Your U Account can do so much more for you than just any old current account. Take our Extra Accounts, for example. They make it super easy to separate your funds for nice things, like trips and evenings out, from the money set aside to pay your bills. Plus, the option to set up direct debits on your Extra Accounts means that once your bill money is out of sight, you can keep it out of mind too, and pay them directly from where you’ve stashed the funds. Click below to find out more about Extra Accounts in general, and how they work.
We’ve also got two optional Extra Accounts that go one step further than that: 365 Budgeting and the Emergency Fund.
OK, but how will they help me budget?
365 Budgeting and Emergency Fund are sort of like templates for Extra Accounts, with standing orders already set up so that once you’ve activated them, they take small amounts of money from your main account to squirrel away for you — all automatically, so you don’t have to figure it out for yourself. Read on!
365 Budgeting: Set aside £667.95 in a year
365 Budgeting — or Budgeting 365, whichever you prefer really — is a really nifty way of spreading your biggest expenses across 365 days of the year, so they don’t seem all that big. Whether it’s for next Christmas, a summer holiday, or something else — it can help you stash away a fund of almost £700 that you’d forgotten you were even saving.
It works by taking just a penny from your main account on day one, 2p the next day, 3p the day after that… et cetera, et cetera, until you have £667.95 set aside for you 12 months later, to spend (or not spend) on whatever you choose to spend (or not spend) it on.
You can even stop it at any point you wish, for example after 100 days (£50) or six months (£163).
And setting it up is easy: just log in to your U Account and go to Extra Accounts > 365 Budgeting, or hit the button below. We’ll do the rest for you.
Emergency Fund: Set aside up to £31 every month
The Emergency Fund was designed to be a buffer in case you find yourself a bit short at the end of the month (or any time before payday). This Extra Account stealthily builds up a fund by taking a barely noticeable £1 every day from your main account, for when you need that money the most.
Use it a bit like an overdraft at the end of the month — the difference is you’re only borrowing money from past you instead of future you, and you won’t get charged for dipping into it.
Set up an Emergency Fund now, or log in to your account and go to Create new Extra Account > Emergency Fund.
Voilà!
For more on our budgeting Extra Accounts, including how to customise or cancel them, head over to these FAQs.
It’s all about you.
