How much is your gov Child Trust Fund?

[Newtonianmechanics]

My daughter is in y11. 15 turning 16.
I haven't invested much in her trust fund as I was unsure her having loads of money at 18 would be useful.

It is worth about 5k now. My dd says her boyfriends is worth £600.

She says some of her mates families have no idea about it.

Guess my Aibu is can't believe some families don't know where there £250 is?

I need to set something up for my DS which bank do you do the ISA through if you don't mind me asking.

I am trying to decide who to go through in regards to the best rates now.
Thankyou.

From (VERY) hazy memory, we had a choice as to where the money went - we shoved it in Building Society account and then added bits where we could. The money had to stay as a CTF, but we could decide where it was put.

@Dacadactyl
I've just requested the details now from CTF. They get back to you within 3 weeks so will know more then. In the meantime I can have a look at the junior ISA rates and then make a decision what to do.
Thank you.

Dd 18 was 32,000
Now in an find in her name to pay for uni
We paid in monthly for the last 8 years or so

Fund !

Eldest is 14, theirs has £23k. Youngest is 11 and has £12k.
This was through saving between £50-£100 each month since they were born. Plan is to have enough to cover university fees so that they can choose to do that if they want to.

Guess my Aibu is can't believe some families don't know where there £250 is?

I'm not at all interested in it. They send a letter every now and then so somewhere o do have details but no I done know where is is offhand.

Why can't you believe that?

I just googled this and it appears to have stopped now

Everyone born between certain years got given 250 quid from the government. Then at 1 year old, if on a low income, the government gave an extra 250 (we received 2 payments) If I remember rightly, a 3rd £250 payment from the government was made when the child was 7 if you were on a low income (we didn't receive this one)

You could choose where to invest it...bank, building society or stocks and shares.

Then you could add to it monthly if affordable for you, up to a maximum of x amount (can't remember what it was cos we couldn't afford anywhere near the max!)

The one we chose it started as a stocks and shares thing and then when DD was a teenager you had the option of removing it from being linked to stock market and put it in cash.

There was a lot of choice and the different amounts are because some people could afford to save huge amounts and others added nothing.

If you did nothing to open an account for your child, the government put it away on tour child's behalf, but where, I don't know.

I'm really confused. I chased my dc ctf as lost track of it many years ago and the company its with said it has £94 in it. Didn't everyone get 250?

When I opened my daughter's (almost 16) one it was originally with a (well known) Building Society and we could put cash into it by going into the branch.
I think we only ever added about £50 if that. You didn't get a passbook - just a number and you just had to tell them the number to put cash in. Literally just write the number on a piece of paper and say "this account please".
It was weird - no paper copies to show what had been added to the account or anything.
The Building Society then stopped doing CTFs and her account was transferred to an online one and then later on to a different provider.
It didn't really give us a choice to opt out and as you can't close the account we were stuck with the online one.
We didn't do online banking then so we couldn't figure out how we were meant to add to it. We never had much spare money to add anyway.
It basically was abandoned and forgotten about.
Bit crap really - but if it had been a passbook type account we might have remembered about it more.

That's an amazing return, what did you have it nvested in?

Have they taken huge management fees? Or if invested on stock market, potentially the value has fallen considerably. How old is your child? Over 18 years I wouldn't expect it to only be worth 94 quid if S&S tbh, but then I'm not particularly up on it either.

14yo has 5k, I think it would be about £600-800 if we hadn't added to it. I converted it to a JISA a while ago and also started JISAs for our younger children who didn't get a CTF. They may need it for uni costs as they will probably only get the minimum loan and we'll have two there at the same time for at least 1 year.

DS is 14 and has £9500 in a CTF. DD is 11 and has £8300 in a JISA. I have a standing order set up but the amounts paid in each month have varied over the years.

I'm stopping the contributions once they each hit £10k and will start paying into a LISA for each DC. I'm not sure how I'll feel if either/both of them blow £10k when they hit 18! There was a lot of scrimping and working multiple jobs on my part when they were younger.

Im going to call them next week and ask. They're 13. We didn't add much as at the time were really struggling. We started saving in a separate account later on, but just shocked it was worth less than what was put in 13 years ago!

Nothing because my beautiful, wonderful daughter was in the ‘care’ system at the time and not one of her social workers or foster carers set it up for her!

There will be a whole host of ‘cared’ for children in her position.

Is this a thing for children born recently?

We added to ours too, and now it’s a healthy university fund.

Be aware that on maturity the funds go directly to the young person.

My understanding is HMRC would have set one up for anyone whose parents didn't invest for them.

You can find out what's happened here https://www.gov.uk/child-trust-funds/find-a-child-trust-fund

If, for some reason, she really hasn't got a fund, I'd complain to Children's Services, because that is a shambles.

@Seashor if one wasn't set up after a year the government put the money into an account for you. Your daughter should have the money somewhere.

Nothing for DC born recently.

Labour brought in CTF around the year 2000, Tories abolished them as soon as they got in the first time, so think they ended it for DC born after late 2010/early 2011.

I can believe it. It is really sad though.

I mean my life has changed so much feom what I thought it would be. My poor dd has poor mental health ASD and ADHD I don't think her having access to 5k at 18 will be beneficial but thats a whole other thread.

I am not smug. I am broke if anything.

This is where I am at.