The New Top Easy Access Savings Discussion Area

crumpet_man

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

How much extra do you think you are earning by withdrawing the cash and moving to another account?

It depends on the difference of interest rates between the accounts in question, the sum you are moving and the length of time and consistency of this practice. I've never attempted to calculate how much I gained by moving funds, probably a few thousands in this millennium.  All I know is if I move money from lower paying account to a higher paying account I earn more.

I should have quoted one of the previous comments regarding the £500 Halifax payments as that is the specific scenario I was referring to.  I did not mean it to be a general open ended question.

For me, £1500 a month paid into and immediately withdrawn from an account paying ~3% to deposit in an account paying ~4% does not seem worth the risk of getting an account closed for roughly £15 more per year.

I wonder what others are doing that maybe I have missed?

I don't think you understood how it works.  Halifax reward account pays you £5 a month if you deposit £1500 and make £500 worth of debit card payments.  You can have up to 3 Halifax reward accounts, so that's £180 a year earned on nothing.  
The discussion you are referring to is about debit card payments, naturally people on here are trying to minimise the loss of interest resulting from debit card transactions and sharing their methods and experiences.

I do understand how it works, I do the Halifax debit card payments to a savings account but leave it in there for the month, withdraw and deposit the next month etc.

Some people are withdrawing funds ASAP (with the risk of getting the account closed and having to wait possibly weeks to access their funds) for a potential £15 per year in extra interest.  I suppose we have our own threshold for what makes it worthwhile, if it was £100 extra interest then I would do it too, but not for £15 a year.

granta

crumpet_man said:

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

How much extra do you think you are earning by withdrawing the cash and moving to another account?

It depends on the difference of interest rates between the accounts in question, the sum you are moving and the length of time and consistency of this practice. I've never attempted to calculate how much I gained by moving funds, probably a few thousands in this millennium.  All I know is if I move money from lower paying account to a higher paying account I earn more.

I should have quoted one of the previous comments regarding the £500 Halifax payments as that is the specific scenario I was referring to.  I did not mean it to be a general open ended question.

For me, £1500 a month paid into and immediately withdrawn from an account paying ~3% to deposit in an account paying ~4% does not seem worth the risk of getting an account closed for roughly £15 more per year.

I wonder what others are doing that maybe I have missed?

I don't think you understood how it works.  Halifax reward account pays you £5 a month if you deposit £1500 and make £500 worth of debit card payments.  You can have up to 3 Halifax reward accounts, so that's £180 a year earned on nothing.  
The discussion you are referring to is about debit card payments, naturally people on here are trying to minimise the loss of interest resulting from debit card transactions and sharing their methods and experiences.

I do understand how it works, I do the Halifax debit card payments to a savings account but leave it in there for the month, withdraw and deposit the next month etc.

Some people are withdrawing funds ASAP (with the risk of getting the account closed and having to wait possibly weeks to access their funds) for a potential £15 per year in extra interest.  I suppose we have our own threshold for what makes it worthwhile, if it was £100 extra interest then I would do it too, but not for £15 a year.

AS I mention above, I do try to leave it in the savings account for as long as possible, but sometimes that is the only spare cash I have to fulfil higher interest rate regular savers so it needs to be withdrawn sooner.
But I stopped doing same day withdrawals a long time ago.

pecunianonolet

For some it's not primarily about an extra amount of interest like a £15 quoted here, and potentially more, but more about a cash flow related element. 

6 Halifax accounts in the household require a spare 3k to satisfy the requirement. Now add on top various regular savers that want funding on the 1st of a month. Plus most household bills, credit card repayments, etc. coming out. That's a rather large amount so being able to satisfy spending requirements and having access to the funds the same day makes a huge difference and allows for all the various requirements to be done in one day and the rest of the month you don't have to bother with any other actions.

Sure, it is possible otherwise but means that you are busy all month having to time payments and withdrawals from e.g. NS&I who take ages to release funds again. 

allegro120

crumpet_man said:

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

allegro120 said:

crumpet_man said:

How much extra do you think you are earning by withdrawing the cash and moving to another account?

It depends on the difference of interest rates between the accounts in question, the sum you are moving and the length of time and consistency of this practice. I've never attempted to calculate how much I gained by moving funds, probably a few thousands in this millennium.  All I know is if I move money from lower paying account to a higher paying account I earn more.

I should have quoted one of the previous comments regarding the £500 Halifax payments as that is the specific scenario I was referring to.  I did not mean it to be a general open ended question.

For me, £1500 a month paid into and immediately withdrawn from an account paying ~3% to deposit in an account paying ~4% does not seem worth the risk of getting an account closed for roughly £15 more per year.

I wonder what others are doing that maybe I have missed?

I don't think you understood how it works.  Halifax reward account pays you £5 a month if you deposit £1500 and make £500 worth of debit card payments.  You can have up to 3 Halifax reward accounts, so that's £180 a year earned on nothing.  
The discussion you are referring to is about debit card payments, naturally people on here are trying to minimise the loss of interest resulting from debit card transactions and sharing their methods and experiences.

I do understand how it works, I do the Halifax debit card payments to a savings account but leave it in there for the month, withdraw and deposit the next month etc.

Some people are withdrawing funds ASAP (with the risk of getting the account closed and having to wait possibly weeks to access their funds) for a potential £15 per year in extra interest.  I suppose we have our own threshold for what makes it worthwhile, if it was £100 extra interest then I would do it too, but not for £15 a year.

I see.  Sorry I misunderstood your post.  Of course everyone has their own threshold, I'm not 100% efficient either, I sometimes choose convenience over effectiveness.  Nevertheless, I wouldn't keep £1500 at -1% unless I really have to.

alfred64

Plus £60 for simply moving money around is not insignificant.

shirley999

pecunianonolet said:

shirley999 said:

shirley999 said:

rallycurve said:

moi said:

SnowMan said:

moi said:

SnowMan said:

I've opened a Cahoot... The terms and conditions say you can close the account by phoning in or writing. But was wondering if secure message might work also? 

"Account closure" is an option in Cahoot's secure message menu, but, oddly they won't close an account that way! 🙄🤷‍♂️

Thanks. Managed to close it by phone now. But they tell me you can close by secure message now apparently (that's a recent change). Just need to send secure message giving details of which account to close (account number and sort code) and move to (account number and sort code) and your address, and where to pay the trailing interest.

Good to know! It must be very recent because just last month I and others here were told no when asking to close an ac by secure message.

I tried to close my Cahoot account via secure message and received this reply from them on 16/04/2025:

We can’t close accounts via secure messaging. Please contact us on the number below and one of our team members can action the closure of your account.

If anyone tries now and succeeds please let us know!

I secure messaged them a couple of days ago to close my account, which has a zero balance, and pay interest into my new account with them.  They replied saying I should make the balance zero then ask again, stating which account I wanted interest paying into.  Also asking for confirmation of my full address.  Annoying I had to write it all out again when all they needed was confirmation of my address.  They didn’t say they couldn’t do it though.

Cahoot did close my account by secure message, no interest added, should have been a couple of pence on £1.00 for 8 months!

Cahoot does not accumulate fractions of a penny over several months. Only if you reached 0.01 in a given month they pay you that. 

Thanks, I’ve doubled my investment in my cahoot account to £2 and done the same with Halifax accounts, for which the same likely applies.  Petty, I know!

mon3ysav3r

allegro120 said:

I see.  Sorry I misunderstood your post.  Of course everyone has their own threshold, I'm not 100% efficient either, I sometimes choose convenience over effectiveness.  Nevertheless, I wouldn't keep £1500 at -1% unless I really have to.

Agreed keeping £1500 at such a low rate wouldn't be good, but I don't see anything in the Halifax Reward Current account terms that say you have to keep £1500 in the account, only that you pay at least that much in every month (and then to get the 5 pounds do £500+ in debit card transactions).

crumpet_man

mon3ysav3r said:

allegro120 said:

I see.  Sorry I misunderstood your post.  Of course everyone has their own threshold, I'm not 100% efficient either, I sometimes choose convenience over effectiveness.  Nevertheless, I wouldn't keep £1500 at -1% unless I really have to.

Agreed keeping £1500 at such a low rate wouldn't be good, but I don't see anything in the Halifax Reward Current account terms that say you have to keep £1500 in the account, only that you pay at least that much in every month (and then to get the 5 pounds do £500+ in debit card transactions).

That's not what is happening, funds are  not left in the Halifax account.

£1500 in NSI at 3.3% AER, at beginning of month withdraw to Halifax current account number 1, transfer £1500 from Halifax current account number 1 to number 2 then number 2 to number 3.  Transfer £500 from account 3 to account 1 and account 2.

Pay £500 into NSI using debit card from each of the 3 current accounts.

£1500 stays in NSI until next month.

If you withdraw £1500 from NSI ASAP you could deposit it in a higher paying savings account and potentially earn an extra ~1% AER on that £1500.

flaneurs_lobster

crumpet_man said:

If you withdraw £1500 from NSI ASAP you could deposit it in a higher paying savings account and potentially earn an extra ~1% AER on that £1500.

That's what I do, £1500 from 7% EA into Halifax, fund a couple of RS from the CA, "spend" £500 funding Revolut with the debit card, residual funds + Revolut transfer back to EA.

pecunianonolet

flaneurs_lobster said:

crumpet_man said:

If you withdraw £1500 from NSI ASAP you could deposit it in a higher paying savings account and potentially earn an extra ~1% AER on that £1500.

That's what I do, £1500 from 7% EA into Halifax, fund a couple of RS from the CA, "spend" £500 funding Revolut with the debit card, residual funds + Revolut transfer back to EA.

Does Revolut allow immediate withdrawal again or only after the transaction cleared?