September 2024’s savings round-up & news
The latest news to help you get the most from your savings account.
Here’s my monthly update sharing changes at leading UK savings accounts, as well as some of the articles you might have missed on the site.
September’s savings update video
September’s savings news
More cuts to rates for new and existing savers
Over the last month, more and more providers have reduced the rates on their savings accounts. There are now just a handful that will pay 5% or more. Among the changes at the top of easy access accounts are:
- Santander Edge Saver from 7% to 6%
- Trading 212 from 5.2% to 5%
- Cahoot from 5.2% to 5%
- Ulster Bank from 5.2% to 4.75% (from 14 October 2024)
Even with these cuts, those accounts are still decent. But there are many more who have also reduced rates and are offering less.
And there could be another base rate cut later this month, which could see this continue.
If you haven’t already, do check what you’re getting, and compare the rates to what is available elsewhere. If you don’t need access to the cash in the short term it could be worth looking at fixed rate bonds and regular savers.
For existing customers you might have a little longer with higher rates as they tend to give notice before reducing what you earn.
Time to ditch Barclays Rainy Day Saver
If you have a Barclays Rainy Day Saver, you’ll hopefully have been cancelling out the Blue Rewards £5 fee each month via the reward on two direct debits.
Sadly, that bonus has ended from September, so you’ll now be paying the full fee. Though you do also get free Apple TV+, there are plenty of ways to get that for free. The same goes for the temporary 1% cashback on spending.
So you won’t ever actually be getting that 5.12% on up to £5,000. Here’s what it would look like based on incremental amounts saved:
It’s worth noting though that Premier account holders won’t be charged anything to access the Rainy Day Saver, so this just applies to those with Blue Rewards.
| Amount saved | Annual Interest | Interest after £60 fee | Effective interest rate |
| £500.00 | £25.60 | -£34.40 | -6.88% |
| £1,000.00 | £51.20 | -£8.80 | -0.88% |
| £1,500.00 | £76.80 | £16.80 | 1.12% |
| £2,000.00 | £102.40 | £42.40 | 2.12% |
| £2,500.00 | £128.00 | £68.00 | 2.72% |
| £3,000.00 | £153.60 | £93.60 | 3.12% |
| £3,500.00 | £179.20 | £119.20 | 3.41% |
| £4,000.00 | £204.80 | £144.80 | 3.62% |
| £4,500.00 | £230.40 | £170.40 | 3.79% |
| £5,000.00 | £250.00 | £190.00 | 3.80% |
Even if you have the full £5,000 saved (and the interest here won’t compound), the best ‘real’ rate you can expect is 3.8%. While that can be beaten you’ll be better off moving your money elsewhere.
Chip overhauls easy access accounts
If you currently save with Chip’s popular Instant Access account, you’ll probably want to rethink things. The account currently tracks the Bank of England base rate by minus 0.51%. From 12 September it’ll change to 1.06% below the gross rate. That would put the AER at 4.01% right now.
To balance out this cut will be a new Chip Easy Access account on 6 September. This will pay a decent 4.84%, though that will include a one year boost of 0.77%. It’s not clear if existing Chip customers will be entitled to the bonus or not, though it appears right now they will.
This new account though isn’t a like for like change. Despite the name it’s really a limited access account as you can only withdraw from it three times a year without penalty. If you take out further cash it’ll drop to 2.97% without the bonus / 3.84% with the bonus.
Coventry Building Society launches new regular saver
There’s a new 6.25% (variable) paying account from Coventry called a Sunny Day Saver. You can add between £1 and £150 each month for 12 months. It’s also easy access, so you can take cash out if you need to, though you can’t replace it each month. So far, pretty standard, but with a decent enough rate.
Where it’s different is the addition of a prize draw. There will be 11 draws over the year, starting in mid-October. There are 20 prizes each month:
- £500 (one winner)
- £200 (five winners)
- £50 (14 winners)
Once you open the account you’ll automatically be entered for each draw. Prizes are added to your regular saver, but won’t impact the up to £150 you can add each month.
NS&I 6.2% fixes to mature
The best rate in the last 12 months was probably the one year fix from NS&I paying 6.2% last September. Well anyone with this will soon see the account mature.
You’ll have a few options, and we’ve detailed the best one year fixes below, but probably the best option is to commit to another year with NS&I as they’re offering 5.15% to those who renew. Sadly you can’t add any further cash to these accounts.
Santander cuts rate on Edge Up savings
If you have the Edge Up current account you can earn 3.5% on in-account balances up to £25,000. Well from 31 October this drops to 3%.
Regardless, I don’t think this is a good place for your cash as you can earn more elsewhere, while get the same cashback benefits for less with the Santander Edge current account.
Tax code warning
This is for any of you you getting ahead of admin and filled in a self assessment form for 2023/24 in regards to paying tax on interest that year.
I filled in my form, with the end result being the tax relief on extra pension contributions being larger than what I owed for interest beyond my personal savings allowance.
I requested the owed tax be paid to my current account and thought that would be it. But a few days later I got an email from HMRC saying my tax code had changed. It was lucky I checked.
Rather than them owe me money, they had altered my tax free allowance to reclaim what I owed on the interest! I called up HMRC (only 20 minutes on hold, which was a nice surprise) and it was sorted within seconds.
Apparently it’s common for the systems to just pull some of the data and they need to manually fix it with a couple of clicks. However, if I hadn’t called up this wouldn’t have been noticed until January.
So if you are or have filled in the form to account for your savings interest (it’s only for those already do this or who earn more than £10,000 in a year), make sure you don’t get caught out.
Virgin pulls 10% regular saver
Sadly Virgin’s 10% regular saver lasted less than a month, and was pulled at the end of August for new customers. I doubt we’ll see anything like this again, but you never know.
I’d certainly be looking at the fixed rate regular savers from First Direct and Club Lloyds sooner rather than later. Though I don’t expect them to be withdrawn, the rate could easily be cut at anytime.
Premium Bond winnings poll
For a bit of fun I asked our YouTube community how much they won on Premium Bonds this month. So far there have been 550 votes:
- More than £1,000 – 5%
- £275 to £1,000 – 5%
- £75 to £250 – 15%
- £50 or less – 8%
- Nothing – 67%
I’m not surprised that two thirds have won nothing this month, though 5% getting more than a grand seems pretty decent. You can see the full Premium Bond odds in our guide.
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September’s savings offers
Raisin: £100 welcome offer
Until midday on 30 September 2024, Raisin is offering a £100 welcome bonus if you open a savings account and fund it with at least £10,000 by 15 October. You’ll need the code OFFER100 for this.
This applies to easy access accounts and notice accounts, as long as you keep the money in the account for at least 6 months; and fixed rate accounts with a term of 6 months or over.
If you keep the money saved for just six months it’s the equivalent of an extra 2% on £10,000. The best option right now is 5%, meaning you’d get £250 interest plus £100 bonus. That £350 is the equivalent of 7% AER back.
For £10,000 in a 12 month fix, this is effectively 1% added to the account rate. The best option on Raisin right now is a 5.05% account, so you’ll get £505 plus £100, which is £605, or 6.05%
The more money deposited and longer you save will reduce this effective rate.
Knowing this will help you compare Raisin accounts to other rates (you can see them all here).
Within 14 days of meeting the eligibility criteria (so 6 and a half months from now), you’ll get the bonus.
To get the offer:
- Click on the below link, which will add the promo code OFFER100
- Sign up for a new Raisin UK Account
- Apply for and open a savings account
- Put at least £10,000 into your new savings account by midday on 15 October 2024.
If you need to access the money within 6 months, you won’t get the bonus.
Tembo Lifetime ISA: up to £300 welcome offer
You can get up to £300 when you transfer your Lifetime ISA to Tembo. The amount you get depends on how much you transfer:
| Amount transferred | Cash bonus | Effective rate |
| Less than £5,000 | £0 | 4.3% |
| £5,000 – £9,999 | £30 | 5% |
| £10,000 – £14,999 | £75 | 5.05% |
| £15,000 – £19,999 | £100 | 4.97% |
| £20,000 – £24,999 | £125 | 4.93% |
| £25,000 – £29,999 | £150 | 4.9% |
| £30,000 – £34,999 | £175 | 4.88% |
| £35,000 – £39,999 | £200 | 4.87% |
| £40,000 – £45,999 | £225 | 4.86% |
| £45,000 – £49,999 | £250 | 4.86% |
| £50,000 | £300 | 4.9% |
The LISA is currently paying 4.3% and you get a 25% top-up from the government when you pay into it.
To get the welcome cash, you need to transfer your Lifetime ISA to Tembo by 30 September 2024 and you’ll get the bonus six months later.
Top savings accounts for September 2024
Remember, these are the accounts at the top of the tables. We’ve more options in our best savings accounts page, which is updated every day by the team.
Current account linked saver picks as of 4/9/24
- Santander Edge Saver (6% AER variable, includes 1.5% bonus for 12 months): min £0 / max £4,000
Easy & limited access picks as of 4/9/24
- Cahoot Sunny Day Saver (5% AER variable for 12 months): min £1 / max £3,000 (part of Santander)
- Oxbury Bank (4.87% AER variable): min £25,000 / max £500,000
- Cahoot (4.85% variable): min £1 / max £2m
- GB Bank via Raisin (4.85% AER variable): min £1,000 / max £85,000N
- Monument Bank (4.81% AER variable): min £25,000 / max £2m
Easy access from investment accounts pick as of 4/9/24
Notice accounts picks as of 4/9/24
- 30 days notice Investec via Raisin (5.02% AER variable) 32-day notice: min £1,000 / max £85,000
- 2 month notice Vanquis Bank (5.05% AER variable): 120-day notice: min £1,000 / max £250,000
- 3 months notice Investec Bank (5.25% AER variable): 90-day notice: min £5,000 / max £250,000
- 4 months notice Vanquis Bank (4.94% AER variable): 120-day notice: min £1,000 / max £250,000
- 6 months notice Ecology Building Society (5% AER variable): 180 days notice: min £1,000 / max £500,000
Fixed savings accounts picks as of 4/9/24
Here are the leading options right now. Make sure you keep an eye on my best buy list for all the options.
- 3 months UMTB via Flagstone (5.12% AER fixed): min £10,000 / max £1m
- 6 months UMTB via Flagstone (5.2% AER fixed): min £10,000 / max £1m
- 6 months Gatehouse Bank via Raisin (5% expected profit rate fixed): min £1,000 / max £85,000
- 9 months Atom (4.9% AER fixed): min £50 / max £100,000
- 12 months UMTB via Raisin (5.05% AER fixed): min £1,000 / max £85,000
- 18 months Hampshire Trust Bank (4.78% AER fixed): min £1 / max £250,000
- 2-year Ziraat via Raisin (4.79% AER fixed): min £1,000 / max £85,000
- 3 year fix Cynergy Bank (4.55% AER variable): min £1,000 / max £1m
- 4 year fix Cynergy Bank (4.4% AER variable): min £1,000 / max £1m
- 5 year fix Cynergy Bank (4.35% AER variable): min £1,000 / max £1m
Regular Saver accounts picks as of 4/9/24
We’ve got a dedicated Regular Saver best buy article, so you can see further details and more rates there.
- Principality Building Society 6-month regular saver (8% AER fixed): min £0 / max £200 a month
- Progressive Building Society Online Regular Rainy Day Saver (7% AER variable): min £20 / max £300 per month
- First Direct Regular Saver (7% AER fixed): min £25 / max £300 a month
- requires a First Direct current account – full review
- Co-operative Bank Regular Saver (7% variable): min £1 / max £250 a month
- Requires a Co-op Bank current account
- Nationwide Flex Regular Saver (6.5% AER variable): min £1 / max £200 per month
- max 3 withdrawals per year, after which your rate drops to 2.15%.
- Requires Nationwide current account – full review
- Club Lloyds Monthly Saver (6.25% AER fixed): min £25 / max £400 a month
ISA picks as of 4/9/24
You can keep an eye on the tables (we update them every day) in our best Cash ISA accounts article.