The New Top Easy Access Savings Discussion Area

thevoid69

Just applied for Ulster. Happy to hear it's basically NatWest.
Waiting for it to appear on the app now. Does this take very long?

I presume the account works just like Chase and other banks, instant transfers and 4.5% interest providing the balance stays above £5k?

Is interest paid monthly on the 1st of each  month? 

Thanks

Steve_xx

thevoid69 said:

Just applied for Ulster. Happy to hear it's basically NatWest.
Waiting for it to appear on the app now. Does this take very long?

I presume the account works just like Chase and other banks, instant transfers and 4.5% interest providing the balance stays above £5k?

Is interest paid monthly on the 1st of each  month? 

Thanks

It can take up to a couple of days before the account appears in the app. 
Yes the transfers will be pretty instant. 
There is a question mark regarding the 4.5% interest. In the terms and conditions it states that the bonus element will not be paid if the account drops below 5K. However what those terms do not state is whether or not the 4.5% rate will be restored if the account balance is brought back above the 5K at any point. This to me is sloppy presentation of terms and conditions and it requires clarification. 
Interest is not paid monthly on the 1st of the month. Interest is paid monthly on the first business day of the month.

BestSeagull

Steve_xx said:

thevoid69 said:

Just applied for Ulster. Happy to hear it's basically NatWest.
Waiting for it to appear on the app now. Does this take very long?

I presume the account works just like Chase and other banks, instant transfers and 4.5% interest providing the balance stays above £5k?

Is interest paid monthly on the 1st of each  month? 

Thanks

 
There is a question mark regarding the 4.5% interest. In the terms and conditions it states that the bonus element will not be paid if the account drops below 5K. However what those terms do not state is whether or not the 4.5% rate will be restored if the account balance is brought back above the 5K at any point. This to me is sloppy presentation of terms and conditions and it requires clarification. 

Ulster. Out of habit I transferred a small amount of money into the new LE Savings account when it opened. Now I'm fearful that because it had a balance of less than 5k earlier today I'll loose the bonus for the whole year. 

I've been grossly misinformed by phone representatives yesterday and the day before so I no longer trust a word they say, and the website is such a contradictory mess that it's worse than useless.  So I'd rather just assume the worst.

I decided that the best way to proceed was to open a new LE saver and to transfer not less than £5,000 in, from the start. 

Steve_xx

BestSeagull said:

Steve_xx said:

thevoid69 said:

Just applied for Ulster. Happy to hear it's basically NatWest.
Waiting for it to appear on the app now. Does this take very long?

I presume the account works just like Chase and other banks, instant transfers and 4.5% interest providing the balance stays above £5k?

Is interest paid monthly on the 1st of each  month? 

Thanks

 
There is a question mark regarding the 4.5% interest. In the terms and conditions it states that the bonus element will not be paid if the account drops below 5K. However what those terms do not state is whether or not the 4.5% rate will be restored if the account balance is brought back above the 5K at any point. This to me is sloppy presentation of terms and conditions and it requires clarification. 

Ulster. Out of habit I transferred a small amount of money into the new LE Savings account when it opened. Now I'm fearful that because it had a balance of less than 5k earlier today I'll loose the bonus for the whole year. 

I've been grossly misinformed by phone representatives yesterday and the day before so I no longer trust a word they say, and the website is such a contradictory mess that it's worse than useless.  So I'd rather just assume the worst.

I decided that the best way to proceed was to open a new LE saver and to transfer not less than £5,000 in, from the start. 

Yes I agree with you. I'm also thinking I'll transfer 5k + into the Limited Edition Saver to be sure of the rate.
I've complained to them about this account as you will have read. I'm sure they will be telephoning me at some point to discuss the reasons why I was prevented from opening this account. During that discussion I will mention the ambiguity of the terms and conditions and I will ask them to make them clearer online.

topyam

Ulster

I transferred £1 to test. Plan on transferring enough to have it over £5k by end of day. Do they update after end of each day?? Hope so. I want the higher rate of interest.

BestSeagull

topyam said:

Ulster

I transferred £1 to test. Plan on transferring enough to have it over £5k by end of day. Do they update after end of each day?? Hope so. I want the higher rate of interest.

That's what I would hope/expect but I don't want to assume anything and, as I mentioned, I now have trust issues with their whole outfit so opened the new account instead so that I wouldn't have to worry about it.

Aidanmc

topyam said:

Ulster

I transferred £1 to test. Plan on transferring enough to have it over £5k by end of day. Do they update after end of each day?? Hope so. I want the higher rate of interest.

It looks like you need to maintain a 5K+ balance to receive the bonus interest part.

janusd

Steve_xx said:

Steve_xx said:

Further clarification has just been received from Ulster Bank. Now they say that existing customers do need to have a current account before applying for the Limited Edition saver account.
Whereas new customers to Ulster Bank do not need to satisfy that condition.

This morning I logged into the app and I have been able to open the Limited Edition Saver without any problem at all. I'm not a current account holder with Ulster, but I do have another savings product with them.
Yesterday they first to told me that I could open the Limited Edition Saver and they provided a link to it that didn't work. Later in the day they said I needed to be a current account holder prior to applying for the Limited Edition Saver.
I'm thoroughly fed-up with their unreliable and incorrect information and I have raised a complaint.
It's only by chance that I discovered it possible to apply for the Limited Edition Saver account. They've not contacted me to inform that there has been some adjustment to the application process.

well done Steve - I made one yesterday too... out of character for me to do that, but as you say, this has been an utter shambles of a product launch - and continues to be... was looping around Cora on the app, telling me to use the app to make a complaint, logging me in, telling me to use the app and so on... used their online form in the end.

my reading of the interest rule is that for any day it's less than £5k, then it's 1.06%; if £5k+, then it's 4.50% - it doesn't feel like an Atom Reward Saver style account to me, but time will tell... though I don't think we can judge the account necessarily on what is in the terms as there is/was no mention of the current account nonsense in there.

I put a test £1 in there this morning, worked fine - just added another £4,999 to the account - again, appeared immediately... it seems the visible interest rate is from the last business day - so currently showing interest rate for yesterday of1.06%, will hopefully change to 4.50% tomorrow.

also spotted one other quirk of the account seemingly not mentioned in the terms - there is no option to have paperless statements for either the Limited Edition Saver or current account - so statements will be sent in the post monthly... there is an option for online statements for the Loyalty account, but not the other two - whether statements for these will be available online also, I don't know - frankly, I don't have the will to chat with Cora about this. 

Steve_xx

janusd said:

Steve_xx said:

Steve_xx said:

Further clarification has just been received from Ulster Bank. Now they say that existing customers do need to have a current account before applying for the Limited Edition saver account.
Whereas new customers to Ulster Bank do not need to satisfy that condition.

This morning I logged into the app and I have been able to open the Limited Edition Saver without any problem at all. I'm not a current account holder with Ulster, but I do have another savings product with them.
Yesterday they first to told me that I could open the Limited Edition Saver and they provided a link to it that didn't work. Later in the day they said I needed to be a current account holder prior to applying for the Limited Edition Saver.
I'm thoroughly fed-up with their unreliable and incorrect information and I have raised a complaint.
It's only by chance that I discovered it possible to apply for the Limited Edition Saver account. They've not contacted me to inform that there has been some adjustment to the application process.

well done Steve - I made one yesterday too... out of character for me to do that, but as you say, this has been an utter shambles of a product launch - and continues to be... was looping around Cora on the app, telling me to use the app to make a complaint, logging me in, telling me to use the app and so on... used their online form in the end.

my reading of the interest rule is that for any day it's less than £5k, then it's 1.06%; if £5k+, then it's 4.50% - it doesn't feel like an Atom Reward Saver style account to me, but time will tell... though I don't think we can judge the account necessarily on what is in the terms as there is/was no mention of the current account nonsense in there.

I put a test £1 in there this morning, worked fine - just added another £4,999 to the account - again, appeared immediately... it seems the visible interest rate is from the last business day - so currently showing interest rate for yesterday of1.06%, will hopefully change to 4.50% tomorrow.

also spotted one other quirk of the account seemingly not mentioned in the terms - there is no option to have paperless statements for either the Limited Edition Saver or current account - so statements will be sent in the post monthly... there is an option for online statements for the Loyalty account, but not the other two - whether statements for these will be available online also, I don't know - frankly, I don't have the will to chat with Cora about this. 

Your reading of the interest rule is, at this point, debatable.
Their sentence,
"If your balance falls below £5,000 at any time during the 12-month term, interest will be paid at the variable interest rate set out above," 
needs to be further detailed to include an indication that the bonus element will be restored if the account balance is returned to an amount in excess of 5k at any point throughout the 12-month term.

Steve_xx

Aidanmc said:

topyam said:

Ulster

I transferred £1 to test. Plan on transferring enough to have it over £5k by end of day. Do they update after end of each day?? Hope so. I want the higher rate of interest.

It looks like you need to maintain a 5K+ balance to receive the bonus interest part.

Yes that is correct. What is debatable is whether or not at any point during the 12 month term if the account balance dips below 5K for a time before being restored to amount in excessive 5K. The way the terms are written at the moment indicate that if the account dips below 5K at any point then the variable rate will apply, minus the bonus. The terms need some clarification to make it clear that once the balance is restored to an excess of 5K then the bonus will be payable.