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How To Claim A Free £500+ From The UK Government 🤑
Teaching What School Doesn't
Noah Brierley
May 28, 2024
Read Time: 3 minutes
👋 Hey guys - Noah here,
In today’s edition, we are looking at
🤔 What is a Child Trust Fund?
💸 How to claim a free £500 from the UK Government
🤷 What to do with the money you claim
🤑 Yes I’m Serious… A Free £500+
Whenever I talk about this, it shocks so many people….
So brace yourself.
If you were born in the UK between 1 September 2002 and 2 January 2011, the Government will have automatically set up a child’s trust fund for you with £250. Or if your family was lower income, £500.
And if you turned 7 before the first of August 2010, the government would have given you another £250 or £500!
Even if you don’t fall into this category, this is still worth knowing about. I’m sure you will know several people who qualify for this money!
What was a Child’s Trust Fund? It was a long term, tax-free savings account set up by the UK Government. It aimed to give young people a boost in their finances when they become adults.
Right now, there is an estimated 1 million Child Trust Fund accounts that have not yet been claimed! That’s HUNDREDS of MILLIONS of pounds 😅 💷
How much could my account be worth?
In July 2023, a cross-party panel of MPs said a total of £1.7B was sitting in unclaimed CTFs.
The amount in one of these accounts depends on several factors:
The amount your parents added to the account while you were young
The amount of interest that got paid into your account
How much money your family earned as a child
]]My Trust fund was around £2,000. £500 was from the Government and the rest was from parents/ interest. 🤑
According to the latest figures from HMRC, the average balance of a CTF stands at £2,100 – but obviously, you could have more or less than this.
How to Claim Your Trust Fund
Once you turn 18 you can
The first and easiest step is to ask your parents if they remember setting one of these up. 🤔
But many parents will have lost/ forgotten about these accounts.
And in some cases, if your parents didn’t set one up for you, HMRC will have automatically done it.
To locate where your Trust Fund is, you can use HMRC’s free tool, which I have linked here.
You want to hit ‘Start Now’ under ‘Ask HMRC To Find A Child Trust Fund’. To start this process you’ll need a Government Gateway ID. If you don’t have one you can easily sign up for free.
Fill in your details.
HMRC will contact you within three weeks. It will tell you which financial provider holds your Child Trust Fund.
Contact your provider. They should be able to give you all the details you need!
What should you do with your money?
The truth is, it is up to you!
There are several ways to go. Here are some ideas below.
Use the money to start a side hustle. £500 - £1000 is more than enough to start anything on a small scale and a great way to multiply that money quickly.
Reinvest that money into good stocks and shares ISA. I would recommend Trading 212. This will mean that all your returns will be tax-free.
Reinvest that money into a good Cash ISA savings account (make sure it’s instantly withdrawable). Trading 212 has a solid cash ISA that pays over 5% annual interest. You can use this amount as an emergency fund.
Use the money to travel. Perhaps you want to do a gap year. Travelling is a great way to learn more about yourself and life!
Put it towards getting a car (that process is not cheap - you’ll need every penny you can get lol!)
Have any more questions?
Feel free to respond to this email and I’ll get straight back to you :)
👀 Things I’m Liking Right Now:
Snoop - a free money management app📗
This app automatically sorts through your bank accounts
You can then use it to see which ones to cancel
It uses AI to show where you can save more money
If you use the link, I may receive some commission :)
Ready to take the next step?
If you haven’t yet, join the hundreds of others who are part of the Teaching What School Doesn’t Skool Community.
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