Can anyone recommend which bank to use if setting up an account for a young child (less than one year old) and/or perhaps recommend another financial option.
The account will be used for making regular monthly deposits from myself and also somewhere to put any monetary gifts he receives. Ultimately providing him with a bit of a help when he reaches 18 or older.
So far I've looked at UBS, Credit Suisse and Post Finance.
Findings:
Post Finance
Free account management
Preferential interest rate: 0.750% (CHF) or 1.000% (EUR) up to CHF 25,000 / EUR 15,000
Are you sure Credit Suisse is free? We had our children's accounts there but got informed that as of 2014 they charge 60 CHF/yr. So we closed the accounts and went to Postfinance.
I would reccommend having the accounts in a bank you are a client of so that you can easily add the accounts to your ebanking etc.
Migros was good too but we are not clients, hence our choice of Postfinance.
Another option you may wish to look in to is a savings plan at an insurer. PAX has a very good one called PAX First Step and it is structured as follows:
you save a monthly amount same as at a bank (you can always put in a lump sum on top of that such as from gifts etc.) whatever you put in is invested in highly diversified security-oriented funds through various private banks that the company works together with there is a guaranteed interest rate of 1.5% for any contracts closed before 01.04.2014 (after that 1.25%) + Chance of surplus. PAX has been performing solidly at around 3% for their surplus the last decade or 2. if anything were to happen to you (or whoever is paying the monthly premium) the insurer would take over the monthly payments so that the savings goal for your child is definitely reached optionally you can add in capital payouts / monthly payouts to yourself or the child if anything were to happen to the child (invalidity / death) (i.e. basically life insurance) Keep in mind that these additional options will cost something (albeit not all too much, last I checked for an invalidity payout of CHF 2,000 a month (lifelong) for the child cost CHF 144 a year to insure) You can also save at an insurer but not add in any of the insurance part, thus it becomes a regular savings account (like at a bank) but is invested through private banks, and has a higher guaranteed interest rate; which is also quite nice. Other insurer offers similar products but I've made the best experiences with this one. The website for PAX's version of this is:
Sadly the website is only available in German but if you have any more questions or would like personalized advice just PM me and I will be happy to answer them.
As for bank solutions the interest rate p.a. at UBS is currently 1% up to CHF 20,000 and only 0.10% for sums above that. Other banks seem to be in the same region.
I would recommend looking into fund solutions for a part of what you save on the children's savings plan (20%, 30%, 40%, 50% etc.) to participate in slightly more exciting interest rates than the bare coverage of inflation. Credit Suisse seems to have the highest interest rate and they also have great funds that you can tie a portion of the investments to; so I would say go with Credit Suisse if the insurance portion is not for you.
As for my recommendation on whether to go with a bank solution or insurance solution: mix! Variety is the spice of life and its no different with saving plans. It depends on the size of the monthly payments though.
Interesting you say that. I'm sure when I looked last year I found that both UBS & Credit Suisse would charge however when I looked today, I found that there are no charges.
I had a bank account aged 9, a cheque book at 11 & a cheque guarantee card at 13 in the UK, however I never gave a POA to anyone. The POA allows you to access your children's money without their authority, kind of sucks, I would have found another bank if I was a child of yours
However, if you are looking at an investment horizon of around 17 years you might want to opt for a funds plan (since the interest rates in Switzerland are not exactly spectacular...).
Of course you might still want to get a separate youth account with which your child learns to "save", "pay" etc. but in terms of providing a nice starting cushion for your child when it turns 18 the funds could be the better option in the long term (unless of course we head into 17 year long bear market...).
The last post was 18 months ago, and we are now also looking for 2 simple bank accounts for our kids. Mainly to balance weekly money, dinner money, hand bills and so on.
Looking for simple account, with interest payable if possible, maestro card, no credit card, online banking.
Any thoughts on the current account offerings ? ZKB, CS, UBS, Post ???