The Great Debate UK
The benefits of early ISA investment
- Rachel Mason is public relations manager at independent financial service providers Fair Investment Company. The opinions expressed are her own. -
The financial media has been packed full of ISA news over the past few months. Most of the advice has been ‘invest in your ISA before it’s too late’. And now it is too late. The media has found something else to write about because the tax year is over, and if you missed it, tough luck.
But actually, you’re just in time for this year, because if you get in early you won’t be caught up in the mad panic next April. A recent survey of Fair Investment Company investors revealed that actually, more than a third make their ISA investment at the start of the season, and this is the most tax efficient way of making an ISA investment.
Although the full allowance is 10,200 pounds, only half of this can be put into a cash ISA – the most popular type of ISA (of the 14.2million ISAs subscribed to in the 2008/09 tax year, 11.2million were cash ISAs).
Budget boost for savers
–Fay Goddard is chief executive of the Personal Finance Society. The opinions expressed are her own.–
As predicted, Budget 2009 was heavy on figures and forecasts and hard on the highest earners. Unsurprisingly it is the latter that the press has picked up on. We all knew that there would be a new top rate of income tax – though some were taken by surprise at the rate of 50 percent and the speed at which it will be introduced.
