:Im interested to know if any of you switch your accounts just for the purpose of the switch incentive? Ive no intention of staying with that bank, just using a sacrificial account to keep it moving. I know ill eventually run out of options but between my and the wife ive made us about £1300 with the new Santander £175 offer.
What kind of totals are other people getting?
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I've tried getting my work colleagues and friends to do it but they all say it's too complicated a process. Just a bit of common sense for free money, what can go wrong 🤔0
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REDDOG said:grumiofoundation said:Daliah said:REDDOG said:Im interested to know if any of you switch your accounts just for the purpose of the switch incentive? Ive no intention of staying with that bank, just using a sacrificial account to keep it moving. I know ill eventually run out of options but between my and the wife ive made us about £1300 with the new Santander £175 offer.
What kind of totals are other people getting?0 -
Do you find it affects your credit scores having several accounts open and jumping around?1
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PriesstesHN said:Do you find it affects your credit scores having several accounts open and jumping around?I don't leave the accounts open anyway. Using the switch scheme closes the old one and then they drop off your history within a year Ive heard.1
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definitely find a new account to switch to once a year or so to get some free cash. I have multiple accounts so i don't have to close my long standing accts. Also gives you the opportunity to compare different products and i've ended up keeping some of the accounts i thought i might switch out of
just switched to first direct for the first time and i really dont understand why they have all these positive reviews around, im really not impressed so far0 -
PriesstesHN said:Do you find it affects your credit scores having several accounts open and jumping around?
If you do not plan to apply for large credit (mortgage etc) within the next 6 - 12 months, you don’t have to have any concerns at all.
If you do intend to apply for large credit, you should keep your current account (and other credit account) applications to an absolute minimum, as most of them involve a hard search which will remain on your credit files for one year.There are ways to limit the number of searches. Starling and Monzo don’t carry out hard searches, and neither does Halifax if you apply for an additional current account. Chase doesn’t do hard searches either but they are not participating in CASS so no use for switching.
The other way of miimising searches, over time, is to have one or two donor accounts in reserve at all times.2
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