Savings Account or Premium Bonds?

Go for a stocks and shares ISA, the interest rates are better. I have a Fidelity one which has done well for me over the past few years but take advice from an IFA before investing.

Georgesgran That is really weird for them to have lost your bonds. When I log into my online account it shows my £1 bond from the late 1950s along with my 1990s bonds. The bonds are linked to your holder number and should all appear. I'm sure it will get sorted as they must have a record of those bonds somewhere and if you have the certificate then that is proof.

One advantage of keeping it in cash ISAs rather than moving to premium bonds, is that you would keep the option open of transferring the cash ISA into a stocks & shares ISA if you wanted to go down that route in the future, then all the dividend income would be tax free. (Although currently you can get up to £2000 of dividend income tax free outside a stocks & shares ISA.

You can set up an online account with NS&I which shows all your PBS going back to 1959. I’ve got some on their bought for me by relatives in the 1970s.

If you can find her holder’s number that would help.

I love it when you see someone with a small holding win one of the larger prizes.

Georgesgran . Has your daughter written herself to NS&I?

They found a record of an old one I had bought me 40 years ago. I had to give them all the change of details: surname and address. I do hope they can find her PBs. Good luck.

www.nsandi.com/contact-us#write-to-us

We both invested in premium bonds two years ago. Both the maximum amount but have since cashed in 1/4. Between the two of us we have always won something every month. The least £25 and the most £225.

NS&I publish the winners (not their names ! bu5 how much they've won and area they live in + much they hold.

All big wins go to those with holding large amounts but there's the odd exception . This month there's someone holding £4,000 that won £10,000.?

www.nsandi.com/prize-checker/winners

encash.

This isn’t meant to derail the thread, but my daughter has a small number (hundreds not thousands) of PBs that she wants to cash in. I have the certificate here, it’s never left my house, but PB say they have no knowledge of her bonds. She hasn’t cashed them in and we are just stuck with what seems a worthless certificate. Has anyone else had any problem tried to encase them?

www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/best-cash-isa/ Pick the ISA that offers 'transfers in' that has the best rate/term for you. Personally at the moment I would not go for fixed rate, as rates are likely to rise. I'd only put money into PB if there was no downside - and here you'd be losing the ISA sheltering.

Check out Moneysaving Expert. Lots of good advice on there.

If you have an up to date phone, I recommend the phone only app for Chase Bank, FSC regulated, currently offering a savings account with 1.5%. I keep up to date with the latest easy access accounts on MSE.

Wow, I think I may go with the Premium Bonds! Otherwise it's 1.25% interest from the savings account. It's a chance but maybe I'll win something.

I have the maximum Premium Bonds and this month I won 3x £25. The most I have won is £500. Our ISA’s have awful rates of interest at the moment.

I also win £25 most months sometimes x2 if you can afford to buy at least 30k I'd go with the bonds

crazyH

That’s super AGAA4 - no one I know has won more than £75

I was quite stunned. I don't usually win anything.

That’s super AGAA4 - no one I know has won more than £75

I've only got £1,125 in premium bonds bought for the first time just over a year ago. That's £1000 of savings and £125 in prizes definitely better than any savings account I've come across.

I did win £5000 once on the Premium Bonds. Happy Day.

I’ve had £30,000 in PB’s since January when I retired. I have made £125 pounds so far which I am more than happy with. It goes into my Christmas present pot. I like the fact that should I need to cash them in I can do so easily with no penalties. My husband puts his winnings back in the PB’s.

I win something most months from my premium bonds. I am close to having the full amount because anything I win goes back into the pot. The most I have ever won is £500. It is usually a single or a few £25s. I also like the thrill of it- somebody has to win the million so why not me?

Hey, Ernie doesn't account for people with lucky streaks! He's random ?‍♀️

I have a comparatively small amount of premium bonds but have calculated that they earned 0.5% interest this year. But I do have a lucky streak for things like that.

I dislike that your savings account starts off with high interest rate which drops after a year, then you have to open a different account to get the good interest rate. I have just done that with a Nationwide savings account. I get rather stressed transferring money online and I don't like all the faffing around with large sums of money.