Moneybox is a new service collating a number of different financial products allowing you to save, invest, buy a home, combine old pensions and more, all in one simple and easy to use app.
You can get started with just £1 and with handy new features such as an ability to save and invest your spare change with rounding up your everyday purchases, Moneybox makes saving money very easy.
They have a range of accounts from Stocks & Shares ISAs, Lifetime ISAs, Junior ISAs, Personal Pensions and a number of different savings accounts. To see if they’re a good fit for you, keep reading this Moneybox review and find out for yourself, it could be a great choice!
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Moneybox Customer Reviews
Moneybox currently has a 4.5 star rating on Trustpilot with over 1,000 reviews and 74% of them being excellent. Many of the reviews cite how helpful the app is for keeping track of everything and having everything available on a mobile app.
Moneybox Stocks & Shares ISA
The Moneybox Stocks & Shares ISA allows you to invest up to £20,000 per year and any growth is not subject to tax. Over the long run, this can save you a significant sum of money through tax whilst also have the added benefit of having more money invested letting compound interest work at a faster rate.
This product is similar to their General Investment Account, although any gains within that account is subject to tax. Make sure to read about the differences between a Stocks and Shares ISA and general investment account if you’re just getting into saving, as could save you quite a lot of money over your investing career.
Cash Lifetime ISA (LISA) – Is it Worth it?
As much as I’m a fan of Moneybox, their Cash Lifetime ISA does let them down. They did have market leading interest rates, however when the interest rates were cut across the UK, Moneybox slashed their rates.
Now companies like Multiply.AI are the market leaders in this space offering 1.5% interest rates, still painfully low, however over double what Moneybox is offering.
Will be interesting to see if Moneybox put their interest rates back up if rates do start to increase across the UK.
Moneybox Savings Accounts – Any Good?
Moneybox offers four types of savings accounts listed below, all of which can be opened with just £1 which is great.
- Simple Saver – 0.47% interest
- 45 day notice account – 0.55% interest
- 95 day notice account – 0.60% interest
- 120 day notice account – 0.80% interest
As you can see, the interest rates on them aren’t great, however the fact anyone over the age of 18 can open one with just £1 and their round up feature can still make it attractive to some.
For those people that find it difficult to save, this round up feature can be very helpful.
Moneybox Pension
The Moneybox pension doesn’t have any monthly subscription fee, just an investment fee and fund charges.
Investment fee:
- Investments under £100,000 – 0.45%
- Investments over £100,000 – 0.15%
Fund Charges: 0.12% to 0.3%
They also offer a pension consolidation service, which can be very helpful if you have a number of pensions with other providers and want to have them all in the same place.
Investing into a pension is a very useful way to save for retirement whilst also saving the tax you would have otherwise paid to receive the money now. There is an annual £40,000 pension allowance and a lifetime allowance of £1,073,100.
Moneybox Round-up Feature – How Does it Work?
Round-ups are a feature that can be activated through Moneybox where you connect your accounts where you spend your money, namely debit and credit cards. Moneybox then rounds-up all purchases into a weekly savings total which is debited from your nominated linked bank account and you automatically save a bit of money, magical!
For example, say you buy a coffee for £2.40, Moneybox will round this up to the nearest pound and add 60p into your investing pot. This will then occur for every purchase made during the week and then the total is invested each week.
This feature doesn’t have to be enabled although may be useful to save money often without even really noticing it which can add up over time.
How Much Does Moneybox Cost?
Moneybox is free when using the savings accounts and Cash LISA.
All products centered around investing include a £1 monthly subscription fee. Thankfully this subscription fee covers all investment accounts, so you can have a Stock & Shares ISA and a General Investment Account and only incur the £1 monthly fee.
The investment accounts also include a 0.45% annual platform fee that is charged monthly plus annual fund provider costs when you’ve chosen your individual investments which can range from 0.12% to 0.58%. These are charged directly by the fund providers.
Moneybox vs Plum
Plum offers very similar products and services to Moneybox that are focused on saving and investing. Their investment products also some with a monthly fee which starts at £1 per month, although can go as high as £5 for additional services including savings goals, cashback opportunities, a money management tool and more. These additional features can be helpful, although can be an additional expensive if they’re not adding much benefit.
Saving money with Plum is free and they offer 0.4% interest which does make Moneybox slightly better as long as you’re happy to lock your money away for a period of time.
If you need any help with budgeting and saving, there are a number of free apps available that offer quite a lot more that Moneybox and Plum. To find out more, read this post I wrote on how to create a personal budget, might be useful!
Moneybox Free Mortgage Advice
Moneybox has teamed up with the Mortgage Advice Bureau and offers a free mortgage advice service via the Moneybox App. This can be very useful for first-time house buyers that are using their Lifetime ISAs to save for a house, or even people already on the property ladder looking to remortgage or move house.
Can I Lose Money in Moneybox? Is it Safe?
Yes you can lose money if you are using products that invest in the stock market as the value of your investments can go down. However, for the actual holding and management of the money, Moneybox partners with fund providers and third party institutions which are under FSCS protection covering up to £85,000 per person per bank.
Is Moneybox a real bank?
No Moneybox is not a bank, although is FCA authorised. All money invested with Moneybox is held by its partner banks that all having banking licenses covered by FSCS protection.
If you need any more information on the protection of your money and which banks are partnered against each product, Moneybox has a useful FSCS protection page on their site.
Overall Verdict
In summary, Moneybox offers a number of great products that are all accessible through a very intuitive, well built mobile app. They have some useful features that are helpful for encouraging users to invest, such as their round-up features.
Moneybox is excellent for a beginner to saving and investing, or for people that are looking to have access to many products in one place to help save time and stress. Unfortunately, they don’t offer much help around educating users on why they need to save and invest and what that would mean for their future.
Also their cash investing products including their Cash LISA and Notice Saving Accounts do seem quite low when compared to other companies in the market.
If you want to sign up with Moneybox, you can get started here with just £1.
Hi, I’m John. I’ve always had a keen interest in Finance, so much so that I’ve made a career out of it! This site is a place where I can share everything I’ve learned as well as give me the excuse to research certain topics.
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