AIB Regular Saver or FA eSavings?

I have €5k saved in a credit union account and intend to continue saving €50 per week, probably by direct debit.

€1k of this will probably go on a holiday this year, but I do not plan an spending the rest of it any time soon.

Would you advise I open an AIB Regular Saver a/c (my current a/c is with AIB) or a First Active eSavings account?

The regular saver account has a higher interest rate and is paid out twice a year as opposed to monthly. Is this a better option seeing as I don't plan on withdrawing the money within a year?

Are there advantages to the eSavings account I'm not considering?

I'm going to keep the CU a/c open and probably still lodge a small amount per month just in case I need a loan down the line.

Thanks

Brian

The First Active E-Saver is a lump sum account, whereas the AIB account is a regular saver with a max deposit of €300 per month - so they're really two totally different things which can't be compared.

I wonder did you mean to say the First Active Regular Saver, which pays a rate of 7.15%??

Anyway, the AIB account is a good option for your monthly savings because the rate is guaranteed to be 3% above ECB until Feb 2009. For a small monthly amount it's the best deal on the market imo. The main drawback is that if you're not already an AIB customer, you have to open a feeder account.

You'd probably also gain by moving your lump sum from the Credit Union to the First Active E-Saver.

Does that mean I can't lodge the already accumulated savings into an AIB reg savier a/c?

Ok, so I can move what I have in the CU into a FA eSavings a/c, and start a regular savings a/c with AIB. As I plan on saving €200 per month from my wages, would it be better to take an extra €100 per month from the FA account and lodge that with the €200 every month to benifit from the higher interest?

Thanks for your help

Brian

rtj said:

Does that mean I can't lodge the already accumulated savings into an AIB reg savier a/c?

Click to expand...

That's correct.

As for transferring money from one account to feed the regular saver, that does not pay off.(equates to annual rate of 3.32%) Only lodge "new" money to the regular saver.

Slim

I would do both. With the FA esavings you'll then feed the AIB reg. saver via the AIB c/a... So you get interest from both parties...

Slim said:

That's correct.

As for transferring money from one account to feed the regular saver, that does not pay off.(equates to annual rate of 3.32%) Only lodge "new" money to the regular saver.

Slim

Click to expand...

You've been corrected on this a number of times, that is just not true. You are ignoring the interest earned in the original account.

Search for any of your old posts on this and you'll see more detailed explanations.

I agree,

the interest rate that you'll get from the combined option will always be between the rate of FA and the one of AIB. So for sure more than 5% and less than 7%.

The_Hustler said:

You've been corrected on this a number of times, that is just not true. You are ignoring the interest earned in the original account.

Search for any of your old posts on this and you'll see more detailed explanations.

Click to expand...

Yes. I had not seen the correction. I apologise for that error. I have recalculated the figures now and, assuming a deposit acc. of 5%, feeding €1,000 per month into a high yield regular saver at 7%, after DIRT I reckon the gain to be .864%, i.e. just over three quarters of one per cent. This may be worth it depending on the costs of operating the particular feeder account, the terms and conditions of the feeder account and the hassle of setting it up etc.

Again apologies for the error.

Slim