Word of warning re. ING Direct & other online savings accounts

oap

We have an Ing account have had it for some time and they are very efficient, our Chelsea BS 12 month savings account, interest paid monthly into our bank account, is coming to an end, we are transferring quite a large sum of money from Chelsea into Ing, Ing say that we can put their sort code in the close account section of Ing and account number and it will go direct to them from Chelsea!!

oap

ps oops sorry, close account section of Chelsea not ing!!!

Walletwatch

Milarky wrote:

On another point, though, I understand that Barclays allow customers to draw on cheques immediately - but at their 'own risk' that the cheque ulimately clears. Can anyone confirm if this is accurate?

Isn't that more on the lines of the cheque discounting facility offered by some banks as a corporate service, for which they charge a small amount as fees? Well, it may be that Barclays offers it for free to retail customers, possibly as a differentiating factor for its accounts and also to mitigate the loss of the paltry 0.1% credit interest they offer on their current accounts?

mary

ejones999 wrote:

This business of uncleareds is the only drawback that I can see on the LTSB site. The rest is easy to use but they only show ledger balances not cleared balances. Don't know why this should be so as this information is freely available when you ask the ATM for a balance.
Eric

I only discovered this recently, even though I've been on line banking for 2/3 years with LTSB. I couldn't understand why a large payment hadn't gone through when in theory the money was in the bank, but obviously not yet cleared. When I rang to enquire what was happening, I was told the way to find the cleared balance is:-
open at Account Overview, then click on the Account Name i.e. Classic.
Your Account details will appear, beneath this it says Account balance and Available balance

Hope you find it.

OzzMosiz_2

Don't FirstDirect have a better rate 5% ?

Limes

That may be so on paper, but. . .

If we have a simple(!) example of somebody depositing £10k on 1/1/05 and then adding £150 per month on the first day of the month until the end of the year, and as tends to be the case once or twice has to make a withdrawal on the account - say £300 on the 1/2/05 and the same on 1/8/05 - assuming no further changes to rates are announced by either company, the ING account holder will end the year with £11,561.02 before tax in their account while the First Direct customer will have £11,496.88 due to their no interest in month of a withdrawal penalty. A whole £64.14 less!

Okay, so this is slightly obscure, but even on the basis of depositing £10k on 1/1/05 and withdrawing £50 at the end of the first month then leaving the account alone you'd still be better off with ING by £23.53 on 31/12/05.

OR if you left the £10k in there then didn't touch the account all year and suddenly needed to get £1 out on 31/12/05 you'd still be better off with ING by £23.43!!!

None of this takes into account loss of interest for time taken to transfer funds but I bet you'd still be kicking yourself with a First Direct account for withdrawing the money!!

ffacoffipawb

Limes wrote:

OR if you left the £10k in there then didn't touch the account all year and suddenly needed to get £1 out on 31/12/05 you'd still be better off with ING by £23.43!!!

But if you could wait until 01/01/2006 (i.e. one extra day) you would be better off by £25 gross / £20 net with first direct.

Limes

ffacoffipawb wrote:

But if you could wait until 01/01/2006 (i.e. one extra day) you would be better off by £25 gross / £20 net with first direct.

Fair enough! Was just illustrating an extreme point about losing interest. I reckon in that case You'd get about £20 gross extra from First Direct based on rates over this year and assuming no further changes (FD £10,510.69 v ING £10,490.56). Fine if you don't have to dip into the account at any point of the year but not if you do. . . :rolleyes:

jonesMUFCforever

mary wrote:

I only discovered this recently, even though I've been on line banking for 2/3 years with LTSB. I couldn't understand why a large payment hadn't gone through when in theory the money was in the bank, but obviously not yet cleared. When I rang to enquire what was happening, I was told the way to find the cleared balance is:-
open at Account Overview, then click on the Account Name i.e. Classic.
Your Account details will appear, beneath this it says Account balance and Available balance

Hope you find it.

I have just found it thanks. But why would they not tell you clearly in first place of this service?
Eric

mary

I did eventually get a letter to inform me that the money had not been paid and they would try again. Before it arrived, I had already seen online after about a couple of days that the money had then gone through! I look on all my accounts daily to monitor progress.