This article is more than 6 months old
It was correct at the time of publishing. Our views and any references to tax, investment and pension rules may have changed since then.
It’s easy to lose track of your finances when your savings and investments are scattered across different providers. Here’s how you can tidy them up.
This article isn’t personal advice. If you’re not sure whether an investment is right for you please seek advice. If you choose to invest the value of your investment will rise and fall, so you could get back less than you put in.
It was correct at the time of publishing. Our views and any references to tax, investment and pension rules may have changed since then.
Uncertainty around the US election, Brexit and dwindling returns on your savings aren’t exactly making things easy for savers and investors. And that’s before the potentially devastating effects of a second wave of coronavirus infections.
Now more than ever, it’s important to focus on what you can control. That includes making sure your financial future is in the right hands. Yours.
Uncertainty in the economy is always a challenging time for investors – but it can also bring opportunities. At times like these it’s a good idea to look at your investments and make sure they still meet your objectives, goals and attitudes to risk.
If you’re worried about the ups and downs of the stock market, remember it’s important to have a diverse and balanced portfolio. This means having a mixture of assets (like shares and bonds), geographies and investing styles. That way your portfolio is likely to be more sheltered from market falls as something else could be working well for you.
It’s also a testing time for savers. Millions of people will see their returns plummet after National Savings and Investments (NS&I) announced it will slash its interest rates from November. Savers will need to keep a close eye on their money and be ready to switch to get a better return on their cash.
Read more on what the NS&I interest rate cut means for savers
Knowing where you stand with your savings and investments becomes a lot harder when you have multiple providers. So the first step is to take stock of all your accounts.
Set aside some time to look through your online or printed statements and get all your account numbers. Then, once you’ve pulled them together, you could start to think about bringing them all under one roof.
It’s not easy juggling savings and investment accounts with different providers. There are multiple management fees to keep on top of, various annual statements to get to grips with, and not to mention more than one set of log in and security details to remember.
We think combining your investments with one provider is key to taking control of your finances. You can:
It’s hard to get a clear overview of your savings and investments if you’ve got more than one provider. Bringing them together means you can easily check whether all your investments are on track and working together to achieve your goals. And if they’re not, you can make changes based on the bigger picture, rather than having lots of isolated views.
It’s true what they say, time is precious. You can get back hours of time by only needing to deal with one provider. Rather than having to make multiple phone calls and logging into lots of different websites, you can check everything in one place.
It’s harder to work out how much of your tax-efficient allowances you have left each tax year when your pensions and ISAs are scattered across different companies. Having them all in one place means less time and admin – extremely helpful if you’re up against the end of tax year deadline.
1.4 million people trust HL to help them make the most of their money.
Whatever the coming months hold, we’ll be there to give you the help and information you need to make the right decisions. By consolidating your investments and savings with HL, you’ll get:
If you’re considering transferring your investments, you need to be aware that pensions are usually transferred as cash. This means you’ll miss any market rises or falls for a period. When transferring investments as they are, you won’t be able to sell them during the transfer, for example to protect yourself from falls or realise gains. You should also check that you won’t lose any valuable benefits or need to pay high exit fees before you apply to transfer, and compare charges – view our platform charges.
This article isn’t personal advice. Unlike cash, investments can go down as well as up in value, so you could get back less than you put in. Tax rules for ISAs and pensions can change and their benefits depend on your circumstances. If you’re unsure what to do, please ask for advice.
Transfer your investments or pensions to HL, or open an Active Savings account, and you could qualify for cashback. You can even qualify for multiple cashback offers as long as you meet the criteria outlined in each set of terms. The more you transfer, the more you could receive. Terms apply.
This article isn’t personal advice. If you’re not sure whether an investment is right for you please seek advice. If you choose to invest the value of your investment will rise and fall, so you could get back less than you put in.
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