I’ve got a few questions for people who have/have had an account with Ulster Bank…
First and foremost, I can’t see any requirement to live/have lived in Northern Ireland to open an account with them, can an account be opened and managed entirely online/via app?
Does anyone have experience with their Premier offering? If I have a premier account with another RBS bank (NatWest) could I open a premier account with Ulster, or would I need to have my salary paid into Ulster to qualify?
Are there any pitfalls I should know about? For example, on their payment limits site it looks like payments in/out take a minimum of two hours to process. That’s not a deal-breaker (I’d basically just be using Ulster for their Loyalty Saver account) but would be good to plan for.
Agreed, though Ulster don’t appear to do a regular saver so maybe that’s their ‘higher interest saver’? Also Uslter’s Loyalty Saver pays interest annually, which isn’t the end of the world, but would be a bit annoying. I’d still absolutely love to see a NatWest equivalent. I’ve mentioned a few times it is the only thing keeping me from having 100% of my (UK) finances with NatWest.
You should qualify via NatWest, I’ve never had my salary paid into Ulster.
Payments in/out are instant - I used to use Loyalty saver and now use the limited edition saver (monthly interest) as my main stoozing/easy access account and transfer in from current accounts for every credit card transaction, and have sheduled payments out several times a month for paying credit card bills. Only issue is scheduling only works on working days.
No issues I can think of unless you want loans/overdraft - their rates and limits are slightly worse than NatWest from what they’re offering me
I am in England, never lived in NI. I have an account with them, no need for a branch everything done in the app.
Everything is like for RBS/Natwest. They say within two hours for faster payments just like any other bank.
All my payments have been done within a minute.
Their app doesn’t work same hours Natwest/RBS apps have a nap.
Same icon and card design as RBS.
App is copy and paste from RBS.
If you do need a branch visit, you can visit a NatWest branch. We had to do one as the OH is Australian and needed to show the residence card. Other than that, fully online.
I need to do the math on whether a 3.5% rate across the board is better than my current Monzo pot setup (3.25% for most pots but importantly 3.65% on the biggest pot)… My current thinking is any small increase in interest probably won’t be worth losing the pot functionality (whereas if NatWest had a Loyalty Saver equivalent then it absolutely would be worth it to be able to consolidate everything in one place.)
Ok I’ve done the math. I’m actually better off sticking with Monzo, largely because 1) just over half my short-term savings are (on average) in my single Select Access pot, which earns 3.65% and 2) In the month I withdraw all of that money, my total short-term savings balance drops below £5k meaning for one month my rate with UIster Bank would drop to 1%.. If I keep the balance over £5k all year then Ulster comes out ahead. But the difference isn’t huge (less than ten quid either way), and having to go back to tracking pots via spreadsheet would be a little annoying.
Oh I am absolutely the same: simplicity is primary, interest rate and features are secondary. I am not a rate-chaser by any means, though I do try to maximise the benefits I get from a simple setup. I average £10-12k total across my Monzo pots, which earns just over £400/year in interest. If I went super simple and only kept NatWest, I’d be losing out on nearly £300 worth of interest. Not a game-changing amount by any means, but enough to be worth keeping my short-term savings in Monzo (especially with the added benefit of pot management, which I quite like).
