Smile Drops ISA rate

M_Thomson

Just logged on to the Smile site and the ISA rate has dropped for customers who hold a current account with them from 5% to 4.65%. Not good news. Did anyone get an email regarding this? I didn't.

hansi

M_Thomson wrote:

Just logged on to the Smile site and the ISA rate has dropped for customers who hold a current account with them from 5% to 4.65%. Not good news. Did anyone get an email regarding this? I didn't.

No, I didn't

Ember999

No, I didn't

rewilson

No I didn't get any obvious notice of the rate change. They are always anxious to tell you good news but like many other banks they like to keep quiet when it's bad news. At least Lloyds had the decency to write and warn me the rate on my Toisa was dropping to 5.05% last month.
The smile drop (7%!) is so significant I'm moving to Stafford Railway BS wich is still paying 5.25%. I know I'm going to see a drop in their rate sometime but I cannot believe they'll drop as low as smile!

StuHolmes

My mother has £13000 in a smile ISA and has just been informed the rate is going down to 3.95%! How easy is it to transfer to a better ISA even though she has already deposited £3000 this year? Any suggestions?

Greycrow

Yes, got an email:
"- cash mini ISA - reduced to 4.65% gross / AER tax-free if you have a smile current account; reduced to 3.95% gross / AER tax-free if you don't have a smile current account".
Previous rate with current account was 5%.
Don't need to be a mathematican to know that's more than .25%.
Maybe time to change, but to where?

realaledrinker

StuHolmes wrote:

My mother has £13000 in a smile ISA and has just been informed the rate is going down to 3.95%! How easy is it to transfer to a better ISA even though she has already deposited £3000 this year? Any suggestions?

Smile's ISA only ever makes sense if you have a current account as well. We're in the process of moving over £30K out.

We have moved ISAs around a fair bit over the years. smile are very good at administering changes as were Principality, A&L & Britannia. Halifax were shocking, Bank of Scotland worse still.


We applied for Yorkshire Building Society e-ISAs yesterday. Even when they drop from 5.2% their rate will be well above smile's. They now accept transfers into the e-ISA although this is not evident from their website.

derrick

StuHolmes wrote:

My mother has £13000 in a smile ISA and has just been informed the rate is going down to 3.95%! How easy is it to transfer to a better ISA even though she has already deposited £3000 this year? Any suggestions?

It is very easy to TRANSFER, just contact the provider you want to TRANSFER to and they will do all the work for you.

ffacoffipawb

realaledrinker wrote:

We applied for Yorkshire Building Society e-ISAs yesterday. Even when they drop from 5.2% their rate will be well above smile's. They now accept transfers into the e-ISA although this is not evident from their website.

Do they???

http://www.ybs.co.uk/savings/online/eisa/more_details.jsp#isaproviders

"Transferring between ISA providers

The Inland Revenue rules allow you to transfer from one ISA provider to another. You can therefore transfer your savings out of E-ISA to another provider, however E-ISA does not accept inward transfers "

Greycrow

realaledrinker wrote:

Smile's ISA only ever makes sense if you have a current account as well. We're in the process of moving over £30K out.

We have moved ISAs around a fair bit over the years. smile are very good at administering changes as were Principality, A&L & Britannia. Halifax were shocking, Bank of Scotland worse still.


We applied for Yorkshire Building Society e-ISAs yesterday. Even when they drop from 5.2% their rate will be well above smile's. They now accept transfers into the e-ISA although this is not evident from their website.

Are you certain of this?
If yes, then YBS has a strange way of making it known.

realaledrinker

As certain as I can be. I first thought I needed to open their normal ISA, which does accept transfers & then do a transfer from there across to the e-ISA, as advised here:

http://www.ybs.co.uk/your_society/showquestion20-412.html

I did as instructed & completed all the forms but then got a call from the branch where I took everyting into to say that I could actually open an e-ISA on line, print off the forms & send them in to HO with a transfer-in form.

I phoned their call centre & asked the guy to confirm this. At first he said you could not transfer into an e-ISA direct but when I mentioned the call from the branch, he suddenly remembered reading an internal memo a few days previously, looked it up and lo and behold it said that transfers-in were indeed now accepted.

Seems they have not yet got around to updating their website!