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Guide to Banking Basics

Introduction

When choosing a new bank, you will often have a range of choices available to you between types of account and how they are run.

Nowadays, most banks will offer a menu of services and different accounts, allowing you to select what suits you best. However, it still helps if you know what choices might be available and how they work. Here are some of them.

Traditional branch-based accounts

Perhaps surprisingly, most banks still offer this service and, for now, it remains free in almost all cases.

The advantage of having a branch you can visit is that it makes it easier to deal with someone face-to-face. Things that might sound more difficult to understand on the phone and incomprehensible on the internet, are much simpler to digest when you are sitting opposite someone in a branch.

On the other hand, most people nowadays like to have a full combination of available services, including a traditional bricks-and-mortar operation with an attached telephone and online option.

If you are in doubt, here are eight questions to ask:

1) Do you want internet banking as a convenient add-on, do you want the most interactive service, or just a good rate of interest?

Generally, internet banking offers better rates, with internet-only operations offering the best deals. You also have the convenience of operating your account 24/7. But without the opportunity of a face-to-face chat, or at least a phone call, you lose some of the capacity to change 50/50 decisions.

For example, what happens if your bank clobbers you with an unreasonable £35 overdraft charge? And who, exactly, sorts out their direct debits on Christmas Day?

2) What products are covered?

Some banks offer a current account as the core facility you can access; others allow you to check the entire range of products, including credit cards, overdraft facilities, credit cards, personal loans and ISAs.

If you are attracted by the internet, you should be aiming for a bank that allows you to at least see and do as much as possible online.

3) How exactly do you bank or save online?

A few do not yet allow customers to monitor their own credit card transactions and balances, while others exclude postal accounts. Some restrict the type of transactions you can make on savings accounts but offer more interactivity on current accounts.

If the rate being paid on it is good, you may prefer the option of a current account to a savings one, especially if this means you can operate the account more easily.


More pages

Page 1: Introduction
Page 2: 4) What online information should a bank display?
Page 3: Offset mortgages

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