Andrew Hagger of Moneynet.co.uk looks at some of the more eye catching changes in personal finance products during the last 7 days

The Chesham Building Society grabbed the headlines last week with a 1 year bond paying 3.95% but required a minimum deposit of £25,000. The account was launched on Friday 19^th of June and by close of play on Monday 22^nd it had been pulled. This just goes to show the level of demand for a decent savings rate in the current environment; however the amount of funds available must have been fairly limited for it to be sold out inside four days.

Following up from my press release last week, Close Brothers Limited have launched two top paying fixed rate bonds for customers with £10,000 or more to invest. The rates on offer are 4.50% gross for 2 years and 4.75% for 3 years. The bonds badged ‘Premium gold’ are available by post and whilst their website says these products will only be available until 3^rd July, they have also published an apology that you may be unable to get through to their client services team due to a very high level of calls. I don’t know about ‘premium gold’, I think with current demand and products selling so fast, a more appropriate label for these products may have been gold dust!

Newcastle Building Society is today launching a five year fixed rate ISA paying an impressive 5%. The account allows transfers in and also withdrawals subject to 90 days notice, it’s almost 1% higher than the competition, so it’s unlikely to be available for long.

Abbey launched their latest challenge to the packaged account market yesterday (22/6) with a deal offering Annual worldwide family travel insurance (including winter sports), green flag motoring cover and a £100 interest free overdraft facility. The account comes with a £10 monthly fee. However for the first 12 months you are also offered a fixed 6% AER credit interest rate on the first £2500 in your account. If you kept this sum in the account for the full 12 months, you’d get a net return of £120 as a basic rate tax payer and so would in effect wipe out the first year’s cost of this account. It’s an attractive looking proposition, but ONLY IF you make use of most of the benefits on offer.

ENDS