Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. Protection built in.

Meet the Other Phone.
Protection built in.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

Did anyone else do NOTHING with the £250 Child Trust Fund

357 replies

WarblingEttie · 16/10/2022 08:56

I just left it where it was and need to find out where it is as DS turns 18 on December 🤔

What did everyone else do?

OP posts:
nicknamehelp · 18/10/2022 14:48

Never added anything to it as its dc who can access it only at 18 and then spend it on anything they want. So we saved but in account in our name so we have control when they get it (ie when it won't be passed away)

WhosafraidofVirginiaWoolf · 18/10/2022 14:59

Did you find out where it is OP? DS's matures at the beginning of March next year and we have already had an email telling us what we need to do to extricate it.

Ds's is with Forrester's Financial.

PITA for us as we have got to get POA for DS to do it.

Mba1974 · 18/10/2022 15:04

@Flippingnora100 as someone else said you can only love it to an ISA would recommend it even if you can only add small amounts..

Mba1974 · 18/10/2022 15:04

@Flippingnora100 move it obviously!!!

sabbii · 18/10/2022 15:15

have online access, yearly reports, saved for 18 yrs even when I was out of work and now those 18yrs worth of savings are being transferred to an adult ISA. Will go some way to my DS end of uni debt

PinotPony · 18/10/2022 15:23

I'm surprised at the number of people who didn't look into the options for investment at the time, even if they didn't have the funds to top it up. It was all explained in quite simple terms and you didn't have to be a stock broker to understand it.

Both my boys were lucky enough to get the CTF - born 2005 and 2009. We put them into a S&S CTF with Legal and General, since transferred to OneFamily. Topped up each month by £50 from us and grandparents.

DS1's CTF moved to more stable cash investments a few years ago and is worth about £15,000. He's planning on using it for a gap year and uni. DS2's is worth about £9,000.

TheColorIndigo · 18/10/2022 15:54

Pants0nFir3 · 17/10/2022 19:00

I cannot simply believe that loads of people are just doing nothing!? Bloody beggars belief! As soon as I received it I put it into a trust fund in my building society. My dd turns 18 in 5 years and now it's a junior ISA. It's worth a whole lot more than a few hundred quid and I know where it is!! How utterly selfish and irresponsible. Maybe it's because I'm a single parent who works hard to ensure a future nest egg despite constant discrimination.

Would you be ok though if your DC spent thousands of pounds on clothes and takeaways?
I kept the minimum in mine, tried to invest in wisely, and saved elsewhere for my child, in a fund that I could control.

Mellowday · 18/10/2022 16:17

Wow i didnt even know this existed ? Who paid it and why?

TeenDivided · 18/10/2022 16:27

@Mellowday A Child Trust Fund is a long-term tax-free savings account for children born between 1 September 2002 and 2 January 2011.
www.gov.uk/child-trust-funds

Pants0nFir3 · 18/10/2022 16:49

The original issue was that people DIDN'T DO ANYTHING with their free government handout. My daughter has been brought up to know the value of things #singlemumteachings

Pants0nFir3 · 18/10/2022 16:54

Its getting quite boring on how the other half have fooked up on a simple investment for their offspring.

Bonniewann · 18/10/2022 17:01

Pants0nFir3 · 18/10/2022 16:49

The original issue was that people DIDN'T DO ANYTHING with their free government handout. My daughter has been brought up to know the value of things #singlemumteachings

That's the weirdest hashtag I've ever read,

MrsRinaDecker · 18/10/2022 17:48

Pants0nFir3 · 18/10/2022 16:49

The original issue was that people DIDN'T DO ANYTHING with their free government handout. My daughter has been brought up to know the value of things #singlemumteachings

Why is it so unbelievable that people who didn’t understand it allowed it to go to the default option rather than moving it and risking messing it up? As you say, it was free government money, so many people trusted that same government to handle the investment. It looks like even those dc will receive in the region of £1000, so hardly a kick in the teeth!

Taillighttoobright · 18/10/2022 17:53

Ah, now, I put one DDs into a high risk thingy, and the other into a low risk thingy. The high risk thingy paid off until I got nervous and converted it into an ISA. Only got £6k in it now - wish I’d kept my nerve. The low risk thingy was only worth about £4K when I ISA’d it.
it’s not life-changing amounts, but my DDs now see the accounts as their “house fund” (ie we’ll pay in a little each month and when they start working they can add themselves, until they have enough for a deposit).
wish we’d paid in a lot, LOT more.

FrankTheThunderbird · 18/10/2022 18:42

I'm actually quite upset by the "omg... why didn't people do anything... I'm a single mum so had to be sensible... blahblah"
Good for you for being a better mum than the rest of us ffs.

I'm also a single mum (although I wasn't when dc were born)
When we got the initial money to invest there wasn't a load of information on where to put it or how to invest it. There was lots of "put it here and we'll give you a Mothercare voucher" not nothing to explain the pros/ cons of different places.

We ended up just picking accounts. I'm fairly sure we qualified for the extra money so invested £500 in total. DS1 got just over £500 this summer. So didn't really make any extra, but it's £500 he wouldn't have had otherwise. Yes a few £k would have been lovely but I'm not complaining.

threatmatrix · 18/10/2022 19:06

PinotPony · 18/10/2022 15:23

I'm surprised at the number of people who didn't look into the options for investment at the time, even if they didn't have the funds to top it up. It was all explained in quite simple terms and you didn't have to be a stock broker to understand it.

Both my boys were lucky enough to get the CTF - born 2005 and 2009. We put them into a S&S CTF with Legal and General, since transferred to OneFamily. Topped up each month by £50 from us and grandparents.

DS1's CTF moved to more stable cash investments a few years ago and is worth about £15,000. He's planning on using it for a gap year and uni. DS2's is worth about £9,000.

I’m 100% in agreement with you. Free money to make more money and they did nothing. Beggars belief.

celestialsphere · 18/10/2022 19:09

I’m 100% in agreement with you. Free money to make more money and they did nothing. Beggars belief.

I think some people just disagreed with the whole thing so didn't take the money. It got invested anyway by the government, I think.

celestialsphere · 18/10/2022 19:11

Taillighttoobright · 18/10/2022 17:53

Ah, now, I put one DDs into a high risk thingy, and the other into a low risk thingy. The high risk thingy paid off until I got nervous and converted it into an ISA. Only got £6k in it now - wish I’d kept my nerve. The low risk thingy was only worth about £4K when I ISA’d it.
it’s not life-changing amounts, but my DDs now see the accounts as their “house fund” (ie we’ll pay in a little each month and when they start working they can add themselves, until they have enough for a deposit).
wish we’d paid in a lot, LOT more.

That's a good amount. Did you add anything or is that an increase from £250?

WhosafraidofVirginiaWoolf · 18/10/2022 20:31

This is turning into quite a nasty, judgmental thread.

Shimy · 18/10/2022 21:02

Only on MN can a simple query about what people did with their CTF turn into a nasty judgemental thread. It could've been such an interesting educative thread that everyone could learn from. You have no idea what's been going on in other peoples lives over the last 18yrs. If they didn't invest it and lost out perhaps they can learn from those who did, now. But no! let's ridicule them and call them irresponsible idiots and shut the thread down. Hope you all feel better.

WhosafraidofVirginiaWoolf · 18/10/2022 21:05

Shimy · 18/10/2022 21:02

Only on MN can a simple query about what people did with their CTF turn into a nasty judgemental thread. It could've been such an interesting educative thread that everyone could learn from. You have no idea what's been going on in other peoples lives over the last 18yrs. If they didn't invest it and lost out perhaps they can learn from those who did, now. But no! let's ridicule them and call them irresponsible idiots and shut the thread down. Hope you all feel better.

100% Agree.

Forgottenwhatsleepis · 19/10/2022 06:55

My eldest put his (£1200) straight into a 2 year ISA, to go towards a car.
My 2nd wasted his on crap 🙄.
My 3rd is 18 next year, so he'll probably do the same as the first.

TeenDivided · 19/10/2022 07:24

All the people who are saying their kids have ended up with anything significantly more than £1200 must surely have added money (that they may well have invested for their children anyway).

It certainly isn't surprising that people unused to saving/investing would have kept money in its default location or in a low risk place. Usually the more you have the more you can afford to risk.

There are a fair number of posters saying their teens wasted their CTF money. I'm sure it wasn't the government's aim to give kids pots of money to just blow at 18 (which is why it was such a shame they set the scheme up to mandate handing over control at that age).

containsnuts · 19/10/2022 10:41

@TeenDivided

And this was the problem with the scheme. Those with plenty money to invest didn't need the £250, and for those who couldn't afford to add anything £250 really wasn't enough.

XelaM · 19/10/2022 11:49

We had our £250 with Bounty Mutual Trust and now I understand Foresters took over a lot of the trust funds, including Bounty. It's worth calling Foresters and asking them if your child's fund is there.

My daughter is 12 and hers is currently worth around £11,500 and my parents only added a bit of funds when she was much younger. I haven't been paying anything in monthly, but now I think I should start.