How I manage my multiple bank accounts

Here’s how to manage direct debits and cycle money to get current account perks.

It’s a good idea to have more than one current account, but with each extra account comes more admin. The good news is that most of the task can be done in one go early on, and then looks after itself! Here’s how I do this for all my accounts.

Current account admin

From cashback to monthly rewards, there are all sorts of incentives and freebies you can get with multiple current accounts. And don’t forget bank switching bonuses.

But many account switches and perks require extras like direct debits or minimum deposits each month. They also have fees and other requirements. Get them wrong and you could miss out or even lose money.

All this can put some people off. But it’s actually a lot easier to manage than you’d imagine, and I think the reward is well worth the effort.

Regular readers will know I have 15 different current accounts at the moment so I’ve got to have processes in place to make sure I don’t accidentally go overdrawn on one or miss out on a perk on another.

Minimum transfers

Many accounts require me to pay money in every month. If I didn’t I could miss out on all those little bonuses or get charged a monthly fee.

The good news is the money doesn’t need to remain in the account, and in most cases doesn’t need to be in one go, so you can hack this by moving the same money through all the accounts. Still that’s potentially a lot of transfers to process, which can take time.

If you have more than two or three accounts, then automation is the key. Set up standing orders to move the money on the same day each month. You can do this easily in your online or app banking.

If you do have multiple accounts with the same provider, transferring between them often doesn’t qualify (eg Halifax to Halifax), so you’ll need to factor this in.

Remember, it’s not just minimum deposits you need to cover here. There are those account fees, and in some cases you’ll want to be adding money to regular savers each month, so they need to be factored in.

There are three methods here:

The endless cycle

One trick is to move the same cash from account to account so it cycles through each one and back to the start, then repeats itself the next month and so on.

For example, you’ve got £2,000 in account a, which you transfer to account b, then to account c, then account d and finally back to account a. Then it repeats the next month, and so on.

The back and forth

Another option is to set up a standing order out of one account into another, and then back the next day. And then move the money into another account and back.

So you’re move £2,000 from account a to account b, then back to account a. Then move £1,000 from account a to account c, then back to account a. And so on.

It makes sense to spread these out through the month so you’re still only moving the same amount of cash. to make sure there is cash in the account to leave it in the first place.

The bitesize transfer

If you don’t have a large amount in your account to keep moving around, you can split the requirement into smaller chunks.

You can use either the endless cycle or back and forth methods to automate this – you’ll just have more standing orders in action.

Let’s say you have an account requiring £2,000 each month, you could use the same £500, and just deposit it and withdraw it four times to total a cumulative £2,000.

Account fees

Reward accounts are great – though you normally need to pay for them. As long as you’re making more that you put in then they can be worth it.

Direct debits

Quite a few switching offers and perks require a couple of direct debits each month. Often it’ll say ‘active’ direct debits, which technically could include any payment that has been taken in the last year.

But for the most part these direct debits have to come out every month to qualify – ruling out annual or quarterly payments.

If you run out of the obvious direct debits, there are a few easy ones you can set up which won’t cost you anything.

Collect rewards

Not all accounts will pay directly into your account. Instead, you sometimes need to cash out your payments.

• NatWest Reward (You need to log into the MyRewards site)
• RBS Reward (You need to log into the MyRewards site)

Log into the app

There’s one final ongoing requirement with some accounts – you might need to log in to your online banking or app on a regular basis.

How I manage multiple accounts

Making sure everything is OK

The standing orders and direct debits should all take care of themselves, but I’ll always check in. In part that could be required to trigger a reward, or to claim the perk itself.

But most importantly it’s to ensure nothing has gone wrong and there’s no risk of going overdrawn. I’ve set up two spreadsheets to keep an eye on things.

The first tells me all the standing orders and direct debits in and out of each account. If I need to amend the size of a standing order (for example when switching banks), I know exactly which is which. It only updates if I change bank.

The other spreadsheet is more active. Every month I open up the apps for my accounts and write down the balances. I try to do this in the first week of the month. This way I know exactly how much I have in each account, and overall.

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What each account requires

Minimum transfers

Account fees

Direct debits

Debit card spend

Collect rewards

These accounts require you to manually withdraw rewards.

• NatWest Reward (You need to log into the MyRewards site)
• RBS Reward (You need to log into the MyRewards site)

Log into the app

You must log in to the app to qualify for these accounts.

• NatWest Reward – every month
• RBS Reward- every month