Hi, I've just been caught out by my alliance and leicester direct saver account.

I noticed I didnt receive any interest on the account in August and September and I asked them what was going on, this is what I was told:

"It may help if I explain that the terms and conditions of the account state that no interest is earned on the account in any month in which there is a withdrawal from the account or the account is closed.

I can confirm that no interest was applied to your account for September due to the withdrawal from the account.

I do hope you find the above information useful, however, if you have any further questions or need any more help please visit our ‘Help’ section online or contact us again.

Kind regards "

Not such a great account after all.

To be honest I'm sick of this bank. Their service is terrible. Their customer support is a disgrace. Their website is poor compared to other banks.

I did find the information very useful as I will now be changing my bank, this is the last straw. Anyone want to suggest a decent bank ?

Should "Kind Regards" say, "F**K you, we got you, thanks for the free cash" ?

Blimey, how things change. I'm sure that account used to be a decent choice. But now it's only 6.3% and no withdrawals allowed? What a rip-off. I can't believe they have the gall to call it an 'Easy Access Savings Account'.

Icesave offer 6.3% and have no withdrawal penalties. In fact as you can transfer money into your Icesave account via direct debit you can even skip the 3 days lost interest you normally get with BACS transfers. The bank is Iceland-based but all FSA regulated and subscribe to the UK Banking Code and all that gubbins.

Or for something a bit closer to home, Sainburys do 6.25% with no penalties.

nsandi and icesave for savings, halifax for a current account, egg money manager to tie things together

It was quite clear in the terms and conditions that there were penalties to withdrawals. What I don't find clear is if you take out money on, say, the 10th of the month do you only miss out on 10 days interest or 30 days? If I can take out money on the 1st of a month there should only be 1 day's missed interest?

Tonester, you lose all interest for all money held in the account for any calendar month that you make a withdrawal in, regardless of the date it is made on (I think!)


As for the original poster, for godsake read the terms and conditions before sticking your money somewhere!

I was caught by these shysters when I STRed and nominated my A&L a/c for the funds. I then wanted to juggle the money into other accounts to keep only £35K in each....

ALSO, the HSBC a/c is similar in that you lose a whole months interest. So, move it at the beginning of the month!

Frank

You've only got yourself to blame Count.

TRY READING THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS BEFORE APPLYING FOR AN ACCOUNT IN THE FIRST PLACE.

A&L will never get my cash again due to their advertising an interest rate, for which I opened
an account, and then 2 months later reducing the rate and pre-dating the change to before
the advert.

Pent

Yeah, I saw this A&L rate but was sure it wasn't an instant access penalty-free account.

I once opened a Mini-cash Isa with A&L and closed it before they even managed to open it -they are so slow. In the 2 days they were still opening the account I worked out they are in fact pretty poor they use headline titles to attract customers and hide the important bits in the bottom lines (in small print).

BTW, if you are looking for a good interest rate the best one around that I can find is 6.4% AER Bradford & Bingley

and apparently theres no penalty for withdrawing yoyr own money, horray!

"You can open your account with as little as £1.
We give you the convenience of online access, 24 hours a day.
You get a great variable rate of interest.
Interest guaranteed to at least match the Bank of England Base Rate until 1st January 2009.
A choice of monthly or annual interest.
You can make withdrawals any time, via BACS, to a nominated account without penalty.
With a minimum opening deposit of just £1"


There are far higher interst rates if you doing regular saving each month think 10% but again you can only put a ceratin amount in each month so you're not going to get that much I don't think.

and remember after Northern Rock phenomenon don't keep all your eggs in one basket (especially if you have greater than £35K as thats all that appears to be guaranteed so afr, unless they upped it to £100k?)
CH

The Sainburys account is rubbish. Firstly, interest is only paid annually (ie. not monthly). Also, there's no facility to easily transfer money into the account online!, which seems daft to me. When I enquired they suggested I should send a cheque in the post!!. So, that's not really an internet account then is it?.

I've had no problems transferring some of my savings there from A&L over the internet.

Of course there is. Make an online payment to the sort code and account number of your sainsburys account. I've had no problems with this.

It's no longer 6.3%. The f******s have reduced it by 0.3% to 6.00% as of 2nd of Jan.

Sainsburys is now down to 6.00%

Icesave decent at 6.30% instant access. but no good if you want to withdraw regular, its CHAPS and it will cost you £30 so be warned.

Their Direct ISA 3 has gone down from 5.9 to 5.65%. Any suggestions of a good alternative ISA I can switch into?

Newcastle Building Society giving 6.43% instant access - but its not fixed -internet account