Halifax to relaunch regular saver @10%+

Steve_xx

Sorry if the answer to this has already been posted, but I can't see it anywhere.

Would it be possible to open two Regular Saver accounts, ie one with Halifax and another with Bank of Scotland?

olivetti

I have opened a 10% regular saver with a £30 initial payment 2 days ago, now that I want to top it up with another £470 I cannot get it to transfer across from my HBOS current account, via online banking.

It let me add the account to my list of payments but says that it failed each time I try to transfer.

Has anyone else managed to make a second payment in from their HBOS current account?

gelato_cat

Thanks Mike - I knew someone would make me see sense Now all I have to worry about is the two years' ISA contributions Egg/Lloyds have lost

I'll be using new money to fund the account.

Am I still better off doing this than tying the £5k up in the 6.25% Guaranteed Account?

Suze

Mikeyorks wrote: »

No - you will lose if you deliberately tie up £5k in one of the nominated accounts .... in order to get the extra 2%.

The maximum benefit is from new money direct into the 10% account. The next best is teaming the 10% with an external feeder account (preferably utilising FP transfers) at circa 6.3% / 6.5%.

The 12% is really only viable if you just happen to have £5k 'tied up' in one of the nominated accounts.

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showpost.html?p=11498941&postcount=98

gelato_cat

PS I must have seen that We Are Saving advert about 10 times in the past four hours!

mariaaaa

olivetti wrote: »

I have opened a 10% regular saver with a £30 initial payment 2 days ago, now that I want to top it up with another £470 I cannot get it to transfer across from my HBOS current account, via online banking.

It let me add the account to my list of payments but says that it failed each time I try to transfer.

Has anyone else managed to make a second payment in from their HBOS current account?

The problem may not be with your HBOS current account. The Halifax RS T&C says "one payment each month" (under "Features") and "Each deposit must be a regular monthly payment..." (under "Deposits"). So I guess it means ONLY one payment can be made into the RS each month?

Paul_Herring

Steve_xx wrote: »

Would it be possible to open two Regular Saver accounts,

Yes it would (but see below.)

The only restrictions on the number of RS you can have are:
1) Restrictions on the number of RS within an individual institution
2) The number of institutions offering RS.

ie one with Halifax and another with Bank of Scotland?

That said, given the ones you mention, the answer is no (#1 applies here) - the Bank of Scotland's RS is the Halifax one - http://www.bankofscotlandhalifax.co.uk/savings/regularsaver.asp

Paul_Herring

Suzey wrote: »

Been following this thread with interest. My problem is that I can commit to saving £500/month, but have stupidly tied up all my money in six-month fixed-rate accounts. The earliest any of them mature is October. So, I don't have £5k that I can transfer into a Guaranteed Saver within the next few weeks to get 12%.

Between
a) what you're getting currently with your fixed rate accounts (and in the future) and
b) the (below par) rate you'd be getting on the £5000 in one of the nominated accounts + 2% on (roughly on average) £3000 (1/2 the end total)

I think you'd be better off rotating the 6 monthly fixed rates. Indeed if I had £5000 free to stick in Halifax to get the '2%' I wouldn't bother and stick it in a 1 year fix elsewhere instead

If anyone is able to make me feel better about this, I'd be really grateful! I'm not even sure why I've tied all my money up - must have been a major lapse in concentration

FWIW, I think having it tied up has actually worked in your favour since you ended up posting about it instead of just sticking it in the Halifax.

==========================

Going off topic - when you get your fixed rates maturing you may want to structure the reinvestments a bit more 'conveniently' - look into 'laddering' them - http://www.bargaineering.com/articles/laddering-your-emergency-fund.html - that URL is aimed at US investors and 'CDs' (certificate of deposit) which are much like our fixed rate savings bonds. Basically you split your capital into (say) £1000 lumps and stagger the starting dates of your lumps such that they mature regularly.

In your case, in October (if you want to stick with £5000 and you want to have them mature (almost) every month) reinvest £1000 in October, Nov, Dec, Jan, Feb (skip Mar) October matures Apr - reinvest (with or without interest) if you don't need it, ; Nov matures May - reinvest, etc...

The longest you'd wait for the return of some capital (unless you can find another £1000 to put into the ladder) is 2 months but it would normally be one month.

dkmax_2

TomJ wrote: »

I've been quite sad and run a spreadsheet to see what the difference in interest earned over the 365 days of this particular acct is; at 10% I calculate you make £29.59 more by opening the RS on 28 Jun rather than 10 Jun and at 12%, £35.51.

The point is that you are making additional money not by virtue of the timing alone but by getting an additional payment into the account in the permitted interest paying period. The asymptotic limit to this method is trivial to calculate as it is simply the interest earned on the additional payment for a year - i.e. £50 in the case of 10% and £500, to be reduced commensurately for the 'phase' difference.

However, the person that doesn't delay gets their entire fund earlier too so it strongly depends on some assumptions about what the interest paying environment is at the other end. Your £29 advantage will be reduced by anything that pays above zero.

There are other potential pit-falls, e.g the Halifax regular savers that didn't open their existing accounts until end of July 2007 or beyond will probably miss out on the 10% rate.

dkmax_2

mariaaaa wrote: »

The problem may not be with your HBOS current account. The Halifax RS T&C says "one payment each month" (under "Features") and "Each deposit must be a regular monthly payment..." (under "Deposits"). So I guess it means ONLY one payment can be made into the RS each month?

The currently advertised RS says;

"Set up a monthly standing order from your bank account - you can make other deposits too, as long as the total each month doesn’t exceed £500"

http://www.halifax.co.uk/savings/regularsaver.asp

ctdctd

Paul_Herring wrote: »

Between
a) what you're getting currently with your fixed rate accounts (and in the future) and
b) the (below par) rate you'd be getting on the £5000 in one of the nominated accounts + 2% on (roughly on average) £3000 (1/2 the end total)

I think you'd be better off rotating the 6 monthly fixed rates. Indeed if I had £5000 free to stick in Halifax to get the '2%' I wouldn't bother and stick it in a 1 year fix elsewhere instead

FWIW, I think having it tied up has actually worked in your favour since you ended up posting about it instead of just sticking it in the Halifax.

Think I disagree here:-
£6000 in the RS at 10% gives £260 over a year
£6000 in the RS at 12% gives £312 over a year

Putting £5000 in the "best" 1 year fixed rate at 7% gives £280
Putting £5000 in the Halifax Guaranteed Saver gives £250 at its 6.25% "reward" rate

So as far as I can tell, you get £540 with 10% RS + 7% fix or £562 with 12% RS + 6.25%.