Savings Plans

Psychological tool to discover financial types

Scottish Widows is launching a new psychological tool to help consumers discover their 'financial type'. 'Sceptic', 'Adventurer' and 'Maverick' are among nine financial personalities to be highlighted by the profiler.



The finance awareness tool was set up after Scottish Widows teamed up with psychologist Pat Knightley. Mike Hoban, customer and brand marketing director at Scottish Widows, said: "Recognising and accepting what motivates our financial behaviour is the only way to maintain a rewarding relationship with money that will last for life."

Ms Knightley added: "We each can act differently around money because of who we are, what motivates us, and the passions and emotions that drive us."

According to Scottish Widows, Brits are saving less and spending more. Saving for retirement dropped from 55 per cent in 2005 to 43 per cent in 2006, and 42 per cent of households carry credit card debt, the survey found.

In addition, 23 per cent of Brits have an overdraft – suggesting that the UK as a whole may be leaning towards the less salubrious end of the personality spectrum.

Over a quarter of Brits 'have no savings'

More than one in four Britons (27 per cent) have no savings at all, a new survey has discovered.

The poll from Scottish Widows also found that a further 25 per cent of Britons have less than £3,000 in savings, meaning that the savings pot of over half of the UK's households would last less than three months if they were unable to work.

Meanwhile, due to the cost of running a home, nearly half (44 per cent) of Britain's households need more than one breadwinner in order to maintain an acceptable standard of living, the firm claims.

In addition, 47 per cent of Britons have a mortgage, 60 per cent have secured or unsecured loans, overdrafts or finance agreements and 63 per cent have credit card or store card debt.

Commenting on the findings, Richard Jones, interim protection market director at the firm, commented: "The problem is that servicing this debt eats into our take home pay and exposes us to financial hardship should we be unable to work."

A recent report from Birmingham Midshires found that most British savers favour instant-access savings accounts, with 51 per cent having opened one in the last three months and less than 16 per cent willing to lock their money away.

Lee Grandin from Insurances Limited comments “Flexibility is of utmost importance when considering where to put savings. Unless the return opportunity is considerable (most typical savings accounts offer poor returns when compared to long term Stock Market saving) then the saver will look for optimum flexibility. A savings account with no exit fees has been very popular in recent times.”

Landlord Mortgages “Instant Savings accounts offer poor returns if relied upon over the longer term. Buy To Let may offer substantially higher returns than the average instant savings account but only over the longer term. It is the security and flexibility that attract savers to the traditional style savings accounts, and out of these attributes only flexibility differs among banks.”

Boost for Britain's savings appetite

Britons are more in the mood to contribute towards their savings plans than they were last year, a new survey claims.

The latest figures from Legal & General's MoneyMood poll show that 60 per cent of adults said that they were in the mood to save at the end of April.

However, 26 per cent of adults questioned said that they were inclined to spend - the lowest April figure for three years.

The survey also found that the percentage of households that said that they have money to spend after paying bills and making debt repayments has fallen from 61 per cent to 58 per cent over the last three years.

According to Julia Clayworth, wealth management customer marketing manager at the firm, this suggests recent interest rate rises have had a minor impact on household budgets, although if rates move closer to six per cent, people's ability to save may dwindle.

"The latest MoneyMood figures show we are still in 'save' mode compared to this time last year," she commented.

Data from Alliance & Leicester indicates that up to 12 million Britons failed to save any money last year.

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