Is there a way to find out if I have already taken out an ISA this tax year using my allowance

Duncan77

Honestly the same happened to me. 
It's easily done!
I opened a Moneybox app last January & put £20k in
I also transferred over 2 ancient ISAs from barclays that were earning next to nothing.
I thought I'd put in a further 20k in April for this years allowance. 
However on checking I never did that for this years allowance. I must have forgotten.! 
So I have just spent hours researching who to go with only to think MAYBE I opened one elsewhere in April??
Delighted to discover I did! With Shawbrook, but I have absolutely no recollection of it. (There's no paperwork, its online only and they dont have an app). 
I found it by searching my email account for ISA & reading through a lot of articles and adverts til I found a welcome email from Shawbrook. 
I must have dementia

Duncan77

Is there anyone who can advise how to set up a savings spreadsheet? 

flaneurs_lobster

Duncan77 said:

Honestly the same happened to me. 
It's easily done!

A spreadsheet is your friend. Just the one sheet would let you add a row whenever an account is opened (ISAs and anything else). Add as much data as you think might be useful (institution name, account name, number, sort code, date added etc). 

FishInGlass

I keep a spreadsheet which shows all my accounts both ISA and non ISA and the interest earned during this financial year in respect to the PSA as well as any maturity dates for fixed products. With the ISAs I also highlight those I have opened this year in a different colour (as well as summing the total) to quickly see which ones they are and where I am with regard to the 20k allowance.

auser99

SlyF0x said:

Thanks guys- I can't work it out so I think I will try opening a new one and if there is an issue it will be returned to me unopened I presume (even if the ISA is with a different provider)

You must have a hell of a lot of money sloshing around or have loads of separate complicated accounts if you can't either 1) remember putting 20k in this year or 2)not be able to track / check what you have opened 

Reed_Richards

No, there isn't.  It seems perverse that at some point after the end of the tax year HMRC will total up your ISA investments and take you to task if you exceeded the limit (£20k) but there is no way for you to retrieve the same information.  But that's the way it is.

eskbanker

Reed_Richards said:

No, there isn't.  It seems perverse that at some point after the end of the tax year HMRC will total up your ISA investments and take you to task if you exceeded the limit (£20k) but there is no way for you to retrieve the same information.  But that's the way it is.

Not sure it's perverse but it's entirely understandable - the data is only held by individual providers, who then make annual submissions to HMRC, so it's only well after the end of the tax year that a consolidated picture is available.

The situation obviously hasn't been helped by the relaxation of rules about funding multiple ISAs of the same type concurrently but it's always been the case that anyone paying into multiple ISAs has to keep their own records about how much has been contributed....

Reed_Richards

Okay, I agree that the final submission needs to be how much is in each new ISA but I don't see that there couldn't be an immediate submission when a new ISA is funded and that that information could be made available via the Government Gateway to the person with the NI Number used to open the ISA.  Or is that still too much to ask of contemporary technology?  

eskbanker

Reed_Richards said:

Okay, I agree that the final submission needs to be how much is in each new ISA but I don't see that there couldn't be an immediate submission when a new ISA is funded and that that information could be made available via the Government Gateway to the person with the NI Number used to open the ISA.  Or is that still too much to ask of contemporary technology?  

It's not a technology issue - the actual transmission of data from institutions to HMRC isn't rocket science - but it's all about the appetite and justification for introducing new processes with such limited benefits.

ISA reporting is an annual process, and clearly, as you recognise, there needs to be an end of year position submitted, so adding some sort of additional real time reporting, simply to convey to HMRC that an account has been opened, would bring no obvious benefit to HMRC or the institutions against which to offset the costs of introducing it, even if the hypothetical solution might assist those ISA holders who are unable or unwilling to keep track of where they've put their money!

Remember too that ISAs can be cancelled within a 14 day cooling off period, which voids them as if they hadn't existed, so there'd need to be logic built into any such real time reporting process to accommodate scenarios such as that....

poseidon1

Duncan77 said:

Is there anyone who can advise how to set up a savings spreadsheet? 

Try the Moneyhub app. I use it to track all savings, current and credit card accounts. Savings accounts are mostly entered manually into the app with notations of interest rates and maturities where relevant. Some savings accounts ( Ford Money and RCI ) use open banking which is helpful.

With regard to the current and credit card accounts, it uses open banking to up date balances daily.

 Furthermore it has income summary functionality which gives me a running total of income received over any period including tax years - very useful for self assessment tax return, and cashflow modelling.

Currently lists 37 separate credit/current/savings accounts, of which 3 are cash isas. If an account is closed there is an archive section so there is still visibility of the account's previous exsistence.

Finally I also use it as an asset register, it can incorporate pensions and investment  portfolios together with approximate house values ( pulled from zoopla), mortgage is connectable and even car values for those interested. All useful to give a bird's-eye view of net asset position for IHT planning purposes. 

Keep it updated, each time you open accounts and you need never lose sight of your accounts again.