Getting paid for banking

So, we recently moved from having cash, to not having cash (bought a house) and as such had to re-align our priorities for banking:

When we still had cash we had mostly accounts that paid interest. Now we have mostly accounts that pay cashback.

When we first started out looking for new bank accounts I was hesitant: Surely, there can’t be enough money in it, to make it worthwhile? When we then made the calculations we still couldn’t quite believe it, but we now make over £30 per month in cashback (after fees), without significant ongoing effort.

This was important for us: We didn’t want to scour cash back sites for every shop, always think about which card to use where, etc., all just to make a few extra quid. That wasn’t worth the effort for us: After initial setup (i.e. account applications and setting up Standing Orders between accounts) the thing should mostly run itself.

The only change in behaviour for us was that instead of using debit cards for our spending, we now use our cashback credit card in supermarkets, and Curve almost everywhere else, and this is the result: 3 current accounts + 2 spending cards.

Account/Product Montly fee Conditions Cashback Assumed monthly spend Monthly cashback
Barclays Blue Rewards £3.00 - £7.00 for 2 DD
£5.00 for Mortage
£3.00 for home insurance
(DD and mortage rewards only, as home insurance is elsewhere) £12.00
NatWest Reward Account £2.00 min income: £1,500 2% for select DD £70 Gas & El
£170 Council Tax
£30 Water
£50 phone/broadband/TV
£30 mobile
£7.00
Coop Everyday Rewards £0.00 4 DD,
min income: £800
£4 + 5p per debit card transaction - £4.00
NatWest Reward Credit Card £0.00 (see below) - 1% at supermarket
0.5% elsewhere
£800 at supermarket
£400 elsewhere
£10
Curve £0.00 - It’s comlicated (figure is our average actual cashback over the last months, minus sign up bonus) £4.00
Total £5.00 £37.00

Net annual cashback: £384

Notes:

  • While there are no conditions for Barclays Blue Rewards per se, they obviously only make sense if you earn enough cashback to offset the fee.
  • Some of these are quite specific to ourselves (not everyone has a mortgage with Barclays, 11 DDs, etc). For others there may be better options out there (e.g. AmEx generally pays higher cashback, Santander may pay higher cashback than NatWest depending on your specific bills, etc.), so this isn’t a case of one size fits all.
  • The NatWest Reward Credit Card usually has a £24pa fee, but that is waived if you also hold the NatWest Reward Account.
  • The assumed spend up there isn’t quite our actual spend (don’t feel comfortable detailing our entire finances on the internet), but the cashback to the right is approximately the actual cashback we have earned monthly (on average) over the last few months.
6 Likes

And what?

You do not mention Monzo, suggest they do anything, say if you will use them or not…

Some extra comments about your thoughts on Monzo may make this post interesting, otherwise it is just a random post with no relevance to Monzo

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You are right. It has nothing to do with monzo. But it is far from alone in that regard in the “General” and “Financial Chat” categories, isn’t it?

I thought, some people may find that interesting. If you don’t: fine :slight_smile: if monzo don’t think it’s a good fit for their forum, and want to delete it, that’s also fine :slight_smile:

7 Likes

I think it can be a useful post if it can lead to discussion. For example had you argued that Monzo should do cashback or have a monthly fee to provide some perks.

Anyone else got any thoughts on that concept?

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Maybe a poll on how much would you pay each month to get cashback perks on your Monzo account?

Some people don’t want any fees, but those that do it may be interesting to see how much they would pay to get these benefits!

It’s not that easy, to me. Ultimately I don’t particularly care about the fees, I care about my net cashback. And there are so many different models out there: fixed cashback (e.g. Coop), percentage cashback (eg NatWest), product dependend cashback (eg Barclays). I suppose, only the 1st two are options for monzo, but they do of course have another potentially interesting option: marketplace dependent cashback (percentage of commission, or cashback paid by marketplace partner). In short: way too many options to make a poll.

And there is a monzo cashback thread somewhere already…

3 Likes

Might be worth throwing TSB in the mix there if you can. £5 for having two direct debits and £5 if you use your debit card 20 times until Dec 2018…

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I would pay a tenner a month for travel insurance and air miles on all spend. My current bank charge me £9.95 for travel and phone insurance, and roadside assistance, but I also pay £150 a year for double air miles on my credit card.

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I tried them, actually, but I wasn’t eligible as I already have an account with them, and they refused my wife for unknown reasons…

Barclays Blue Rewards are a really good idea - I think Monzo Coral Rewards which work in the same way would be a really brilliant idea

1 Like