Get £5 every month with Halifax Rewards Current Account

Halifax has introduced a new current account, Rewards Current Account that give you £5 net per month if you fund the account £1,000 per month. That's a good deal based on article from easier.com

"A customer earning 0.1% credit interest would need to maintain a balance of £75,000 throughout the month to earn the equivalent amount of net interest."

Bank of England drop interest rate to 2%

Today Bank of England has announced a drop in its interest rate from 3% to 2%, lowest since 1951. Continue read here.

UK Bank Interest rate now 3%

This is a big news! Good for mortgage owner and bad for saver.

Alliance Leicester 12% Regular Saving

Another good saving rate I found out today. A massive 12% AER on a Alliance Leicester premiere regular saving account. When invest the maximum of £250 per month, a total of £3,000 will be paid into your account during the 12 month term and no withdrawals were made. At 12.00% interest, you would earn approximately £195 gross.

Halifax 7% Web Saver

Today I noticed Halifax has introduced Fixed Rate Web Saver at 7% for 6 months deposit. This is the best short term deposit deal for the moment.

How troubled Iceland banks affected UK

I'm surprised to learn a lot of county desided to bank in with Iceland bank instead of UK, I can understand partially due to the fact that interest is higher. But it is troubling UK government as Iceland banks have now been nationalize, hence what will happen to the large amount of UK deposit? Individual saver is guarantee to a certain limit, but council deposit is not. In months to come, I'm sure the government will feel the burden, and we might hear another rescue plan...

On 8/10/08 publication report, Bank of England has a ready reserve of £50billion, and I suppose it has deducted the £50b bailout amount on UK Banks. How much more bailout can the government afford in future?

ING Direct has acquired the savings customers of Kaupthing Edge UK

KaupthingEdge is the largest Iceland bank, with £50k deposit guarantee by UK has got their customer saving deposit acquired by ING Direct. KaupthingEdge offered attactive interest as they don't have any branch in UK. I'd withdrawed my saving from this bank as I rather put my money in a UK bank as a cautious move.


The government's decision to take control of Kaupthing, the country's leading bank, which has assets and debts across the continent, means that the Financial Services Authority now has control of all three of the country's major banks. The other two, Landsbanki and Glitnir, are in receivership. - AP

For futher reading, Iceland suspends stock trading, creates new bank

Icesave halt deposit and withdrawal

Icesave, was once the recommended top ISA bank by Moneysavingexpert.com is now facing financial problem. I was considering to open an account with Icesave half year ago. Lucky me.

It has been another tough day for banks elsewhere in Europe, with the government of Iceland taking control of the country's second-biggest bank, Landsbanki. Landsbanki owns the internet bank Icesave, which has stopped allowing customers to withdraw money. Icesave is thought to have 350,000 customers in the UK and Netherlands. If Landsbanki were to fail, savers would be entitled to their first £16,000 from Icelandic authorities and then up to another £34,000 from the UK Financial Services Compensation Scheme. - BBC

Halifax 10% Regular Saver

Amid the interest rate cut for saving account from 5.25% to 5%, Halifax announced a massive 10% regular saver rate valid for 1 year. This is the best deal I ever seen since 1998.

UK InterBank fund transfer done in 2 hours

Just discovered today, transfer £ from HSBC to any UK bank only take 2 hours instead of 3 working days. That's a good news. :)

First Direct 7% ISA deal

I just came across FirstDirect and it is offering 7% tax free Regular Saver ISA. The catch is you can't use the £3600 allowance at once, but can only break it to £300 per month.

£10 free by signing up Monilink for Mobile Banking

Monilink is a mobile service from famous ATM company that allows you to manage your bank account like viewing statement, transfer money with most UK banks.

I just noticed Monilink is giving £10 credit to your bank account when you sign up 1 free account with them.

But there is a small print, it seems today is the last day for registration. Since I won't be able to get my passcode on time as it will be sent to home address, I might not get £10. I extracted the small print from their term & condition.

If a customer registers more than one account the £10 payment will be made to the first account which is registered for MONILINK™ Mobile Banking provided the registration meets the eligibility criteria. Payment will be made within 35 days of the first transaction, provided that this occurs between 1st October 2007 and 31st January 2008 and that MONILINK™ Mobile Banking has not been cancelled in the meantime.

HSBC banking experience

HSBC is my prefer bank since I'm in Malaysia as they provide very good service. I'd a credit card with HSBC UK for a few months now, and I wanted to cancel it today. To try my luck without going to the till or talk over the phone, I sent them a secure message to cancel it. The next thing I know was, they cancelled it straightaway for me with no question ask. I'm amazed by their quality of service! They earned my thumb up for best internet banking.

6.41% AER saving rate from ICICI bank

I just open 1 account with ICICI. OK, besides Mini ISA/Max ISA that is tax free, elsewhere all saving is taxable and you won't be able to get the publish rate. I found ICICI Bank HiSave Saving Account is offering 1 of the best interest rate with 6.41 Annualized Equivalent Rate (AER) (6.23% Gross), althought after tax will be around 5.14%. From 1st of January 2008, ICICI AER rate is guaranteed to be 0.30% above Bank of England base rate till 31st of December 2011 :)


The good thing is there is no maximum cap on how much this rate limits to. For Alliance & Leicester, they are offering quite a high rate, but only for the initial £2.5k, exceed that you will get a crappy rate like 0.1%. In addition, Premier Current Account below required £10 per month.

Oh, if you have more money to put in you can opt for the HiSave Term Deposits, either 6 months or 1 year for better rate.