The New Top Easy Access Savings Discussion Area

roose0

I recently opened an easy access account with Charter Savings and overlooked the withdrawal timescale. I wasn't aware that it takes at least one business day for withdrawals to process, which results in a loss of interest for that day.

To illustrate, if you withdraw your funds 14 days after making a deposit at an AER of 4.57%, your effective return would actually be 4.27% AER when factoring in the one-day loss of interest. This is calculated as follows: 4.57%*14/15 = 4.27%.

Bridlington1

@soulsaver

With the Coventry BS 5 Access Svr2 OL  rate cut from 4.66% to 4.5% (among many other cuts to Coventry's savings accounts) coming into effect today, if I'm not mistaken this pulls Monument EA at 4.55% back into the top 10.

Additionally with cuts to other EA accounts coming into effect this month it seems the following may be dragged back into the top 10:

Chetwood Bank Easy Access at 4.52%

Family BS Market Tracker Saver 4.5% £500 min

Ulster Bank Loyalty Svr  4.5% (reducing to 4.25% 22/4/25) £5k min

poppystar

roose0 said:

I recently opened an easy access account with Charter Savings and overlooked the withdrawal timescale. I wasn't aware that it takes at least one business day for withdrawals to process, which results in a loss of interest for that day.

To illustrate, if you withdraw your funds 14 days after making a deposit at an AER of 4.57%, your effective return would actually be 4.27% AER when factoring in the one-day loss of interest. This is calculated as follows: 4.57%*14/15 = 4.27%.

Not so. You’re mixing up a yearly rate with the loss of a day. You lose a day’s interest at 4.57%/365. 

1spiral

poppystar said:

roose0 said:

I recently opened an easy access account with Charter Savings and overlooked the withdrawal timescale. I wasn't aware that it takes at least one business day for withdrawals to process, which results in a loss of interest for that day.

To illustrate, if you withdraw your funds 14 days after making a deposit at an AER of 4.57%, your effective return would actually be 4.27% AER when factoring in the one-day loss of interest. This is calculated as follows: 4.57%*14/15 = 4.27%.

Not so. You’re mixing up a yearly rate with the loss of a day. You lose a day’s interest at 4.57%/365. 

I think the point is still valid. If you were to withdraw the full balance and return all the funds to Charter when they are available to you, across the year you would lose about 26 days interest, despite Charter having your funds on every single day throughout the year. So your rate would be reduced by (26/365) thus giving a return of about 4.25%.

I take this type of calculation into effect when ascertaining suitability of accounts for myself. The difficulty is coming up with a realistic guess as to how long an account is going to remain competitive. When rates were rising, I used 14 days. Now rates are falling, I work on 60 which means my comparative rate for the above account is  4.495%.

EthicsGradient

1spiral said:

poppystar said:

roose0 said:

I recently opened an easy access account with Charter Savings and overlooked the withdrawal timescale. I wasn't aware that it takes at least one business day for withdrawals to process, which results in a loss of interest for that day.

To illustrate, if you withdraw your funds 14 days after making a deposit at an AER of 4.57%, your effective return would actually be 4.27% AER when factoring in the one-day loss of interest. This is calculated as follows: 4.57%*14/15 = 4.27%.

Not so. You’re mixing up a yearly rate with the loss of a day. You lose a day’s interest at 4.57%/365. 

I think the point is still valid. If you were to withdraw the full balance and return all the funds to Charter when they are available to you, across the year you would lose about 26 days interest, despite Charter having your funds on every single day throughout the year. So your rate would be reduced by (26/365) thus giving a return of about 4.25%.

I take this type of calculation into effect when ascertaining suitability of accounts for myself. The difficulty is coming up with a realistic guess as to how long an account is going to remain competitive. When rates were rising, I used 14 days. Now rates are falling, I work on 60 which means my comparative rate for the above account is  4.495%.

Talking of "realistic", is it really "realistic" to withdraw the entire amount of a savings account every 2 weeks? There may be some person who does this, but they'd be vanishingly rare.

No, look on it as what it is - loss of one day's interest on the withdrawal amount. So for a withdrawal of £800, that'd be about 10p. Slightly annoying, but not huge in the scheme of things. In minimum wage terms, it's about half a minute's pay.

SaveTheEuro

Nottingham Building Society is reducing the interest rate of the Bonus Access Saver 8 from 4.5% to 4.25%.

From 18 March 2025, the interest rate payable on your Bonus Access Saver 8 will decrease to 4.25% gross p.a./AER*. 

This includes a bonus of 2.05% until 30 April 2026. The interest rate without bonus will decrease to 2.20% gross p.a./AER*.

1spiral

EthicsGradient said:

Talking of "realistic", is it really "realistic" to withdraw the entire amount of a savings account every 2 weeks? There may be some person who does this, but they'd be vanishingly rare.

No, look on it as what it is - loss of one day's interest on the withdrawal amount. So for a withdrawal of £800, that'd be about 10p. Slightly annoying, but not huge in the scheme of things. In minimum wage terms, it's about half a minute's pay.

It depends on whether you're moving funds to provide additional income. As I stated above, when rates were rising rapidly (a couple of years back) it wasn't uncommon for me to open an account and withdraw the full balance for a new account a couple of weeks later, I accept if you're keeping it as your main day to day usage account, you're not going to be removing more than a few hundred quid here and there.

liger

Cahoot Sunny Day Saver (Issue 4). 4.5% upto £3k available from today.

wiseonesomeofthetime

liger said:

Cahoot Sunny Day Saver (Issue 4). 4.5% upto £3k available from today.

Glad I opened issue 3 before issue 1 expired then. Funds move across on Friday at 4.75% 😄

nottsphil

roose0 said:

I recently opened an easy access account with Charter Savings and overlooked the withdrawal timescale. I wasn't aware that it takes at least one business day for withdrawals to process, which results in a loss of interest for that day.

To illustrate, if you withdraw your funds 14 days after making a deposit at an AER of 4.57%, your effective return would actually be 4.27% AER when factoring in the one-day loss of interest. This is calculated as follows: 4.57%*14/15 = 4.27%.

Not so. You’re mixing up a yearly rate with the loss of a day. You lose a day’s interest at 4.57%/365. 

Roose isn't confused at all - s/he's taken care to quote those rates as AERs. Banks and building societies are obliged to do this for comparison purposes, even for one month term deposits, so it's perfectly acceptable to quote an AER for half that period. It's also much clearer from those AERs that one fifteenth of the interest is being lost.

This brings me to my own problem where I am unable to access the proceeds of a matured savings account procured through Hargreaves Lansdown because I've just found out I need to verify my linked account with a code... which they'll only send through the post! I am, however, allowed to immediately reinvest it in a selection of products from their associates, which includes instant access accounts. So, in order to avoid losing a pound a day until maybe Monday, I intend opening one of these - but which one? Can anyone confirm one which does same day withdrawals and doesn't deny interest on BOTH the days of deposit and withdrawal? Also, I have no current passport or photo driving licence and dislike app-only accounts.Thanks.