Icesave have increased the interest rates on two of its savings accounts from 25 June.

The Icelandic bank has increased the interest rate on its Icesave Easy Access Savings Account from 6.05% to 6.30% as well as increasing the AER on its Icesave Fixed Rate Savings Account from 7.01% to 7.06%.

With these two Icesave Savings Accounts, you can choose to have your interest paid monthly or yearly and, because the bank is registered with the Financial Services Authority (FSA), be safe in the knowledge that your money will be covered under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) even though the bank is Icelandic.

The Icesave Easy Access Savings Account gives the saver online access to their money 24 hours a day, seven days a week and guarantees to beat the Bank of England base rate until October 2011 and match it until 31st January 2013. To open the account, you need a deposit of £250 and there are no catches or penalties if you withdraw your money.

The Icesave Fixed Rate Savings Account is a term account and you will therefore not be able to make any deposits or withdrawals once the account has been opened. You can open an account with £1,000 and the interest rate of 7.06% will be fixed for the entire term of the account; a time period you can choose out of either 6 months, 1, 2, or 3 years. The account also offers 24/7 online access so you can view the progress of interest being added to your account

To open either of these accounts you must be at least 18 years of age.

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Marks and Spencer has increased the online discount for its pet insurance from 5% to 20%.

You can choose between 2 levels of cover if you choose Marks and Spencer Pet Insurance.

What’s more, you will benefit from a 24-hour helpline, manned by veterinary nurses, which you can call to get advice about your pet’s health if you take out a policy. Plus, you will receive an extra 5% discount if you insure more than one pet with the insurer.

Marks and Spencer Pet Insurance will also give you funds towards advertising should your pet be stolen or go missing. Additionally, you will benefit from a 5% discount at Best Pet Pharmacy which offers repeat prescriptions, non-prescribed drugs, pet food and dietary pet food if you buy Marks and Spencer Pet Insurance.

Click the link for more information about Marks and Spencer Pet Insurance
 

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This month we are bringing you our top tips on how to protect your garden goodies from thieves and vandals because recent news has been full of stories about the increase in summer thefts from UK gardens.

Several publications have reported that Halifax Home Insurance found that garden theft goes up by 52% in the summer months, compared with the winter months.

Plus, recent research by NFU Mutual, the rural insurer, found that 33% of the people it surveyed had been victims of garden theft.

The thieves are set to come away with substantial hauls because, according to Lloyds TSB, the average garden contains goodies worth £1,237, with the typical cost of the most expensive garden item at £426.

Possibly more worrying is the fact that Lloyds TSB found that 55% of those surveyed have never even checked to see if their garden contents are covered by their home insurance policies.

Of course, the temptation is to avoid buying nice things for our gardens in case they get stolen. However, seeing as though summer sun in Britain is a rarity these days, we should be making the most of our gardens when we can and not let the thieves ruin it for us. So, how can we fight back against the garden criminals?

How to make a garden thief’s job difficult

1. Lock expensive items up
   
   If you have a shed, lock bicycles, children’s toys and moveable items of garden equipment in it. Make sure the shed is sturdy and the door is lockable.
    
2. Maintain your fencing
   

   If there are any obvious gaps in your fence which could make it easy for would-be thieves/vandals to enter your garden, get them fixed as soon as possible.

   Adding trellis to the top of your fencing can be another good deterrent because it won’t hold the weight of anyone trying to climb over and the thought of falling and getting caught may put someone off climbing over.
    

3. Chain things down
   
   Secure valuable items to large, heavy objects with chains and locks. If possible, an even better way would be to concrete them into the ground.
    
4. Make things heavier
   
   Putting bricks in the bottom of large plant pots, or weighing down garden furniture, could be enough of a deterrent for a number of would-be thieves, especially those who are intoxicated on the way home from a night out.
    
5. Mark your property

   Use a UV pen or data-tag to mark your garden goods with your postcode. This will aid the police in getting the item back to you if it is recovered. You can also get window sticker which say your property is marked in such a way and this too could put off any would-be thieves.
    

6. Check your locks

   Make sure your garden gate is tall enough and has a heavy duty lock on it to further restrict access to would-be criminals.
    

7. Protect with prickly plants
   

   Consider placing pretty defensive plants around statues and ornaments. The extra obstacle could really prove effective in deterring would-be criminals.

   You could also put them next to vulnerable areas of your fencing and around your shed too for further defence.
    

8. Install lights
   

   Fitting motion sensitive security lights around your more valuable items is an effective way of scaring off criminals. It will also alert your neighbours to possible trespassers and so potentially give you another line of defence.

   If you have the spare cash, you could even go one step further and install CCTV to watch over your garden and its contents.
    

9. Lay gravel paths

   It’s near impossible to walk quietly on gravel and criminals will be aware of this fact. If you lay gravel in and round your garden, criminals will likely avoid it because they know they need to rely on stealthy tactics to rob you of your goods.
    

10. Join a Neighbourhood Watch scheme

    Joining a neighbourhood watch scheme can help reduce crime because it dramatically increases the number of people watching over your garden. Some insurers even offer slightly lower premiums to those enlisted in a neighbourhood watch scheme.

    If there isn’t one already set up in your area, speak to your neighbours and find out if they would be interested in joining up.
     

11. Keep an inventory

    Take photographs of particularly expensive items and keep an inventory of the contents in your garden, then put them in a safe place. This will come in handy in aiding the recovery of your goods if they are stolen and should help with any insurance claims too.
     

12. Don’t give the criminals cover

    Try not to make your garden too secluded because this will give would-be criminals the cover the need to enter your garden and go about their business unnoticed.
     

13. Ask for an extra watchful eye while on holiday
    
    Before you go on holiday ask a neighbour or friend you trust to come and check on your house from time to time. Get them to remove mail from the doormat because this will be an indicator to criminals that no one is in and cancel the milk if you have that delivered on a regular basis.

    Get them to check on your garden once in a while too.

    You could even use a plug timer to schedule your living room lamp to come on for a few hours in the evening which may help to further deter would-be thieves.
     

14. Use your common sense
    
    Probably your strongest defence will be using your common sense to decide how to treat your garden goods. If they are really expensive, lock them away when not in use. If you think things are worth a lot of money and easy to steal, then so will the thief.
     
15. Check your home insurance

    Unfortunately, although these tips will help in ensuring the safety of your garden contents, they may not be 100% effective.

    Some home insurance policies come with cover for your garden furniture and some even provide cover for your plants too.

    When you make your inventory of garden contents (see tip 11 above);
    INSERT INTO `module_blog_posts` VALUES write down how much it would cost to replace the item if stolen or damaged and add up the total cost. Some insurance websites come with special calculators you can use to add this up for you.

    Once you have this figure, check your home insurance policy to see if you have adequate cover. If you don’t have enough cover, you can probably arrange extra cover with your home insurer.

    If you do, check which items are covered and which aren’t (in the exclusions section) and note this down.

    If you want these excluded items covered you will need to speak to your insurer to see if this can be arranged.

    Don’t forget to compare home insurance to get yourself the best policy for your needs and circumstances.

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The results for the compareandsave.com poll, ‘Have credit card offers improved, got worse or stayed the same over the past two years?’ are now in.

Thank you to all those people who took the time to participate in our poll and we hope you find the results as interesting as us.

Of the 301 people that took part in the poll, a massive 47.2% (142) said that they thought credit card offers had got worse over the past two years.

On the flipside, 25.2% (76) said that credit card offers had improved and 10.3% (31) said the offers had stayed the same.

The percentage of people who said they didn’t know if credit card offers had improved or not over the last two years was relatively high at 17.3% (52).

For those of you who thought credit card offers had deteriorated over the last two years, we currently have some great new credit card deals on the site.

The Capital One Platinum Credit Card is offering 0% on balance transfers and purchases until September 2009.

Plus, the Barclaycard Platinum Credit card is offering 6 months free gadget insurance which gives the cardholder £500 cover for gadgets and £500 for personal possessions.

Click the link to find out more about the Capital One Platinum Credit Card.

Intrigued by the gadget cover? Click the following link to find out more about the Barclaycard Platinum Credit Card.

We have today launched the new compareandsave.com breakdown cover poll. It is dotted around the site on most pages, so if you see it and have a few spare seconds, please have your say and make your vote.

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We have today launched a new poll on the site asking you, our readers, about how much you use your breakdown cover.

Breakdown cover is a service you can buy which would mean you could call for roadside help should your vehicle unexpectedly stop working. A mechanic will come and either try and temporarily fix your vehicle or, if that is not feasible, will arrange a recovery service back to your home or to the nearest garage so it can be repaired.

We would like to know how many times you have had to use your breakdown assistance in the last 12 months, if you have breakdown cover. If you don’t have breakdown cover we would like to know if it’s because you don’t have a car or just because.

The poll is dotted around on most pages of the site and just involves a simple click on the relevant answer and then a quick click on the submit button. You will also get to see how others have voted once you have submitted your response.

You can click on the link to find out more about the breakdown cover poll.

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You can now compare breakdown cover at compareandsave.com.

Breakdown cover will cover you in the event of your vehicle unexpectedly breaking down when you are on your travels.

The breakdown assistance policies you can buy vary but most basic ones will enable you to call out a mechanic to temporarily fix your vehicle to get you to your destination, or back to your home, or recover you to the nearest garage for your vehicle to be repaired.

The brilliant thing about breakdown cover is that you can still get cover even if you don’t have your own vehicle by buying a personal-based membership. With this type of cover, you can call for breakdown assistance no matter what vehicle you are in, even if you don’t own it, because it is you that is covered not the vehicle.

We are currently offering breakdown cover from a number of providers including several of the UK’s largest breakdown services including the RAC and Green Flag.

Click the link to find out more about Breakdown Cover.
 

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When people think of travel insurance, they generally think of it as being something to protect them while they are on holiday.

However, some people forget that travel insurance is also there to protect them before they set off.

Most travel insurance will include an element of cancellation cover to cover the traveller if they need to cancel the trip because events such as illness, the death of a ‘close family member’ and redundancy.

When you go to buy your travel insurance, the insurer will not ask you when you want cover to begin and end but will instead ask you for your departure and return dates.

This can be quite confusing for those people wondering about their cancellation cover because it would appear it doesn’t start until the day of departure. Some people may think this means that if you can’t make the holiday on the day of departure then your cancellation cover will kick in regardless of when the insurance was purchased.

What some people don’t realise is that this cover will only apply if the travel insurance policy was purchased before the event causing the need to cancel occurs. If a family member becomes ill after you have booked your holiday but before you have purchased your travel insurance and they then happen to pass away before you go on holiday, your insurer may not cover you for cancelling your holiday because the death will not be totally unexpected.

Another possible scenario could be that you have booked your holiday and get ill in the time frame before you purchase your travel insurance. Your cancellation cover will therefore not be valid if you were ill at the time you purchased your travel insurance because you will have been aware of the slightest possibility that you may not make your holiday.

The key thing to learn from these possible scenarios is that buying your travel insurance as close to the time of booking your holiday is probably the most sensible thing to do.

If you compare travel insurance it won’t take you long to find the policy that’s right for your individual needs and circumstances. If you have any doubts about whether or not you can get insurance cover, it is probably best to make these queries before you book your holiday.

Click the link to compare travel insurance

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The Halifax has launched its new All In One credit card offering 0% on balance transfers AND purchases for 10 months.

On top of these competitive interest-free periods on balance transfers and purchases the card also boasts a low typical variable APR of 15.9% on purchases and 23.95% on cash transactions.

In order to receive the 0% balance transfer offer, the transfer must be made within 90 days of the account opening and is subject to a 3% admin fee.

To qualify for the credit card you must be ordinarily resident in the UK and be at least 18 years old.

This is an offer which clearly illustrates the changing nature of credit card offers as issuers compete for custom.

Click the link for more information on the Halifax All In One Credit Card
 

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Yesterday we published a news story about the extra cost faced by those consumers who choose to pay for their annual car insurance premiums in monthly instalments (‘£624m bill for pay monthly car insurance customers’).

Many people choose to spread the cost of the insurance premiums over 12 months because they cannot afford to pay the lump sum in one go.

However, because the insurance company is effectively giving the customer a credit facility when they allow them to spread payments, it will charge the customer interest for the privilege. Unfortunately, the interest rates are quite high (above 20%) so the consumer ends up paying a substantial amount more for their insurance policy by paying monthly.

So, how can you avoid these interest charges?

A limited number of insurers don’t charge interest for paying by monthly instalments therefore one way would be to favour these insurers for your insurance products.

The possible flipside to this strategy is that the insurance policy may be more expensive than some of the others on the market and so you may be saving money in interest but you will be paying more for your policy anyway.

If, however, the policy is cheaper and doesn’t charge interest for paying monthly, you could be set to save a substantial amount of money using this method.

If you aren’t fortunate enough to find an insurance policy that is the right price and also payable monthly at no extra cost there are other ways you can spread the cost.

One way would be to get a 0% on purchases credit card with the longest interest-free period possible, pay for your insurance using this card and then pay the balance off in equal monthly instalments.

At the moment, the longest 0% offer on purchases comes with the Capital One Platinum credit card and lasts until September 2009.

Realistically speaking, if you got a credit card and managed to get its typical APR (around 15.9% on most credit cards on the market) it would still be cheaper to pay for your insurance using your credit card than pay the interest charged by your insurer.

Another alternative would be to raid your savings to pay for the lump sum and then replace the money monthly to your savings account instead of paying it monthly to the insurer. If you have a savings account paying even 7% interest, you will be paying a lot more out in interest charges to your insurer than you will be making on the same amount of money in your savings accounts. This means it would be more cost effective to use your savings to pay for the insurance and then pay yourself the money back over the course of the 12 months.

Whichever method you choose, be sure to make the quality of insurance cover your top priority and always choose the policy and method of payment which best suits your needs and circumstances.

Click the link for more information on the Capital One Platinum credit card.

Need motor insurance? Compare car insurance here.

Compare home insurance to find your next buildings and/or contents policy.

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Barclays have launched a new regular savings account which aims to help savers to reach their goals.

The Barclays Monthly Savings account offers a high fixed interest rate of 7.75% AER for 12 months if you deposit between £20 and £250 per month into the account by standing order.

One of the great things about this regular saver is its flexibility because it allows you to skip a payment, change your monthly standing order and make withdrawals if you need to. Most regular savers restrict you to one or two withdrawals per year. However, there are no withdrawal restrictions with the Monthly Savings account.

If you do choose to make a withdrawal you will earn the lower interest rate of 3.03% AER for the month when the withdrawal was made.

Your interest will be paid monthly so you will be able to see how well your savings are doing when you manage your account in branch, online or by phone.

The maximum amount you are allowed to deposit in this savings account is £3,000 over the 12 month term of the account. After the 12 months, your account will automatically be switched over to one of Barclays’ instant access savings accounts.

To apply for the Barclays Monthly Savings account you must be at least 16 years old and there is a limit of one account per customer.

Click the link to apply for the Barclays Monthly Savings account.

Want to save more than £3,000 in 12 months? Compare savings accounts to get the best savings rates

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