Zurich Child Savings Account

H

harmlessdonkey

Registered User
Messages
17
Hi,

My sister is looking at setting up a child savings account for her newborn. Looking to save approx €200 per month and maybe some lump sums from time to time. She called up Zurich and enquired about their account and was told that account is more for grandparents with a lot of money looking to save despite their site saying it's from €75 per month. He tried to sell her some regular savings products.

I am wondering if anyone has a view on this, is he trying to sell the other products or is the child savings account really not suitable for smaller savings?
 
With an investment timeframe of presumably c. 20 years she might be better off just buying shares directly and holding them. Lower charges and better tax treatment than a unit linked fund. She might want to look into bare trusts either way. Search for existing threads about them. They're not as complicated as it might sound.
 
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Thanks Gerard.

So we’re not talking huge amounts of money, 200 per month for 20 years or so. She wanted it to be in her child’s name so was interested in the Zurich child saving product but the agent told her it wasn’t suitable because she wasn’t rich basically. Tried to sell her another product.

Curious as to why he did that as the information on the site doesn’t indicate any requirements beyond €75 per month.
 
I don't get the agents response. The whole point of these schemes is to avail of the small gifts exemption so by it's very nature, it is not designed for passing on vast sums of wealth to children/grandchilden. €200 per month is completely acceptable amount for accessing these schemes. I have seen less. Are you sure there is isn't some sort of mix up? Maybe around the potential lumps sums???
 
I’ll ask her again. But she said the agent said it’s more for grandparents with a lot of wealth. Then he sent her brochures for the Zurich life regular savings plan.

As far as I can tell these plans would then be a gift to the child in 18 years which would circa €50k which could eat into the life time tax exemption unless as Clubman suggests she sets up a bare trust. However is there any benefit to this over just using the purpose-built Child Savings Plan?
 
If the intention is to provide for the newborn's education one may not need to worry about about eating into CAT allowances:

[broken link removed]

Having it in the name of the parent also means that, in the event the parent meets hard times in the next two decades, they retain the option of using that money to keep the show on the road.

Grandparent's don't have that CAT exemption as far as I am aware so I can see why the plan in the childs name makes sense in that instance.
 
The regular saver and the children savings plan are the same thing. They just gave one a name to attract people savings the children's allowance for their kids. Both are suitable for regular saving of €200 pm. Tax is looked after by the life company.

If you set the plan up under a trust, the policy passes over to the child at 18 but it does not come off inheritance. If you gave a child the proceeds of 20 years of savings, it does. See people who pay for deposits, weddings etc. They don't declare it. There are lots of instances of parents gifting their children money.


Steven
http://www.bluewaterfp.ie (www.bluewaterfp.ie)
 
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