How well do you monitor your savings account?
December 1, 2007 by admin
Filed under News, News-Banking
A recent report has suggested that many Brits with savings fail to monitor their savings accounts to the degree where many would not even notice right away if there was £1000 was missing from the account.
The report suggests that around 10% of those with savings would not immediately realize if £1000 went missing from their accounts. The survey was carried out by the mobile banking service Monilink, and comes at a time when many people may be at risk of fraudulent transactions following the loss of 25 million account details by HM Revenue and Customs.
It is thought that the reason why so many people are so lax about checking their bank accounts is a condition known as finance phobia, which is a condition where people are afraid to look at their accounts in case the balance is lower than expected. Officials from Monilink state that many people would simply prefer to ignore their accounts than risk looking at them and finding that their account balance was lower than they expected it to be. It is thought that around 20% of those that do not check their accounts blame finance phobia.
On a national basis there is over £43 billion pounds stored away in accounts that are not monitored by account holders. Around 50% of the British public do check their bank account balances on a weekly basis, but a further 25% only check their savings accounts once a month. Around 25% of those that were polled said that checking their accounts would materially affect their lives because they suffered sleepless nights as a result of their finances.
‘These findings suggest consumers need all the help they can get to keep tabs on their money. Poor money management and existence of “finance-phobia” in Britain is worrying considering the rising levels of debt problems Britons face.’
Tom Smith
1st December 2007
