advice on bank interest rates

[Josie1968]

Hello

I just wondered if anyone could give me some advice as to where the best place to keep my savings is please? My current account earns very little interest, so was hoping to put it somewhere else. Or should we invest it? Not sure what to do,

Thank you. :)

There isn't much interest out there.
The best way to get interest on money these days seems to be through opening what the banks advertise as current accounts and moving money from one to another as they have to have £1k or £1.5k coming in each month.

My 'go to' place for advice is Money Supermarket

You can look to see if you prefer to be 'on it' all the time and moving things around all the time, or if you can lock the money away, or if you want to save something monthly, or if you want to be able to access it, etc etc.

BackforGood thank you for your advice, I will have a look at Money Supermarket :)

Don't invest until you have already put away a good few months in living costs/savings in instant access accounts as for investments, you need to be able to leave it for a few years at least and not have to take the money out when the stock market is low (like now, it's dropped massively in the last few weeks due to Corona fears).

If you have a regular amount you can put away, you can get up to 2.75% in a regular savings current account but you usually need to have the right current account to qualify.

The best you can get now is about 1.3% for instant access or 2% for fixed term savings. I usually look at www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/ for information, but as they own Money Supermarket (or the other way round) it's probably all the same info.

There's also premium bonds, where the average payout is around 1.3% but you could get less, so you're effectively gambling your interest on the chance of winning a bigger prize, but with rates being so low, you might decide it's worth doing that.

If you have a lot of money to save (more than about £70-80k), make sure you understand the bank protection rules in case a bank goes bust and also tax on savings. Or if you're on a low income, look at Help to Save accounts where the government will top your savings up.

If you are employed, pay into your company pension, because if for example you pay in 5 percent. Your company should also add the same amount for FREE !

Yes, free money !

Check the percentages with your employer

regular savings only pay on small amounts. No account available anywhere in the UK pays over real inflation (over 3% - the basket is fiddled), and most don't even reach the official figure.

this site is Daily Mail affiliated but does give a comprehensive list of what is available which is kept up to date. Read and weep...

www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/article-1583859/Best-savings-rates-General-savings-Internet-branch.html

I received a grand total of £16 interest from a year regular savings account that matured
Not a lot, but still better than zero !

However, the cash backs on my current accounts are doing better !