The Top Regular Savers Discussion Thread

allegro120

ForumUser7 said:

Ecology Building Society Regular Saver

Now this account no longer accepts direct debit deposits, what have people done with it please?

It's one of those open ended accounts, but requires monthly funding, has a period after closure during which you cannot open another, but is at a very low rate so difficult to know, and has limited withdrawals.

I already have an easy access with them, so would retain my membership through that.

Thanks!

I’ve used it since September 2021 for DD purposes and will be closing it now. I don’t have any other account with Ecology and not planning to open a new one for maintaining membership. They’ve never offered any competitive rates, at least on my watch. 

Bridlington1

qbadger said:

AmityNeon said:

qbadger said:

AmityNeon said:

qbadger said:

Vernon BS Online Regular Saver

Deposits on non-working days: can anyone confirm whether deposits on non-working days are in fact treated as having been received the same day, please?

The value/posted dates for my deposits on Sunday 01 Dec and New Year's Day are next working day (02/12/24 and 02/01/25) in the transaction history.

Does the word 'value' appear anywhere? Is there any indication in your Vernon BS transaction history indicating the dates of the non-working days the payments were sent?

No. Nothing in the transaction history to suggest that deposits are processed on non-working days.

In that case I think it's likely that payments sent on non-working days are only received by Vernon BS (for interest purposes) on the next working day.

Assuming you've always deposited £250 per month, if the opening deposit was somehow sent on Sunday 10 November and you received £0.93 interest at the end of the month, then non-working days are included.

The £250 opening deposit was sent (and credited) on Mon 11 Nov. The interest received on 30 Nov 24 was £0.89, reconciling to 20 days at 6.5%. Unfortunately my case doesn't really help with reverse engineering the answer to this question regarding the treatment of deposit on non-working day right now - for that we require the data from someone who sent funds on a non-working day prior to 30 Nov 24.

Thanks for the reports on payments into Vernon.

Vernon are among the few banks/building societies on the first page that I've never sent a payment to so went off the general Ts&Cs when writing the first page, which weren't as clear as some of the others regarding payments received on non-working days.

I've amended the first page of the thread to reflect this info. For now I'll err on the side of caution and assume payments received on non-working days are treated as having been received the next working day for interest purposes until I've seen further reports/info on how Vernon handle payments in.

chris_the_bee

happybagger said:

Yes I had that chat the other day with them (furness), described as a Christmas saver, coming out during Jan, said "couldn't remember" the rate but it was "more than the current one" (sitting at 4.75). Did say they'd open it up by phone if need be, save a branch visit.

In case it mirrors last year's, 6%, it went live 12 Jan 2024.

Furness
Mine started 10th January 2024

Bridlington1

happybagger said:

Yes I had that chat the other day with them (furness), described as a Christmas saver, coming out during Jan, said "couldn't remember" the rate but it was "more than the current one" (sitting at 4.75). Did say they'd open it up by phone if need be, save a branch visit.

In case it mirrors last year's, 6%, it went live 12 Jan 2024.

Even earlier than that if I'm not mistaken, the Ts&Cs were first archived 5/1/24:
https://web.archive.org/web/20240105113739/https://www.furnessbs.co.uk/media/pzrb2p3o/christmas-regular-saver-issue-1-05-01-2024.pdf

EDIT:
The first report I can see on this forum of it being launched is also 5/1/24:
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/80507606/#Comment_80507606

simonsmithsays

allegro120 said:

ForumUser7 said:

Ecology Building Society Regular Saver

Now this account no longer accepts direct debit deposits, what have people done with it please?

It's one of those open ended accounts, but requires monthly funding, has a period after closure during which you cannot open another, but is at a very low rate so difficult to know, and has limited withdrawals.

I already have an easy access with them, so would retain my membership through that.

Thanks!

I’ve used it since September 2021 for DD purposes and will be closing it now. I don’t have any other account with Ecology and not planning to open a new one for maintaining membership. They’ve never offered any competitive rates, at least on my watch. 

Closed mine too

s71hj

simonsmithsays said:

allegro120 said:

ForumUser7 said:

Ecology Building Society Regular Saver

Now this account no longer accepts direct debit deposits, what have people done with it please?

It's one of those open ended accounts, but requires monthly funding, has a period after closure during which you cannot open another, but is at a very low rate so difficult to know, and has limited withdrawals.

I already have an easy access with them, so would retain my membership through that.

Thanks!

I’ve used it since September 2021 for DD purposes and will be closing it now. I don’t have any other account with Ecology and not planning to open a new one for maintaining membership. They’ve never offered any competitive rates, at least on my watch. 

Closed mine too

What are the main advantages of having accounts that accept payments by direct debit? I know they can be useful short term for switch incentives and £2 dds for Natwest bank account qualification but are there more opportunities I'm missing out on!

Hattie627

s71hj said:

simonsmithsays said:

allegro120 said:

ForumUser7 said:

Ecology Building Society Regular Saver

Now this account no longer accepts direct debit deposits, what have people done with it please?

It's one of those open ended accounts, but requires monthly funding, has a period after closure during which you cannot open another, but is at a very low rate so difficult to know, and has limited withdrawals.

I already have an easy access with them, so would retain my membership through that.

Thanks!

I’ve used it since September 2021 for DD purposes and will be closing it now. I don’t have any other account with Ecology and not planning to open a new one for maintaining membership. They’ve never offered any competitive rates, at least on my watch. 

Closed mine too

What are the main advantages of having accounts that accept payments by direct debit? I know they can be useful short term for switch incentives and £2 dds for Natwest bank account qualification but are there more opportunities I'm missing out on!

There used to be current accounts which offered interest and/or monthly reward payments for having 2, or sometimes 4 direct debits, paying out each month. Club Lloyds current account offered interest,  as did the old TSB Classic Plus c/a and Bank of Scotland Vantage. Co-operative Bank used to offer a monthly reward for paying out 4 direct debits. Halifax also. Barclays Blue Rewards was similar. Now the trend has moved on to reward a certain number of debit card transactions. or debit card transactions amounting to a certain amount over the month (eg Halifax Reward, Danske Reward).

figgyc

/s71hj said:

What are the main advantages of having accounts that accept payments by direct debit? I know they can be useful short term for switch incentives and £2 dds for Natwest bank account qualification but are there more opportunities I'm missing out on!

Only other ones I'm aware of:

• Zopa's beta bank account gives 2% cashback on Direct Debits up to £1500/year (so £30 cashback). This doesn't need to be on all the time though - for this I used an investment account to set up a £1500 DD, let it pay out once, and cancelled it, and still got the cashback, you'd only have to do that once a year until they end the promo
  
• As mentioned above - Bank of Scotland's "Vantage" feature and Club Lloyds give a tiered 1.5%-3.5% interest on current account balances - this needs 2 DDs among other requirements. Those two do still exist actually, but the rate is pretty rubbish vs Kroo's 3.65%.
• I imagine you knew this already but for completeness, RBS run a Reward account identical to Natwest's and you can have both.
• Santander's Edge current account pays 1% on select bill DDs (utilities, council tax, broadband, phone) - costs £3/month so break-even is min £300/month of bills, max £10/month cashback. Having the account also lets you use the Edge Saver (very good 6% on £4k, I use this as my "holding account" for next month's RS funds). (There's also the Edge Up, costs £5/month, with a higher cap of £15/month and 3% current account interest, but you can't use the Edge Saver with one - so I wouldn't recommend it, but on reading the T&Cs it doesn't look like anything is stopping you from having both to get the higher cashback cap and the saver?)
  
  No cashback on savings DDs, but if you are using bill DDs to fill any of the other requirements that need them, you might want to move those to Santander and use savings DDs to replace them.
  
  I'll also mention that if you don't set up any DDs on the Edge account and don't meet the payin requirement, no cashback but they never charge the fee but you can still get and use the Edge Saver - I do that as I have less than £300/month of bills (plus I have a few that I pay by debit/credit cards for more than 1% back), credit to whoever on the forum originally figured that out.
  

By the way just FYI there is a "Savings/investments DDs and debit card deposits" thread which is the best place for knowing what accounts offer the DD in feature (and the debit card feature which as Hattie627 mentions is good for the Halifax Reward account)

Bobblehat

happybagger said:

Yes I had that chat the other day with them (furness), described as a Christmas saver, coming out during Jan, said "couldn't remember" the rate but it was "more than the current one" (sitting at 4.75). Did say they'd open it up by phone if need be, save a branch visit.

In case it mirrors last year's, 6%, it went live 12 Jan 2024.

You've reminded me of another bit of info I gleaned from the branch visit today ... phoning a branch now diverts you through to Barrow HQ, you used to be able to phone your branch directly.

That link you posted mentions Friday 12th Jan 2024 as launch date of the soon to be maturing version. Just like Chris_the_bee, mine started on 10/1/2024 with a branch visit! Brid also confirms an even earlier start date, so I'm looking forward to next Monday 

Hope I'm not disappointed or unnecessarily raising peoples' hopes!

surreysaver

ForumUser7 said:

Ecology Building Society Regular Saver

Now this account no longer accepts direct debit deposits, what have people done with it please?

It's one of those open ended accounts, but requires monthly funding, has a period after closure during which you cannot open another, but is at a very low rate so difficult to know, and has limited withdrawals.

I already have an easy access with them, so would retain my membership through that.

Thanks!

I'm still expecting one direct debit to be taken. Once this has been taken I will just reduce the account to the minimum required to keep it open (I believe it's £10) just to keep a relationship with Ecology just in case it becomes worth it later