Cash ISA Transfer Rules

Norwooder · 14 September 2019 at 8:27PM

I have c£50k in a Tesco easy access cash ISA (£15k contributed in this tax year, the remainder from previous years). Tesco recently announced they will be reducing the variable element of the interest rate...

Are there any ISA rules preventing me from transferring the majority* (say £49k) of the balance I have with Tesco to another ISA I have with Family Building Society from a previous tax year?

I thought I had read somewhere that if you transfer an ISA account where you had made current year contributions, that partial transfers are not allowed.

* I would like to keep the Tesco account open because I think it might be useful to have a 'flexible' ISA in the future.

eskbanker · 15 September 2019 at 12:27AM

The rule is that current year contributions need to be kept together, so if you have £15K of current year money in with £35K of prior year money then you'll easily be able to accomplish this, whatever size of transfer you have in mind - any transfer of less than £15K can be attributed to prior year money or anything above that can be nominated to include current year contributions.

https://www.gov.uk/individual-savings-accounts/transferring-your-isa:

If you want to transfer money you’ve invested in an ISA during the current year, you must transfer all of it.

For money you invested in previous years, you can choose to transfer all or part of your savings.

Note that individual providers may layer their own rules on top of the actual scheme ones, so aren't compelled to accept transfers, or can choose not to handle partial ones....

Tom99 · 15 September 2019 at 4:24AM

I think you can transfer any amount up to £35k or the whole £50k.
Does the account allow a £0 balance or will you have to close it?

eskbanker · 15 September 2019 at 11:25AM

Tom99 wrote: »

I think you can transfer any amount up to £35k or the whole £50k.

Those aren't the only options though - if OP wanted to transfer between £35K and £50K, there's nothing to stop them from moving all of this year's £15K plus any amount between £20K and £35K from prior year money.

Assuming partial transfers are permitted by the providers concerned of course....

Cash ISA Transfer Rules

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Cash ISA Transfer Rules

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