I recently set one up. I think it was with the Childrens Mutual through Coop financial. It's an ethical stakeholder. I read lots of info and got rather confused but in the end decided it was quite easy.
All the sites seem to give the same information which is about the major types.
Cash - safe but not expected to have a high yield. No fee.
Stakeholder - usually market tracker. Expected better return than cash over 18 years. Max 1.5% fees.
Shares - Best return expected. Higher risk. No max fees.
Beyond that, the information I wanted to make a proper informed decision seemed to be a little thin on the ground.
- Cash has done better than Stakeholder over the last few years and there are comparisons of the best rates at various sites.
- There are no real comparisons of the stakeholder schemes because the economy has been variable and the fees are the same.
- Shares are across a variety of managed schemes and really you need to know about things like commodities movements and various arcane ratios for business sectors.
My final logic went like this :- Shares schemes are too complicated for me, certainly to manage on a regular basis. Cash schemes are better now but probably won't provide the best return in the long run. So only stakeholder are left. There's no decent comparisons available so my only choice was ethical or normal. Choosing ethical limited me to a couple of options. I can't remember what the final arbiter was, something like free gift or colour or something of that nature. Assuming the rates are roughly the same the important thing was to get the money in the account as soon as possible. If I don't like the options I can transfer it for free at a later date.
Then my son will spend it all in 18 years on wine, women and song. I don't mind the wine and the women so much, as long as he isn't using it to vote on the 2027 X-factor winner.
