Natwest Premier switch - £500

winkowinko

Says you need a £100k income, but then also mentions you need to pay £15k within 90 days of switching. Unsure whether just paying the £15k (non salary) would satisfy the switching bonus criteria?

Premier Reward Account | NatWest Premier

unclebatman

Does anyone have any practical experience of how NatWest govern the salary aspect?
I’m thinking salary sacrifice in particular. I meet the criteria but my net paid salary appears well below the threshold.

dcs34

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82124967#Comment_82124967

This page might be a help: https://www.natwest.com/premier-banking/support-centre/general-banking-information/general/how-do-you-define-income-or-savings-for-premier-customers.html which suggests it is net salary, but allows you to aggregate any other income sources (e.g. pension payments, rental, benefits).

Given it's such a large list of potential income sources they can't expect to police it by using, for example, inter-banking codes, or saying that salary must be a third party BACS payment. Presumably there's an element of self-certification by you applying for it and having some evidence that your total income (based on that list) is at least £100k? And they'll check (presumably semi-automated with a human oversight) from time-to-time that you're still broadly within the eligibility requirements, with some discretion (e.g. self-employed individuals might pay their "salary" in irregular lumps by standing orders, rather than a PAYE employee who gets paid the same amount each month by BACS).

I appreciate it doesn't quite answer the question you've asked, but I was offered to join Premier by NatWest despite never having a salary in five-figures. My theory is their computer systems misinterpreted my (regular) regular saver funding process (i.e. paying a big lump of money into the NatWest account at the start of each month, to disperse into various regular savers) as a proxy for a big salary payment.

unclebatman

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82125881#Comment_82125881

Much appreciated DC, thank you.

I’ll do some more homework

PRAISETHESUN

Previous NatWest/RBS/Ulster incentives requiring you to pay in a minimum amount into the account have not required you to pay your income, and I would be surprised if this offer is any different, especially since it does not specifically it. You should be fine to pay in multiple smaller amounts, holding for 24 hr each time.

Just be careful if you do this since such activity may be viewed as suspicious (large amounts deposited into a brand new account followed by rapid withdrawal, especially if done multiple times), so be prepared in case NatWest or your other bank decide to freeze accounts to investigate.

As for Premier, I've also got Premier accounts with NatWest and RBS. I was invited by NatWest despite not having the required income (I cycle a lot of money through the account each month similar to the other poster). For RBS I applied for the upgrade directly after my NatWest account was upgraded and was accepted. I'm expecting it to be reviewed and downgraded eventually but I'll take my additional rewards until they do.