Barclays customers who applied for the Tax Haven Cash ISA have received apologies from the bank following significant delays before their accounts were opened.
An apology is all they are going to receive though it appears as Barclays has stated it will not pay the interest that investors would have accrued if the accounts had been opened on time. It seems that a particularly heavy demand for the ISA created a number of administration difficulties for Barclays leading to delays in accepting applications and opening the accounts.
Assuming the person applying for the Barclays ISA had invested the maximum allowed of GBP3,600, they would have lost around GBP9 in interest so far. This in one way is not a vast amount of money, but the underlying principle is of much greater importance. Multiplied by the number of people taking out this particular Tax Haven Cash ISA it also becomes a much larger sum.
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The personal finance arm of Saga Insurance has just brought out a new interest rate guarantee for their online savings account.
The online savings account is now guaranteed to offer an interest rate that will always be with a quarter of a percent of the top 5 variable rate accounts average. Saga Insurance personal finance division has calculated that the average rate as it stands is 6.25 percent gross, working out to 6.43 percent AER.
New customers can sign up to the new savings account online at the Saga Insurance website, whilst existing online savings account customers will see their interest rates changed automatically. The account only needs a deposit of one pound to open and as such offers an extremely attractive rate.
A new international bond has been introduced by the Alliance and Leicester which is a limited edition fixed interest rate for one year.
Investors can sign up for the bond from now and, with a minimum investment requirement of GBP50,000, enjoy an interest rate of 6.65 percent gross if taking the interest payment at the end of the year or 6.45 percent should interest be paid monthly. The Alliance and Leicester fixed rate bond is available to both new and existing customers as long as funding does not come from money already held by Alliance and Leicester.
An Alliance and Leicester spokesman, when discussing the new bond at its launch said that they always endeavoured to offer the best interest rate they could and this particular bond should be very popular in what is a highly competitive market.
