Fixed Saver Terms and Conditions
General info
Our agreement
Banking with Atom is straightforward, so we give you information when it’s relevant to you. At this point, our contract with you consists of our App T&Cs, our Registration T&Cs, our General T&Cs, these Fixed Saver T&Cs and a product specific Summary Box, based on the account you open. Please ensure you read them so you understand the terms of our agreement with you. If there’s any conflicting information, these Fixed Saver T&Cs take priority.
These T&Cs detail the agreement between you and Atom (‘we’/ ‘us’) when you have a Fixed Saver account with us.
Each condition of these T&Cs operates separately. If any court or competent authority decides that any of them are unlawful or unenforceable, the other conditions will remain in full force and effect.
Eligibility
You must be at least 18 years old and a UK resident to open a Fixed Saver account.
Alternative format
Our digital format goes a long way towards achieving full accessibility for all, but if you need these T&Cs supplied in another format, or if we can help you to use our service in any other way, simply contact us via the Help button in the App, call us on 0333 399 0050 or email customersupport@atombank.co.uk.
Your data
Protecting your data
The only additional information we’ll collect when you open a Fixed Saver is bank or building society details. We will hold details of every account used to make payments in and out of your account. This data will be held in a secure environment and will only be used to validate your identity or to make future payments out of your account, in line with any instructions you give us. Take a look at our Privacy Policy for more information about how we protect your data.
Your account
Opening a Fixed Saver
Once you’ve downloaded the App, registered Your ID and verified your identity, you can open a Fixed Saver account in the App.
When you open an account, you’ll receive a fixed rate of interest on the money you put in it for the specified term, starting from the day you fund it. You can see the term and rate that apply to your product in the account view in the App.
Fixed Savers don’t have a ‘cooling off’ period (a reflection time when you have the option to change your mind and close the account), so please make sure this product is right for you before you open an account and pay money into it.
Account holders
Currently, Fixed Savers can only be opened as sole accounts (just you). There’s no limit to the number of accounts you can hold, as long as the total amount deposited in your combined accounts doesn’t exceed the Maximum Balance Limit (see ‘Balance Limits’).
If you need someone else to operate your Fixed Saver account, we can register a Power of Attorney (POA) for it. If we do this, your Attorney will be able to access information about your account and in some circumstances, we may restrict what you’re able to do. At this time, we’re only able to register a POA if you’re an existing Atom customer - i.e. you have opened at least one account with us. Please call us on 0333 399 0050 to discuss setting up a POA for your account.
Interest
As soon as we receive a payment into your account, you’ll start to earn interest. Interest on your balance is calculated daily and will be paid at the rate stated in your Fixed Saver Summary Box (based on the number of actual days in the relevant period and a year of 365 days).
All interest is paid gross, in line with the Personal Savings Allowance (PSA). You can find more information about the PSA at https://www.gov.uk/apply-tax-free-interest-on-savings.
You can choose how you want the interest on your account to be paid:
Monthly interest
Your interest will be paid on the day of the month you open the account (e.g. if you open it on the 16th, your interest will be paid on the 16th every month). Once your account is open, you can choose to receive your interest on an alternative day of the month. If your interest is usually paid on the 29th, 30th or 31st and that date doesn’t appear in a month, it will be paid on the last day of that month.
Annual interest (term: 1 year or more)
Your interest will be paid annually on the date of account opening, except if you open your account on 29th February, when your interest will be paid on 28th February in non-leap years.
Annual interest (term: less than 1 year)
Your interest will be paid at the end of the product term, on the day of the month you open the account. If you open your account on the 29th, 30th or 31st and that date doesn’t appear in the month at the end of your term, your interest will be paid on the last day of the month.
Paid in or paid out
You may choose to have interest added to your account (‘paid in’) or paid into your nominated account, which is another bank or building society account in your name (‘paid out’). If you choose to have your interest paid out, then close your nominated account and don’t tell us, your interest payment will automatically be returned to us. If this happens, we’ll pay it into your Fixed Saver account and change your preference to ‘pay in’. You’ll be able to change it back to ‘paid out’ at a later date, by updating your nominated account details in the App and changing your preference back to ‘pay out’.
Charges
There are no charges applied to your Fixed Saver account.
Statements
You can access your account and check your balance at any time in the App.
Your statement will be put in your Vault within a few days of your account opening anniversary and/or at the end of your product term, and we’ll let you know when it’s ready.
If you need a statement for a specific reason, you can request one by calling us on 0333 399 0050 at any time.
Maturity
When your account reaches maturity (i.e. when the fixed product term ends), you’ll need to decide what to do with your money.
We’ll contact you before your maturity date with your available options, so you can log into the App and tell us what you want to do with your money. We’ll complete your instructions on the maturity date and tell you what we’ve done.
If you don’t provide maturity instructions, or if they’re incomplete, at the end of your product term, we’ll automatically transfer the money out of your Fixed Saver, as follows.
If you have an open Instant Saver, we’ll move your money into that account. If that means you go over the Instant Saver Maximum Balance Limit, we’ll ask you to take some of the money out. If you don’t move the excess balance out of the Instant Saver, we may transfer it to your connected account, then let you know what we’ve done.
If you don’t have an open Instant Saver, we’ll move your money into a Holding Account with a variable interest rate. You’ll retain your Fixed Saver sort code and account number and we’ll provide you with new T&Cs for this account. You won’t be able to make any additional payments into this account, and you can only make a single withdrawal from it, to enable you to take all of your money out of the Holding Account in one go.
Payments
Deposit window
Once you’ve opened your account, you can only make payments into it for a specified period. We call this the ‘deposit window’. The deposit window starts as soon as you open your account and closes at a fixed point in the future. You can find details of the deposit window for your account in the App and in your Fixed Saver Summary Box (in your Vault).
Once you’ve made the minimum initial payment specified in your Fixed Saver Summary Box, you can make as many payments as you like into your account during the deposit window, up to the Maximum Balance Limit.
If you open an account and don’t pay anything into it during the deposit window, the account will be registered as an ‘unfunded’ account, and we’ll close it in due course. Please note that because we don’t class this as an open account, we won’t send you a statement when we close it.
Balance limits
When you open an account, your first payment into it must be more than the minimum initial payment specified in your Fixed Saver Summary Box.
The total funds held in your savings accounts with us cannot exceed our Maximum Balance Limit. This limit is currently £200,000 - you can hold up to £100,000 in Fixed Savers and up to £100,000 in easy access accounts (Instant Saver and/or Holding Accounts). We may breach the limit in some circumstances - e.g. to add interest to your account.
Payments in and out
Payments in and out of your Fixed Saver can only be made using the Faster Payment Service.
You can make payments into your account from another bank or building society during the deposit window. These inbound payments will usually show in the App immediately, but we suggest that you check with the other bank or building society that they’re able to transfer the funds before your deposit window closes. We cannot accept liability for any payments from other institutions that we don’t receive during your deposit window. You’ll find more information about making payments in the General T&Cs.
In some circumstances (e.g. if we use your bank account details to verify your identity) you will only be able to make payments into your account from a specified UK bank account in your name.
Once you’ve paid money into your account, you can’t withdraw it until the end of your product term. The only exception is in cases of financial hardship, which will be assessed on a case-by-case basis and may result in us allowing you to withdraw some or all of the money from your account before the end of the term. If you ever need to tell us about financial hardship, please contact us via the Help button in the App – we’re here to help.
Our Fixed Saver is a non-transactional account, which means you cannot use it to deposit income or pay bills. We monitor payments in and out, to keep your account safe. If we see unusual activity, we may contact you and there may be a delay in processing payments while we complete fraud prevention checks.
The legal stuff
Changes to these T&Cs
We’ll give you 30 days’ notice to consider any changes to these T&Cs, unless they’re to your advantage, when we’ll make them straight away. In some circumstances, we may be required by regulation to give you more or less notice - in these cases, we’ll tell you how much time you have to review the changes. You can object to the changes before they take effect and depending on the circumstances, you may be able to close an impacted account; otherwise, you’ll be deemed to have accepted the changes from the date they take effect.
We’ll only make changes to these T&Cs:
- To reflect developments in our App or proposition (including our products / services);
- To respond proportionately to changes in the law or decisions of the Financial Ombudsman Service;
- To meet regulatory requirements;
- To reflect new industry guidance or codes of practice which raise standards of consumer protection;
- To proportionately reflect other legitimate cost increases or reductions associated with providing the particular product or service you use;
- To ensure we are being fair to all our customers; and/or
- To respond to changes in general banking practice for the benefit of all consumers.
We’ll only do this if we reasonably expect to be affected by one of the above reasons.
Compensation
Atom is covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). The FSCS can pay compensation to savers if a bank is unable to meet its financial obligations.
Most savers – including individuals and small businesses – are covered by the scheme.
An eligible saver is entitled to claim up to £85,000. For joint accounts, each account holder can claim up to £85,000 (a total of £170,000 where there are two account holders). The £85,000 covers all the funds held in the eligible customer’s accounts with the bank, including their share of any joint accounts, and not to each separate account.
We’ll share detailed FSCS information with you when you apply for a Fixed Saver account; and we’ll save this in your Vault once your account is opened. For more information about the FSCS (including amounts covered and eligibility to claim) please visit https://www.fscs.org.uk/. You can contact the FSCS directly with any compensation-related queries on 0800 678 1100 or 020 7741 4100.
Applicable law
These T&Cs are governed by the laws of England and Wales and if there’s any disagreement about them, or between us about your account, we each agree that this’ll be dealt with by the Courts of England and Wales.
Fixed Saver T&Cs_v4.0. Effective from 28/10/20.