The Individual Savings Accounts (Isa) allowance is expected to increase by £470 at the start of the next financial year.

The news comes after the previous increase which was brought in earlier this year, pushing the annual Isa allowance from £7,600 to £10,200, of which half can be stored in a cash Isa.

The Isa limit is set to rise again to £10,670, which will come into force at the beginning of the new financial year (April 2011). Although only half can be added to a cash Isa, investors can place the full amount into stocks and shares Isas and pay no income tax on any returns. (more…)

In the last couple of years, savers have been given a wake-up call warning them that even though their money is in the bank, it doesn’t necessarily meant it’s safe. Now i’m not talking about the risk of your money being stolen in a bank robbery…something far less obvious – banks failing.

The scare surfaced after Lehman Brothers – a global financial services firm, declared itself bankrupt in 2008 marking the largest bankruptcy in U.S. History.

Concerns were again raised after Icesave – an online savings brand owned and operated by Landsbanki, collapsed affecting hundreds of thousands of customers and businesses. In the UK, Icesave’s marketing slogan was “clear difference”, offering its customers three types of savings accounts: an instant access savings account, a cash ISA, and a range of fixed rate bonds, paying interest rates of more than 6%. This was enough to attract over 300,000 accounts in the UK alone. (more…)

This years budget has proved to have its ups and downs, but a definite bonus to all you savers out there is that the amount of money in which you can invest into an Individual Savings Account (ISA) will be increasing from the current maximum of £7,200, to £10,200!

This means that you can boost your current annual £3,600 cash ISA savings to £5,100, and the same goes for your stocks & shares ISA allowance, but with this type of ISA you can invest up to your full ISA allowance, giving you the option to potentially invest £10,200 every year – either entirely into a stock & shares ISA, or a combination of the two.

This is great news, as it effectively means that you can invest a higher amount and receive 100% of the returns, without having to pass a penny on to the tax-man!

However, the new allowance will not be made available instantly. If you’re less than 50 years old, you will have to wait until the beginning of the new tax year (6 April), and even for those that are aged over 50, you will have to wait until 6 October before you become eligible to invest the increased amount.

According to http://newsbump.co.uk/ the allowance will see future increases to stay in line with inflation.

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By Sam Gooch