Confused about child saving options

[Paris2019]

I'm a FTM of a 10 week old and want to start up a savings account for him but despite lots of research I'm confused re the best option. DH and I want to put £100 a month away, plus poss the occasional extra bit here and there. Grandparents will also want to save for him... probably around £1000 per year in total. Primarily I want the money to be locked away til he's 18 and I don't intend to make withdrawals.

Am I best with a junior isa or child savings account? I'm confused about the £100 interest limit with the latter but presumably I wouldn't reach this threshold??

Also is it best for Grandparents to set up a separate account or contribute to the same one??

No idea on that one sorry but that would be roughly £40k for an 18 year old which is very, very generous.

Whilst you're doing your research on which product to invest in, it might be worth asking in chat or having a look through the archive at how other 18 year olds have handled a lump sum like this.

I have a children's regular saver for my child which I pay into monthly which has a fixed higher interest rate, then at the end of the year all that money transfers into a bog standard children's saving account. I'm sure I'm not getting the most interest I could but it's better than nothing. There's a £200/month limit on the regular saver so Grandparents put money into the standard saving account. I can't remember why I didn't choose an ISA now, possibly the interest rates were lower.

We are fortunate that our DS grandparents set up a junior ISA for him and save a bit each month (they did this without consulting us though). However, we decided not to put our savings for DS into this one and set up our own savings account in our name so our child does not have access to a large sum of money at 18.

As far as I know the difference in the two accounts is that the child savings account will be accessible whenever whereas the ISA not until 18.

I’d rather possibly set up a child savings account to allow you LO to save their own money e.g. presents, whereas the ISA for longer term savings.

We've gone for a junior ISA and grandparents contribute to it too think it's because can get better interest than a savings account. I was given a lump of money at 18 and just wasted it. It taught me never to be so stupid again and I'm really tight with money now, my cleverer brother and sister used theirs very wisely. I think if you have spare money now it's useful putting it in as who knows what will happen down the line and the more you can put away when they are young the more it can grow (hopefully).

I think the junior ISA is the best option with the large caveat they would get access at 18.

We’re keeping savings in our name for this reason - I’d ideally want to give it them when they are looking to buy a house in mid-twenties as a deposit.

My son just turned 18 has had his child trust fund made available to him, it’s just over £9K, he’s agreed to put £7K into premium bonds he will have access to the rest of the money to hopefully travel once covid restrictions allow and have a bit of fun. His older brother had his 5 year’s ago and has nothing left but he did travel to New Zealand and a couple of other countries, I wish he’d have saved some.

We’ve spread our bets a bit and invested in Junior ISA (access at 18), savings account (access controlled by us), pension. Contributions are from grandparents and us. We didn’t want everything going to them at 18, and happened to read an article about starting pension saving early - the potential numbers are fantastic when you start as a baby. Obviously this is locked away until they are pensionable age but we are saving £50/month into that and it’s already building up nicely. Not sure they will appreciate that one until they are much older but we are very comfortable with that.