Now we have our housing equity it needs a good home

We have decided to opt for instant access, and we're going to open 5 accounts, just to spread te risk a little.

We need 2 online accounts, 1 telephone account an 2 'walk into the branch accounts'.

Help seriously needed here folks, links etc as well if possible.

Thanks in advance

The Tickles

Abbey e-saver is not bad instant access and good rate

Cheers, I just need to 'over the counter' accounts, but all the ones I've looked at have shite rates, I just want somewhere to bang my fistd if things go really wrong!

Any tips guys and girls?

Hope this helps: http://www.fool.co.uk/savings/savings.htm

Keep different accounts at different banks as well with deposits no more than £30 K, if we had a banking crises god forbid the govererment insures the 1st £30 k I think, but check that, anything over can be lost no comeback. You think thats OTT, try asking the Argentinias, they didn't see it coming either.

Online: Cahoot & Egg or Smile.

Don't forget to make the most of tax free national savings (including premium bonds) first off. As risk free as you can get.

Have a look at www.moneyfacts.co.uk

It's a bit clunky but you can compare lots of accounts.

PS What happened about that house you had your eye on where the owners had moved out and you didn't trust the EA to pass your offer on? Did you offer in the end?

Nope, just decided to sit tight.

Another prop that we viewed at 330K last year, just relisted at 310K, so the early falls are coming, although I guess it'll be later this year when the real fun begins

Till then it'll be 5%+ all round

ING.co.uk

Only 5%, not that great.

If your spreading the risk (just in case!) and want to have any chance of being covered by the FSA, then also make sure the bank you place your hard earned dosh in is not in the same group as your other ones.

I.e HBOS who I believe own halifax, rbs etc. Only put 30k in the group and not 30k in each.

Only found this out after some research, yes apparently it's the parent or the "legal entity" that is reponsible and the individual high street trading names mean nothing if it all hits the proverbial fan.

Thanks for that, I suspected as much, anyone know if theres a list of 'who owns who', in the banking world?

Just going to open a telephone account from the 'AA' 5.26% for the first year, run by Birmingham midsires, therefore the Halifax, which by the loooks of it owned by HBOS

Thanks for the heads up

No No No! Royal Bank of Scotland and 'Bank of Scotland' are not the same thing. HBOS stands for 'Halifax Bank of Scotland' which was formed from a merger between (you guessed it) the Halifax and Bank of Scotland.

RBS is not part of the same group.

For info on compensation limits under the "FSA" (really FSCS or Financial Services Compensation Scheme) see www.fscs.org.uk

From their site:

Deposits: £31,700 per person (100% of £2,000 and 90% of the next £33,000).
The Scheme is triggered when an authorised deposit taker, (such as a bank, building society or credit union) is unable, or likely to be unable, to repay its depositors. Joint account holders are each entitled to claim compensation to up to £31,700. The limit applies to the total amount a person has deposited with a firm, not each account held.

I am an Internet Security Architect. I have worked for a variety of global blue chips including global investment banks.

Personally, as tempting as the online rates currently are, I would not put my savings into an online account at the current time.

Heh, some of my bank accounts are belgian, the bank security over there is a lot tighter; none of that mother's maiden name rubbish.
One bank uses a challenge-response scheme with a little 'pocket calculator' that's uniquely coded to your account. Another bank uses public-private key certificates which need to be on your machine, in addition to passwords.

Any idea what the legal protection/bank policies are, here in the UK?

I think one of the BIG mistakes people in the UK make with regard to online accounts is that they assume that the safeguards in place are identical to those that you have with an account at a branch office.

In certain key areas they are not and you often agree to limited safeguards via the terms and conditions which, invariably, the majority of people do not read or, if they do, do not fully understand.

With many online accounts the terms and conditions push the onus for security of an account away from the bank and on to the customer. When you add to that the soemtimes quite appalling IT standards I have seen or heard of in some financial organisations then... best of luck...

I have a few K with First Direct at 5.2 with their e-saver acount. Surely, and I agree that IT is poor in places, that if some of their customers were skimmed then the bank would compenstate as the bad publicty would be horrendous for them.

I have no idea what their policy would be BUT I do know that the T&C of some puts the onus on you to such an extent that I think it would just make things more difficult for you to get your money back. I think, with the huge increase in online banking, that banks are going to be see more instances of customers losing money and, inevitably, they won't be able to take the hit for them all so they won't cover them all up.

My major concern would be in someone completely blitzing your account 'technically' whereas it would be nigh impossible for you to actually prove you had X amount in there. I'll give you an example:

I am THINKING about opening an ONLINE ISA with one provider who is offering a very good rate BUT I am treating the 3K as a type of bet. I can 'afford' to lose it. On the other hand I would NEVER put my mortgage deposit savings into an online account as if it 'disappeared' that would be the end of my hopes of ever buying a house.

I know of cases where financial institutions did lose records of not just how much money their customers had/owed but who in fact their customers actually were. Can you imagine trying to access your cash and the bank saying: "Hang on mate, we have no record of you ever having an account with us!". Think it won't happen? Think it doesn't happen?

This is usually a result of the 'if you pay peanuts you get monkeys' attitude to hiring and paying for IT staff but, have no doubt, the boys and girls out there who are trying to hack in sure aren't monkeys. It is bad enough when there are IT gurus trying to hack your online savings but even worse when poor practice on the inside is doing as much damage.

[quote=The Masked Tulip,Mar 7 2005, 10:01 PM]
I have no idea what their policy would be BUT I do know that the T&C of some puts the onus on you to such an extent that I think it would just make things more difficult for you to get your money back. I think, with the huge increase in online banking, that banks are going to be see more instances of customers losing money and, inevitably, they won't be able to take the hit for them all so they won't cover them all up.

My major concern would be in someone completely blitzing your account 'technically' whereas it would be nigh impossible for you to actually prove you had X amount in there. I'll give you an example:

Hi MT,
Do you think that printed records of account balances, statements and transfer trails would be a sufficient safeguard?

If you can't easily get to branches, then internet banking is a godsend. I have blessed it for years. No more searching for car parking all full with staff vehicles, no more branch ****-ups. No more 'just pop in to sign'. No more standing in-line behind people paying in large sums of money in small change.

Your point of view is quite disturbing. But surely, if things reached the point where banks wanted to renege on their customers, the game will be all but over. Cash would probably be nearly worthless.

The Masked Tulip speaks sense on internet banks

Theres nothing stopping a 3rd party hacking into your computer and getting the details. Theres already mole programs which can read your keystrokes and email them back to the hacker.

The trouble is if you listen to the paranoia about Internet Banks you earn about 1% less on your money.

Most accounts I have have a Direct Debit link with my personal bank account. The only thing you could do if you hacked and got hold of my log-in details is move the money into my Personal Bank Account. I (deliberately) don't have Internet Banking on personal bank account and the bank (Nat West) has recently implemented a policy that if you want to draw more than 1k in cash you have to produce Driving Licence or Passport.

Nationwide's e-savings account only allows the money to be moved to a Flex account with them. If you want to get money our of your Flex account you need a plastic card to do it.

However, I still think it is sensible to spread your risk - so I have four accounts and am willing to sacrifice the odd fraction of a percentage for peace of mind.

I have used C&Gs telephone based accounts for years with no problems.

I think the fears of a banking crisis are a bit overblown. HBOS just made 9 BILLION profit - reckon they could take a few bad debts without hurting. In the last crash which was accompanied by a serious recession, lots of bankruptcies and repossessions - no banks or building societys went under. Their risk is well covered.

Internet Banking has been going for a few years now. Anyone know of any examples of wholesale fraud being perpetrated and, if so, who was it against? If there has been any, they have managed to keep it pretty quiet.

Identity Theft does seem to be a concern. Read an article recently where a woman had 40k pinched from her account. Worryingly it had only been in there for a day or two - it was the deposit for a house purchase that had gone wrong. Implication is that her account was being 'watched'. The person who nicked her money had a passport in her name.

The bank re-imbursed her when it looked at the security cameras and saw it was not her that had taken the money out. Funny thing was - the thief withdrew the money at a different branch from where the account was held. Don't think my bank would allow that.

Anyone know if you can insure against being the victim of Identity Theft or online theft?

[quote=Marina,Mar 14 2005, 01:00 PM]
The trouble is if you listen to the paranoia about Internet Banks you earn about 1% less on your money.



The issues raised by The Masked Tulip persauded me to ask internet only bankers, EGG, about security today.
They made very confident and reassuring statements about their encryption system and security in general.
It seems very unlikely to me that they would fail to ensure the security of their systems. Even if they did make some fundamental error and customers lost deposits, EGG would surely repay it. The impact of customers losing money would be devastating to their whole business and the internet banking industry as a whole.
Whatever losses they had to refund would be a drop in the ocean compared to killing off the whole business.
If I buy a dog, I don't bark. If I put money in a bank, I don't try and second guess their security systems and expertise.
Internet banking is just too convenient to ever want to return to branches and all they entail.

There certainly are a lot of potential ways for hackers to steal passwords and the like, but the vast majority so far have relied on clueless users rather than security holes at the banks: people who receive emails from the bank asking them to log in to 'hack3rsRus.ru' and confirm their banking password, or equally stupid tricks.

Provided you always type in the URL manually, check the certificate if you think anything is wrong, and run a firewall and programs to check for scumware, internet banking should be pretty safe from our side: that's not to say that someone at the bank couldn't steal the passwords and sell them to the Russian mafia.

I was shocked by Natwest's online system, it being completely open to keypress readers on the customer side.

The only (password) system that can be a basis for safe banking is 'one-time passwords'. The ABN AMRO system I use in Holland is exemplary. You get a little card reader at home.
You stick your bank card in the reader, put your pin number in. The website prompts you
with an 8 digit number. You put it in the card reader and it gives you a 6 digit number
to type in the web page, then you're logged in.

It's different every time so you're safe from keypress readers on your PC.

There's no way I'm storing large amounts of cash with Natwest!

Pent