The bank that won’t pass on rate rises unless you ring and ask:

Today Money Mail reveals the array of tricks greedy banks use to prevent interest rate hikes from being passed on to depositors.

In the worst-case scenario, one savings account provider – Sainsbury’s Bank – won’t increase the interest on its ‘variable’ Isa unless customers explicitly request it.

Buried in the terms and conditions for its 2.85 percent Variable Rate Cash Isa, Sainsbury’s warns “interest rates won’t automatically change to match new rates.”

That means anyone who opened the account before April last year was left with a rate of just 0.7 percent – despite the higher rate now being advertised to new customers on the website.

The bank confirmed that customers who call or contact the online chat service can have their rate increased to 2.85 percent.

Money Mail’s investigation found that other banks are also guilty of leaving customers in bad paying accounts while flaunting top deals to entice new customers.

In just over a year’s time, the Bank of England’s base rate has risen from a hefty 0.1 percent to 4 percent.

That should have given the long-suffering savers a huge boost. They had seen yields plummet as base rates fell in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, and rightly expected a turnaround.

But damning analysis for Money Mail by expert rate monitors Savings Champion found that some banks have not raised rates at all for hundreds of their products.

For example, Virgin Money has left rates on 343 accounts unchanged for at least a year as base rates skyrocketed.

The rate on his Easy Access E-Saver and Easy Access account has remained at an all-time low of 0.25 percent. This low rate now applies to 34 different issues of the E-Saver and 38 issues of the branch account Easy Access.

Virgin Money has also moved customers from other old savings deals to these zombie accounts.

Customers who had old issues from their Defined Access E-Saver account have switched to the 0.25 percent Easy Access E-Saver Issue 32. Still, the bank is offering new customers 2.25 percent on its latest account expense – the Defined Access E-Saver Release 17.

Santander launched eSaver Issue 20 last July and paid 0.75 percent. In November it launched eSaver Issue 21 and paid 1.5 percent – but didn’t raise the rate for customers who had taken out the old Issue 20 just four months earlier.

In other cases, Savings Champion’s analysis found that banks, including the AA and Allied Irish Bank, still pay as little as 0.01 percent on some accounts.

Just a few weeks ago, the bosses of Barclays, HSBC, Lloyds and NatWest were dragged before MPs on the Treasury Select Committee to discuss why they were so slow to raise savings rates but quick to raise mortgage and loan rates. loan costs.

Figures show that net interest margins at the big four banks – the difference between what they charge borrowers and pay depositors – rose 13 percent to 23 percent last year.

The five largest banks raised £39.9bn from this gap last year – an increase of £7bn.

Anna Bowes, of Savings Champion, says: ‘People look in the window at what’s on sale and think they deserve that top rate. But in many cases they are fobbed off with a lower rate.’

James Dover, 82, from Liverpool, is among those earning 0.7 per cent on Sainsbury’s Variable Rate Cash Isa, even though the general rate has been raised to 2.85 per cent.

He expected the rate to increase automatically because the name of the account said it was “variable.” But when he called last week, he was told his interest rate hadn’t changed since Sainsbury’s started raising rates for new depositors last July.

The difference in annual interest on £20,000 – the maximum you can pay to an Isa each year – between a rate of 0.7 per cent and 2.85 per cent is £430.

After his call, Sainsbury’s quickly raised the rate to 2.85 percent. The company confirmed to Money Mail that cash Isa customers should contact the company by phone or via a secure message online to increase interest.

James says, “I thought it was up to the bank to let people know about rate changes. Many like me are left on the lower rate without realizing it. It’s not fair.’

On the non-Isa version of this account, the Defined Access Saver, you must open a new account online or by phone to benefit from the new rate. It means existing customers have a rate of just 0.9 percent, compared to the 3.05 percent offered to new savers.

Other sneaky tricks include savings providers not having issue numbers on their accounts – instead, the rate earned depends on when the account was opened.

Tesco Internet Saver has a top rate of 2.9 percent including a bonus of 2.2 percentage points for a year. But your bonus can be much lower depending on when you opened the account. A year ago that was only 0.25 point.

Since then it has offered 17 different bonus rates between 0.4 points and the current 2.2 points. Once you’ve been in the account for a year, you’ll earn the standard rate of 0.7 percent.

Last week, Halifax and Lloyds adjusted their rates following the 0.5 percentage point hike in base rates in early February.

But they continued only one-tenth of the rise. Halifax now pays 0.7 per cent on balances up to £10,000 in its Everyday Saver and 0.8 per cent on balances up to £50,000.

At Lloyds you earn 0.65 per cent on up to £25,000 in the account. Barclays Everyday Saver is stuck at 0.55 percent.

NatWest Flexible Saver pays 0.65 per cent on balances up to £25,000, while the best of the bunch is HSBC Flexible Saver, which goes from 0.9 per cent to 1.3 per cent tomorrow.

An easy way to avoid the pitfalls is to open an account that pays the same rate to all savers. These include web-based Ford Money Flexible Saver and Investec Online Saver, both at 2.9 percent, and app-based Zopa Bank Instant Saver at 3.07 percent. NS&I’s Direct Saver, available over the phone or online, pays a competitive 2.85 percent.

Skipton BS Base Rate Tracker Issue 4, available by phone, online or through branches pays 2.9 per cent. It guarantees that the rate will move with the base rate for two years.

sy.morris@dailymail.co.uk