NS&I JISA - payment restrictions

BB1878

Anyone considering one of these accounts for their children should be aware that payments are only currently (April 23) accepted from one account. Therefore grandparents etc would have to make a payment to that account for further transfer into the JISA.
I set up my sons JISA last year and both my partner and parents have been unable to set up direct debits (or debit card payments) into the account. My bank account is the only one that payments will be accepted from.
The website is misleading and states ‘ Anyone can top up a child’s Junior ISA by bank transfer. All deposits must be from a UK bank account’ but I have today been advise by NS&I (finally) that is not the the case and transfers will have to be paid to me to transfer on.
Seems a bit ridiculous imho and would certainly have put me off opening the account in the first place if that was clearly stated. 

cloud_dog

Obviously I haven't checked out all JISAs that are available, but this seems quite standard. 

ForumUser7

cloud_dog said:

Obviously I haven't checked out all JISAs that are available, but this seems quite standard. 

I held a JISA with Darlington BS and anyone could pay in by bank transfer. It seems OP is confusing debit card transactions with bank transfers to me.

BB1878 said:

Anyone considering one of these accounts for their children should be aware that payments are only currently (April 23) accepted from one account. Therefore grandparents etc would have to make a payment to that account for further transfer into the JISA.
I set up my sons JISA last year and both my partner and parents have been unable to set up direct debits (or debit card payments) into the account. My bank account is the only one that payments will be accepted from.
The website is misleading and states ‘ Anyone can top up a child’s Junior ISA by bank transfer. All deposits must be from a UK bank account’ but I have today been advise by NS&I (finally) that is not the the case and transfers will have to be paid to me to transfer on.
Seems a bit ridiculous imho and would certainly have put me off opening the account in the first place if that was clearly stated. 

I have attached the relevant info to this message, for my reference while responding (https://www.nsandi.com/products/junior-isa).

You mentioned that your partner and parents have been unable to pay by debit card. This is in accordance with the information below 'only the person who manages the Junior ISA can top it up by debit card. Make sure to use your own UK debit card'.

Re Direct Debits, I cannot see this in the information box, so it seems they may not offer it.

Your partner and parents should be able to arrange a bank transfer (faster payment etc.) into the account. Please note this is not the same as a debit card payment, even though it debits the same account. It is a different type of payment method.

If you make a bank transfer in, ensure you put the Junior ISA account number without any hyphens spaces or full stops into the reference field, and nothing else in that field. Else NS&I may fail to allocate it, and their customer service is pretty abysmal at the best of times, so I wouldn't like to see you having to go through finding it with them.

It would be a good idea to make a small test payment once you've added the payee, to ensure that it goes to the right account before adding a larger sum. NS&I states a minimum of £1 https://www.nsandi.com/help/manage-your-savings/top-up-savings

The 23/24 tax year JISA subscription limit is £9,000, and you can only pay into one cash JISA per year. This is important, as it applies to the total deposits into the account. You, your partner, and your parents must not deposit more than that between you (it is £9,000 in total, not each).

I would suggest you do some research on the NS&I help page and product page to ensure you are happy to go ahead with this account, there are better rates available and with better CS too https://moneyfactscompare.co.uk/isa/junior-isas/

BB1878

@ForumUser7 - Thanks for taking the effort for such a long reply, not sure if I wasn’t clear or you didn’t read the OP but you’ve actually posted an image reenforcing the misleading statement from the NS&I website.
Despite the website (and now you) advertising that ‘Anyone can top up a child ISA….. ‘
That is inaccurate as confirmed to me by NS&I support staff on Friday. Payments into the JISA can only be made by me, from my account, be that transfer, standing order or debit card, each of which I have already done.
My point remains, if anyone is considering opening this online cash JISA so family members can also pay into it (yes up to £9k per tax year 🙄), as NS&I suggests they can, then they will be disappointed.

ForumUser7

BB1878 said:

@ForumUser7 - Thanks for taking the effort for such a long reply, not sure if I wasn’t clear or you didn’t read the OP but you’ve actually posted an image reenforcing the misleading statement from the NS&I website.
Despite the website (and now you) advertising that ‘Anyone can top up a child ISA….. ‘
That is inaccurate as confirmed to me by NS&I support staff on Friday. Payments into the JISA can only be made by me, from my account, be that transfer, standing order or debit card, each of which I have already done.
My point remains, if anyone is considering opening this online cash JISA so family members can also pay into it (yes up to £9k per tax year 🙄), as NS&I suggests they can, then they will be disappointed.

I did read the OP, I think it’s quite possible that NS&I have misinformed you. Did more than one support staff member confirm the statement on their website being inaccurate? Usually, the content on provider websites is (relatively) thoroughly checked before posting, so written summary boxes and ts and cs documents are more often correct than support staff, IMO.

Before replying this time, I consulted gov.uk (https://www.gov.uk/junior-individual-savings-accounts/add-money-to-an-account) and found this statement “Anyone can pay money into a Junior ISA, but the total amount paid in cannot go over £9,000 in the 2023 to 2024 tax year”, so I still believe NS&I’s webpage is correct, and the support staff are not.

The following section of my response refers to this document (https://www.nsandi.com/files/asset/pdf/junior-isa-brochure-print-friendly.pdf):

• NS&I states ‘Minimum subsequent deposit £1 made by debit card or bank transfer/standing order’ - in your OP you mentioned your parents and partner not being able to make direct debits into the account. This is correct, as NS&I do not offer DDs to this account.

• NS&I goes on to state ‘Whenever you want, you can pay money in…using a UK debit card in your own name. Anyone can make deposits by electronic transfer, including by standing order’ - it is correct that your partner/parents cannot make debit card deposits into the account, as these cards would be in your name, not theirs. This is a step to prevent stolen cards being used. They should however be able to make an electronic transfer in, or set up a standing order in, direct from their own bank. Have your partner/parents attempted this?

• Debit card deposit - payment made direct with provider (NS&I), in this case on their website, using the 16 digit card number, CVV, expiry date, name etc.
• Direct debit - mandate filled out with provider with sort code, account number, bank address, signature etc. who can then request the agreed funds from your bank as agreed. N.B. NS&I do not offer these on this account
• Electronic transfer - usually a faster payment, in which you send a payment from your bank to the other bank (NS&I) using their sort code and account number and account specific reference etc.. N.B. funds take longer to appear in the account than with debit card transactions, as the payments go through a clearing bank. (I think) this results in a few days loss of interest, as the transaction isn’t backdated
• Standing order - to all intents and purposes, an automated repeated electronic transfer

BB1878

@ForumUser7 Yes the call handler went off to check before advising what I’ve posted is correct.
People other than myself have attempted direct debits, standing orders and faster payments from their accounts more than once and the payments have been rejected.
at least two NS&I staff consulted on my query and the response was only I can make ANY payment.
But perhaps you are correct and me, my parents, my partner and the NS&I staff are wrong.

Have you had success paying into a 3rd parties cash JISA @ NS&I?

ForumUser7

BB1878 said:

@ForumUser7 Yes the call handler went off to check before advising what I’ve posted is correct.
People other than myself have attempted direct debits, standing orders and faster payments from their accounts more than once and the payments have been rejected.
at least two NS&I staff consulted on my query and the response was only I can make ANY payment.
But perhaps you are correct and me, my parents, my partner and the NS&I staff are wrong.

Have you had success paying into a 3rd parties cash JISA @ NS&I?

Did the handler say when/if they’d correct the account literature? If not, I suggest you raise a complaint with NS&I, as they have a duty to ensure their account related literature is not misleading. It is not in dispute that the documentation states anyone can pay in, and I have no reason to doubt what you were told on your call. But as these two bits of information contradict, NS&I aught to rectify it so customers aren’t being given different information by different channels. I would also suggest you message NS&I on Twitter, and tell them what the website says vs what you were told on the phone and you’d like to know which is correct. Hopefully they’ll then check for you, but please note that they cannot deal with account specific queries - so they won’t be able to look into the rejected payments etc. You’d be best off raising a complaint to get that looked into. It may be a good idea to write into them with special delivery for the complaint, as that way you can include printed screenshots of the returned payments, and payment details that are filled out.

How did the people other than yourself attempt to set up direct debits please? I’ve not been able to find any form of mandate for these online at NS&I, only standing orders. If NS&I can be used as a source of direct debits, there are lots of forumites who would find that really good for ‘donor accounts’. With the standing orders/faster payments, were these set up in accordance with the screenshot in my previous post? I.e. was the account specific reference there etc.? If so, I don’t think these should be rejected, and you should consider raising a complaint.

I’m not trying to suggest you are wrong, rather I’m highlighting the fact that NS&I and Gov.UK both display information that contradicts what they told you on the phone.

I haven’t paid into an NS&I JISA before, but I’m using first hand knowledge on other JISA products with two different providers, and publicly available guidance on both Gov.UK and NS&I. You mentioned you wouldn’t have opened this product if you knew others couldn’t pay in - I’m happy to try and help to get to the bottom of this, and try to figure out what’s going on, or alternatively I’m also happy to not comment further on this post if you just wanted to warn people about NS&I. If you wanted help on the topic, this is the right board. If you don’t, this board may be better: https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/categories/praise-vent-warnings