Question Time: Is saving 15% of my salary into my pension enough? How long do I keep financial docs? ISA rules when I die?

In our Question Time podcast, Martin Lewis gives you answers on anything and everything, including: I’m 23 and saving 15% of my salary into my pension, is that enough? I’m starting to see my credit card debt grow, what should I do? How long should I keep my financial documents for? What happens to an ISA when you die? Plus, we have a shares Junior ISA success! If you want to ask Martin a question, you now can! His Question Time podcast lets you ask Martin absolutely anything and everything (within reason!). So, if you’ve always wanted to know his favourite weather, which factor suncream he uses, or have a very complicated question about your finances, email it to [email protected] mailto:[email protected].

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:38Martin Lewis?

  I tried really hard, but no one was available.

• 0:41Speaker 03

  It's so brilliant that you've listened and you've been thinking about your pension at such a young age.

• 0:45Speaker 04

  Actually, that's £700 we had it on, we actually haven't cleared that.

• 0:49Speaker 03

  There is nothing worse than a tax investigation. You can effectively increase your ISA allowance, it's on top of your normal ISA allowance, that you can put those new assets in.

• 0:58Martin Lewis?

  Hello and welcome to the cunningly named The Martin Lewis Podcast. I do wonder what that's going to be about. And this is our Question Time episode, where you are Esquire's extremely savvy questioners. Get to ask me your questions on absolutely anything and everything, open brackets within reason, close brackets. This week, you ask me: I'm 23 and saving 15% of my salary into my pension, is that enough? I'm starting to see my credit card debt grow, what should I do? How long do I keep financial documents for? What happens to an ISA when you die? And a success: my daughter's shared junior ISA is up 24%. Play the theme tune.

• 1:53Martin Lewis?

  Hello and welcome to our Question Time edition of the podcast. Yes, the one where you can ask me questions on anything and everything, open brackets within reason, close brackets, and you know who's here. It's the curator of questions himself. Professor, Lord, Sir, Matthew Burnham, Esquire, PhD. I've changed it up.

• 2:16Speaker 05

  So many changes.

• 2:18Martin Lewis?

  I've added in a Lord.

• 2:18Speaker 05

  A Lord. I like Lord. You know, I think I would take it if I was.

• 2:22Martin Lewis?

  If you're offered.

• 2:23Speaker 05

  If I was offered, I think I would take it.

• 2:25Martin Lewis?

  Well, I moved your PhD to the back rather than having the doctor in the front. I don't know what you thought of that.

• 2:30Speaker 05

  I think I prefer doctor to PhD. I know it's the same thing, but.

• 2:34Martin Lewis?

  You're very picky.

• 2:35Speaker 05

  I am very picky. I love these titles.

• 2:37Martin Lewis?

  To first time listeners, these are all legitimate titles that Matt has within the canon of the podcast.

• 2:45Speaker 05

  But earned titles still.

• 2:46Martin Lewis?

  Potentially earned titles, potentially. And actually, when I called you on Friday to discuss the Last Question Time podcast, and I, as I called you in our just private phone call, referred to you by those titles.

• 3:01Speaker 05

  You did.

• 3:02Martin Lewis?

  You then referred to me as Mr Martin Lewis, and I actually have a CBE.

• 3:08Speaker 05

  Yes, you corrected me.

• 3:09Martin Lewis?

  Even put that in my title, and I'd just given you all of those honorifics.

• 3:13Speaker 05

  But no, you don't use it, so.

• 3:15Martin Lewis?

  No, I don't. I just feel, I don't know. It's interesting. I'm incredibly proud to have the honour of a CBE, but I do sort of feel that to put it after your name is just a bit too showy offy. I think it's something very British about not putting it after your name. Do you know what I mean? It comes on official letters to me or often addressed CBE, or if someone's formally inviting me to something. But I feel like putting it in your social media profile or something like that is just a little bit.

• 3:41Speaker 05

  What about your email signature? Is it in that?

• 3:45Martin Lewis?

  Hold on. No, it isn't in my email signature. It isn't in my email signature. I don't know. It just feels a little, it feels a little bit like na, na, na, na, na.

• 3:54Speaker 05

  No, you've earned it.

• 3:55Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, I have. I have. But I will, sometimes it's better, there are certain things that you don't call yourself, and I think it's better for other people to call you. It's interesting because people often say, oh, you're so cool. You call yourself a consumer champion. I've never called myself a consumer champion. Other people have called me consumer champion. It is not a term I think I can self imbue. So, and I think even though I do have the CBE. Anyway, we're talking about, because there's big news today, everybody. The big news is Rosie, for those who don't know, Rosie works with me. She is my live on air fact checker and brilliant, super clever researcher. She's always a part of the pod, but she never speaks.

• 4:39Martin Lewis?

  She is a woman of mystery, who many of you wonder what the real Rosie is like. Now, Rosie, there was a staff party in Manchester yesterday. Rosie went up to Manchester and she's actually in the studio with you, Matt, not with me.

• 4:53Speaker 05

  Yes, she is. She's sat opposite me.

• 4:54Martin Lewis?

  So this is, this is quite difficult because normally I ask Rosie things and then I reply for her based on the looks that she gives me back. You're going to have to be the voice of Rosie today.

• 5:04Speaker 05

  Okay, so I'll do my first one. I looked at her while you were introducing her and she smiled in a way of saying, oh, Martin, shut up.

• 5:12Martin Lewis?

  Oh, Martin, shut up. Oh, it wasn't, I thought it would be the Mona Lisa smile. I often get the Mona Lisa smile. It's sort of a smile, but I'm not sure if she's slightly going, I'm cringing, but okay.

• 5:22Speaker 05

  It's definitely that.

• 5:26Martin Lewis?

  All right, first question. First question, stop in there.

• 5:30Speaker 05

  What are we doing?

• 5:31Martin Lewis?

  We're doing first question.

• 5:32Speaker 05

  What's the first question?

• 5:33Martin Lewis?

  I don't know.

• 5:33Speaker 05

  Oh, Isaac.

• 5:35Martin Lewis?

  Yes.

• 5:35Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 5:35Martin Lewis?

  You know the first, you're the curator of questions. Don't ask me what the first question is. You're, you're, it's your job.

• 5:40Speaker 05

  Right, Isaac has emailed this in.

• 5:42Martin Lewis?

  Cringe, I'm not cringey.

• 5:44Speaker 05

  You call yourself cringey.

• 5:46Martin Lewis?

  No, I said I wasn't sure if Rosie's look was saying I was cringey. I didn't say I was cringey. Anyway, let's do the question.

• 5:51Speaker 05

  Yes, Isaac's emailed this one in to [email protected]. He just says, Dear Martin, which I don't know if I'm happy with or not.

• 5:59Martin Lewis?

  I think, I think after our, our earlier bantery interchange, I like it.

• 6:03Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 6:04Martin Lewis?

  Yeah.

• 6:04Speaker 05

  Is it because I've been off for so long?

• 6:06Martin Lewis?

  You've been off for six weeks. Don't, you're not going to get the Dear Martin and Matts when you decide to go gallivanting around.

• 6:11Speaker 05

  I know. Anyway, he says, I've got a question about pension savings. I'm aware of the general rule of thumb that to maintain a similar standard of living in retirement, you should contribute roughly half your age as a percentage of your salary into your pension from when you start working.

• 6:25Martin Lewis?

  Well, that's brilliant. That is my rough rule of thumb. Yeah, you take your age. So if you start your pension at 30, half it, 15% of your total income. Your salary should be going into a pension to give you a decent income at retirement. It is not a hard and fast rule. Many people do not do it, but it is a nice intuitive rule that helps and also makes the point very strongly. Start at 20, it's 10%. Start at 30, it's 15%. Start at 40, it's 20%. The earlier you start, the better. Do carry on.

• 6:57Speaker 05

  He goes, I'm currently 23 and I've just started my first job after university. I'm contributing 9% of my salary into my pension and my employer is also contributing 6%. So in total, 15% is going in. Is that good?

• 7:09Martin Lewis?

  Very good. Brilliant. Well done you.

• 7:12Speaker 05

  He says, what I'm not sure about is whether the half your age figure, so about 11 and a half percent for me, refers to my personal contribution only or the total, including employer contributions. I'm trying to understand whether I should be increasing my own contributions. He then says, love the podcast. It's saved me plenty of money since I've started saving.

• 7:30Martin Lewis?

  Well, wonderful, Liza, and it's so brilliant that you've listened and you've been thinking about your pension at such a young age. It's really important because the earlier you start putting money in the pension, the reason it's beneficial is you'll have it in an investment, but you effectively have that investment can compound over so many years. And I'm making this number up now. I used to have an actual figure, but I'm going to sort of make it up. So it's a conceptual, not a numerical idea. But for every pound you put in, in your early twenties, you're going to have to put in 30 quid in your fifties to get the same result. So it's so worthwhile doing it early when you've got disposable income, maybe you're living at home, I don't know. Now, the general rule of thumb is about the total going in, so it includes your employer contribution. So you are over the rule of thumb.

• 8:15Martin Lewis?

  That is not me saying not to. It's brilliant to get a head start, especially at this age. If you do not need that money, don't lower your contributions. And why I find our pension rules so frustrating? I am a supporter of pension auto-enrollment, just to say here. We're talking private pensions here. Workplace pensions are a private pension. Generally, you're building up the money purchase pensions or defined contributions. You're building up a pot of money. You're putting money in, it's being invested and you'll have that when you retire and you can take it out currently age 55, though the rule is changing to age 57, probably when Isaac retires, it'll be somewhere around age 60. And if you put money in your workplace pension, your employer has to contribute.

• 8:58Martin Lewis?

  The minimum figures are you put 5% in, they put 3% in. I'm glad to see it's higher in this particular case. Here's my problem, Matt.

• 9:05Speaker 05

  Go on.

• 9:07Martin Lewis?

  The rules say auto enrolment only starts once you're aged 22 and earning £10,000.

• 9:15Martin Lewis?

  If you earn £6,240, you can ask to be in your firm's pension scheme and it can't refuse and it must contribute too. And you can do that when you're 18, 19, 20, 21. Why don't we just make it automatic if you're earning 10 grand at 18, that it goes into your pension because it means people are starting even earlier. And often at that age, funnily enough, they do have disposable income because many people are living at home and it will be tougher later on when they have many more costs to put money away in their pensions. And the law actually changed, so the, this is really complex now, the law changed a couple of years ago, giving the government the ability to change the rules so that auto enrolment started at a younger age.

• 9:59Martin Lewis?

  But they have never enacted that and I think it's a shame. I think far more people should be more like Isaac. Well done, Isaac. Hopefully this will bear huge fruit. And if you really want to get complicated, grandparents, there's actually a rule that says you can contribute £3,600 to a pension even for a non taxpayer or the non taxpayer can do it themselves and they still get relief. So you can put £2,880 a year in a pension. The pension company, the relief will come in, in a private pension, that'll mean they actually have £3,600 saved on the back of putting £2,880 in. And you can do that for a child, you can do it for a baby, of course. Not only grandparents can do it, parents can do it, aunties and uncles can do it.

• 10:41Martin Lewis?

  But it's often a great way for grandparents to put money away for their grandchildren and be remembered once they're aged 60 and get their pension. You go, my grandpa, my grandma started this off. It's quite nice.

• 10:54Martin Lewis?

  Right, Matt, it's an even number. It's a caller. Who've you got for me?

• 10:59Speaker 05

  It's a caller. Chris in Chelmsford is here. Hi, Chris.

• 11:03Speaker 04

  Hi, are you okay?

• 11:04Martin Lewis?

  Hi, Chris.

• 11:05Speaker 04

  Hi, yeah.

• 11:06Martin Lewis?

  Welcome on board. What can we do for you?

• 11:09Speaker 04

  Well, I suppose it's a...

• 11:10Martin Lewis?

  And I hope it's not just for a badge.

• 11:13Speaker 04

  No, not at all, not at all. My email definitely didn't say that.

• 11:16Speaker 05

  Isn't there a mention somewhere in your email about a badge?

• 11:19Speaker 04

  No, no, no.

• 11:20Speaker 05

  Or a squire? No, maybe I imagined.

• 11:22Speaker 04

  Might have signed off with a squire-to-be, maybe.

• 11:25Martin Lewis?

  Well, you are already a squire and you are gonna get a badge, which is very exciting. And just for anyone listening who doesn't know, if your voice is in this podcast, either on a voice-record message or a caller, you get one of our special new exclusive ESQ badges with a picture of my face, saying that you're an extremely savvy questioner. And in one of the full stops, I've learnt, I haven't seen it yet, there is a tiny picture of Matt, too. What more could anyone want? Well, probably your question answered, so let's do that.

• 11:56Speaker 04

  Okay, so I suppose it's kind of three questions in one, if that's okay.

• 12:00Martin Lewis?

  Greedy. Let's do it.

• 12:02Speaker 04

  While I've got you. So currently, I've got a credit card that I generally use for work expenses. But over the last year or so, I've kind of spent outside of that and ended up with about £700 on it. I'm trying to clear it in full.

• 12:18Martin Lewis?

  In full. Well done.

• 12:21Speaker 04

  But that's not always easy, so it's starting to build up a little bit of interest. So I suppose my kind of question is what to kind of do with that. So me and my wife, when we got married, we added all our credit cards to one balance transfer card, which has got about 24 months left on 0%, which we are more than comfortable in paying.

• 12:46Martin Lewis?

  And will you clear that before the 24 months ends?

• 12:51Speaker 04

  Not on how we're paying it now, but we could if we probably wanted to.

• 12:57Martin Lewis?

  And you've got a pretty decent credit score. So if you needed to, you could either clear it or you could shift it again at the end of that balance transfer period onto another 0% card.

• 13:06Speaker 04

  Yep.

• 13:06Martin Lewis?

  Okay, so in my head, I'm not worried about that. I don't want you building up debt, but it's at 0%, which is as good as it gets. Okay.

• 13:13Speaker 04

  Excellent. So yeah, I suppose my question is kind of what to do with that one. So we've got, as I said, we've got another card that has that 0% on it. My view, or my preference would be to take out a 0% card in my name and then transfer this excess balance to that. And then it's comfortable for me to pay off in sort of 24 months. We could pay it off from savings, but I'm a little bit cautious and don't necessarily want to do that. I kind of want it saved for a rainy day. Another thing we thought about is on our other card, we were sent sort of an offer to transfer another 0% for 12 months. But my worry with

• 13:55Speaker 04

  that is, is from what I've kind of read is, I don't really know how those payments work. So if we put it on that card and we were paying the same amount off or a little bit more each month, how do they split that payment? You know, would it just pay off the original balance first? And then at the end of that 12 month offer, we might have paid off more off the original balance, but actually that £700 is still there.

• 14:19Martin Lewis?

  So you've already got debt on that card, have you?

• 14:22Speaker 04

  Yes, that's the one we've got the 0% on.

• 14:24Martin Lewis?

  Okay, fine. Right.

• 14:26Speaker 04

  And then they've offered us a promotion for, to add on an additional 0% balance transfer, which is one of the options we're looking at. But I don't know how they do the payment. I don't want to kind of get to the end of those 12 months and go, actually, that's £700 we added on. We actually haven't cleared that. And we're now adding paying interest on that, even though the other card or the original balance still has a 0% on it for a couple of months.

• 14:49Martin Lewis?

  Okay, so let's try and break this down a little bit. First of all, can I ask, do you know why the in full rule is the in full rule?

• 14:58Speaker 04

  Because it's irrelevant on what the essentially it's what the balance is on there that you pay the interest on. So even if there's a pound on there, you pay the interest essentially for the whole amount that was on there for the month. Is that correct?

• 15:11Martin Lewis?

  It's exactly correct. If you had a thousand pounds on it and you paid nine hundred and ninety nine pounds and ninety nine p off, you would still pay interest on the entire thousand pounds. If you paid a thousand pounds off, you don't pay any interest. So that's the reason it's such good. So you've got that. So I'm going to answer technically. There's a little bit of me that feels I need to give a bit of avuncular, for those who don't know, that means uncle-like caution, if you don't mind. You've got savings and you're building up this debt. But and while the debt, you're managing it the right way because you're moving it to zero percent and you're utilizing the credit that you've got to do so. There's a little bit of concern here that you are

• 15:55Martin Lewis?

  flippantly building up a bigger debt balance than you need. And I just think it's it's worth me saying before I answer, I'd like you to be a bit more cautious. You know, ultimately, debt is debt and it has to be repaid. The fact there's no interest on it, yes. I mean, you can stews where you're deliberately building up artificial debt in order to make money from keeping it in a savings account. And that's a that's a good clever thing to do. And yes, you've got the money in the savings. So you're going to me, I don't want to use my savings because I want those for a rainy day and all my debt is at zero percent. Therefore, actually, I'm up in doing it that way, which is good conceptually. But you're actually spending

• 16:36Martin Lewis?

  more than you earn and building up debt from that. And I don't like that for you, if that's fair.

• 16:42Speaker 04

  Yeah, I think that's probably my wife's concern with with getting another card.

• 16:49Martin Lewis?

  Well, I think what we have to do is we have to deal with the situation that you are in, but I do think that you should probably see this as a bit of a warning sign. And I would say from this moment on, you do not need to build up any more debt. Now, and I would probably, I mean, if your credit score allows it, I'd probably have a separate card for work expenses, a reward card, because hopefully they're going to pay you on time. And therefore you can separate that out from your own spending. And in your own spending, you should be paying off in full each month, right? And you shouldn't be building up and running up a bigger debt. And I say this, I say this with love in the right way, not, I'm not telling you off. But I think just, just listening to this, it is setting off

• 17:33Martin Lewis?

  not loud alarm bells, but a tiny little bit of ringing, a tiny little bit of ringing.

• 17:39Speaker 04

  That's my aim is to, is to get it. So it's all clear. Essentially start afresh. We know where we're at.

• 17:45Martin Lewis?

  Well, so on that basis, well then, yes, absolutely. You, I would, I would go quite simply and get yourself, as long as you've done, you go and do an eligibility check and it's saying that you can get a new card, I would get yourself a new card. You can even go, right now, there's 13 months, 0% fee free available. And if it's a small amount, you might be able to clear it within that period because you know that when you do a balance transfer, that's a balance transfer for those who don't know is when you get a new card that pays off debts on existing cards for you. So you owe the new card, but at a better interest rate, hopefully a 0% and interest free interest rate, you normally pay a fee up to three or four percent of the amount you're transferring. But right now, there are cards available where you can transfer for up to 13 months with no

• 18:28Martin Lewis?

  fee. So then there's absolutely no cost. So perhaps as a discipline thing, if you were looking to get a 0% card anyway, you've got your 24 months that you're paying off. You've got, you could get yourself a shorter card just for this 700 quid, which has no fee. So there's absolutely no cost to doing it and you can clear that. And then I would suggest, you know, the danger of credit cards, they're very cheap when they're 0%. The danger of them is they are an open ended borrowing facility. And I always say borrowing is for A one-off planned deliberate purchase where you've budgeted the repayments. Borrowing willy-nilly because you have a few months where you spend more than you need is a danger sign. So I don't think you're in any danger. I'm not saying your finances are a big problem.

• 19:11Martin Lewis?

  I think there is a danger of getting into bad habits here.

• 19:15Speaker 05

  Yep.

• 19:15Martin Lewis?

  But that's roughly where I'd go. Does that... Are you happy with what I've said? I hope I haven't been rude or offended you.

• 19:20Speaker 05

  No, no, no, no, no. Makes perfect sense. And I think your sort of hesitancy and caution there is exactly the same as my wife's with the situation. So I completely get that.

• 19:28Martin Lewis?

  Sometimes the right thing to do is listen to your wife.

• 19:32Speaker 05

  We won't tell her. Oh, she'll probably listen to this.

• 19:34Martin Lewis?

  She'll listen, yeah.

• 19:34Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 19:35Martin Lewis?

  All right. It sounds like you're doing well. I think it's a good conversation. And actually, asking the question when you're in your position is important because hopefully it just firms everything up. Little bit tighter budgeting, get these cards paid off, listen to your wife, and it should all be fine.

• 19:50Speaker 05

  Excellent. All right. I appreciate that, Martin.

• 19:52Martin Lewis?

  Thank you. And you're getting a badge. What more could you want, Chris?

• 19:55Speaker 05

  What more could you want? That's it. What a day with the sun shining and I get a badge.

• 19:59Martin Lewis?

  Chris Hayden Esquire, thank you.

• 20:02Speaker 05

  Thank you very much.

• 20:03Martin Lewis?

  Cheers, mate.

• 20:03Speaker 05

  Cheers, Chris.

• 20:04Martin Lewis?

  Bye-bye.

• 20:06Martin Lewis?

  Are you sitting there thinking, oh, I know what I wanted to ask him? Well, this is your opportunity. If you've got a question, then just send them in to [email protected]. And please do start them Dear Martin.

• 20:21Speaker 05

  No, Dear Matt.

• 20:22Martin Lewis?

  Dear Martin.

• 20:23Speaker 05

  Dear Matt.

• 20:25Martin Lewis?

  Okay, Matt, it's a read. It's question number three.

• 20:28Speaker 05

  Question three is from Susan. Or Suzanne? How would you pronounce it? Suzanne? Susan?

• 20:33Martin Lewis?

  It depends. It could be both.

• 20:34Speaker 05

  I'm gonna say Su.

• 20:35Martin Lewis?

  And do you know what? You were quite rude about my pronunciation off air a moment ago. Because I was saying, when my brain was elsewhere, okay, I said opaque as opposed to opaque. And you and Lady Rosie were both... Lady Rosie was doing it far more kindly than you, was slightly making fun of me, and there were ageist remarks going on. So now you want my help to know how to say Suzanne or Susan. I'm not giving it.

• 21:00Speaker 05

  That's fair.

• 21:01Martin Lewis?

  You're gonna hoist your own petard, young man.

• 21:03Speaker 05

  That's fair enough. I'm gonna say Suzanne because there's a Z. So Suzanne has emailed in, [email protected]. Hello, Martin and Matt. The correct way.

• 21:13Martin Lewis?

  Hello, Susan or Suzanne.

• 21:15Speaker 05

  Or Suzanne. She says, I enjoy listening to your podcasts. Could you answer the following? I'm trying to streamline my filing by keeping online records. Which documents should you keep original paper copies of?

• 21:28Martin Lewis?

  What an interesting question. The conventional wisdom is you only need to keep bank, credit card and other personal finance documents for six years because HMRC, the tax office, is said to only be able to ask you to go back that far. Now, actually, HMRC only requires most tax records to be kept for people doing self-assessment for 22 months after the end of the tax year. Limited companies generally must keep accounting records for at least six years. But I would probably go for the six-year rule anyway for safety, just in case you have a tax investigation, because there is nothing worse than a tax investigation. They have huge powers. It can be very distressing. What was that £52 you got from that? I don't even know who the company was.

• 22:11Martin Lewis?

  You know, so you just want to keep those records. Beyond that, I have a very different take to other people. And I am going to read you something now, because I was hastily finding it while you were asking me, from a blog I wrote back in 2013. Were you still in school, Matt?

• 22:30Speaker 05

  Yes, I had just started my sixth, so A-levels. I'd just started A-levels.

• 22:36Martin Lewis?

  So you were too young to have even read this blog at the time?

• 22:39Speaker 05

  Yeah, I don't think I knew who you were then.

• 22:40Martin Lewis?

  You probably wouldn't have done that. So in that blog, I specifically said, "Evidence of systemic mis-selling often takes years to work through the system. If it's related to a pension, it could be many decades. So it's impossible now to say what you may need the paperwork of in a few years' time. Therefore, for safety, keeping old documents as long as you can, even for now closed products, is a reasonable precaution." And I did it in a blog entitled "How Long to Keep Your Documents For?" Since that point, we have had the car finance mis-selling scandal, where you can now claim back to 2007, but the biggest problem people have is finding their own documentation.

• 23:23Martin Lewis?

  So obviously with car finance, that worked well for anyone who was following that advice that I gave in 2013. And that's really my read-across. While for complaints or firms to the ombudsman, the usual rule is six years from it when it happened, those rules can stretch when there's widespread mis-selling. So what I would say is... You don't want to be keeping a record of every payment you've ever made. But for most major transactions, products or services, I would want to keep my sign up documents, any upgrade documents and any closure documents, which detail exactly what was paid and what wasn't paid and what the terms were. So here's my list of what I would suggest. Any product that you sign up for and any product, once you've paid it off,

• 24:07Martin Lewis?

  I would keep the details of the terms that you signed up to and that you had when you got it in the first case. And the details of how much it was for, and I would store that digitally, but not all the payments in between. So applications and agreements for loans, credit card, mortgages, car finance, hire purchase. Couple of bank statements a year showing interest fees or add-ons. And before switching or closing accounts, download your key statements and agreements. Opening or upgrading paperwork for financial products like packaged bank accounts and savings. Booking confirmations for flights or costly travel, because you might be able to back claim those two. You won't need to keep those so long. And costly purchases, keep a record of who you paid and when, and keep the receipts and any warranty or guarantee.

• 24:50Martin Lewis?

  So anything that's enough to prove what you had is where I'd go with this.

• 24:57Martin Lewis?

  Okay, ye guru of the format, it's question number four. It's even, we must have a caller. Who's on the phone?

• 25:05Speaker 05

  And we don't.

• 25:07Martin Lewis?

  What?

• 25:07Speaker 05

  Have a caller.

• 25:08Martin Lewis?

  Matt?

• 25:08Speaker 05

  I know. So I tried really hard, but no one was available to come on and talk to you. No one wanted a badge. In fact, no, they all wanted badges. In fact, they all expressly said how much they wanted to come on and wanted a badge, but couldn't make it work because of meetings and childcare issues, things like that.

• 25:24Martin Lewis?

  Well, then there's no badge, people.

• 25:26Speaker 05

  No badge.

• 25:26Martin Lewis?

  There's no badge.

• 25:27Speaker 05

  I did say we'd read it out.

• 25:28Martin Lewis?

  We'll give you the answer. We'll give you the information. We can never deprive you of that information. But badges are sacrosanct. If you're not willing to lend us your voice, we're not willing to give you a badge.

• 25:38Speaker 05

  But you can still.

• 25:39Martin Lewis?

  That's the type of people we are, isn't it, Matt? We're tough, we're hard, we're mean, we're sticklers for the rules. We are. I wanted to do badge something, but I couldn't come up with anything. We are, we are badgers.

• 25:51Speaker 05

  No.

• 25:53Martin Lewis?

  It didn't work.

• 25:54Speaker 05

  But, but you can call yourself an esquire if we read out your question, right?

• 25:58Martin Lewis?

  Yeah.

• 25:58Speaker 05

  Yeah, so that's fine.

• 26:00Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, you're still an esquire. I don't want to deprive you of that.

• 26:02Speaker 05

  Just no badge.

• 26:03Martin Lewis?

  But badges are, badges are special.

• 26:04Speaker 05

  Okay, okay.

• 26:05Martin Lewis?

  So have we sent out to all the people so far? Yeah, are we, are we up with our backdating of badges for all the people who have promised badges?

• 26:13Speaker 05

  Yes, to everyone who's come back to me and said with their address, I have sent them out and I sent them out a few days ago. So they should be on the way.

• 26:20Martin Lewis?

  Have we had any, thank you for the badges. I really love them responses yet?

• 26:23Speaker 05

  Not yet. It's only been a couple of days though, so.

• 26:25Martin Lewis?

  You must keep us in touch on that, Matt.

• 26:26Speaker 05

  I will, I will.

• 26:27Martin Lewis?

  Because I am, I'm, I'm highly invested.

• 26:29Speaker 05

  Okay.

• 26:30Martin Lewis?

  In, in badge gate.

• 26:32Speaker 05

  I think a lot of people are.

• 26:33Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, yeah.

• 26:34Speaker 05

  Shall we go to this question?

• 26:35Martin Lewis?

  I don't want to badger you about it. That was better than my first badger. Yeah.

• 26:40Speaker 05

  Right, Jordan's emailed in. He's emailed in an investing success.

• 26:45Martin Lewis?

  You know, I'll pin the blame on you if they haven't gone there.

• 26:49Martin Lewis?

  Okay, sorry.

• 26:49Speaker 05

  Rosie's doing the smile that you mentioned.

• 26:55Speaker 05

  The Mona Lisa smile.

• 26:56Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, the cringe smile. Okay, fine. What's your, what's your question?

• 27:01Speaker 05

  So this one's from Jordan and he emailed, he has emailed in, Dear Martin, Matt, Matt and Simon and Rosie.

• 27:08Martin Lewis?

  Oh, well, that's very nice.

• 27:09Speaker 05

  I know. So everyone's included.

• 27:11Martin Lewis?

  And, and I'm sure, Matt, you were the first, Matt.

• 27:13Speaker 05

  I think I was. Yeah, I read it. I read it as that. Um, he has said, I hope you're all well. After listening to this week's Question Time pod, which was a couple of weeks ago. He said he was compelled to email in. It was in relation to the chap who wanted to swap his junior ISAs to investment junior ISAs, but was worried and was meeting resistance from his partner. He says, I've always been interested in investing and had some success during COVID in 2020, but lost some money. I've also tried to build an investment pot, but with recently having a child, that pot has depleted too unfortunately. However, when my daughter was born on New Year's Eve 2023, I almost instantly opened a stocks and share junior ISA for her and have been religiously invested £100.

• 27:56Speaker 05

  Month to build her a nest egg for the future. Due to my philosophy of time in the market, not timing the market. I went for the most ambitious managed fund available and have had an unbelievable result so far. It's not all been plain sailing and there have been some dramatic swings. But overall, her account is up to over 24%. Obviously, I've been very lucky, but I believe this impressive gain is because I'm consistently investing and buying the dips as well as the highs. Pound cost averaging, if you will. I've made 41 regular investments plus some additional totaling £4,600 and her account is now worth £5,700. He says, I know the thought of investing can be daunting, but the sooner you start, the more time you have for your kid's account to grow.

• 28:40Martin Lewis?

  Oh, well, Jordan, thank you very much. It's really important because, yes, we had, we had a caller on who was talking about putting money into a cash junior ISA and debating whether it should go into a shares junior ISA. And my view on this, as I've said many times before, is the golden rule for investing is you want to be using money that you don't need, that you can lock away for more than five years. And any money put in a junior ISA is by definition locked away until the child is 18 and cannot be accessed. So it's money you definitely currently don't need. And in most cases, especially because most people tend to start these things when the child is very young, you're locking it away for way more than five years. So it really fits in the centre of the Venn diagram of when it's right to invest.

• 29:22Martin Lewis?

  And it's lovely to hear that you've been doing that and it's working well and to have a testimonial. And it's actually given me an idea, Matt.

• 29:28Speaker 05

  Oh, go on.

• 29:30Martin Lewis?

  For a sort of, it's a new element to the Question Time podcast.

• 29:34Speaker 05

  Uh huh.

• 29:35Martin Lewis?

  So we normally ask people for questions.

• 29:38Speaker 05

  Yes.

• 29:38Martin Lewis?

  But often, and what I'm starting to find is we're getting some very personal questions, which are about life experience coming in and what you should do. We had the brilliant question from Sarah in last week's podcast about, you know, effectively she's saying, am I a failure? Because I'm nearly 50 and I haven't bought my own home. And I thought that was fascinating and no was my answer. But I actually think I would like to invite our listeners to get in touch if they have anything to add or any experience on the back of the questions that they've heard. And so it's more a response read rather than the question. And I think, which this was, this was the first example of it. So treat this listeners as an open invite.

• 30:21Martin Lewis?

  If you hear something and you want to engage in that debate and discussion, of course, this is the Question Time podcast. Well, Matt and I can bicker. We must always be nice and considerate to anybody who gets in to ask a question and give them a reasoned answer. But I know you would do that anyway. Then feel free to send us a note on your thought on it. It's going to lead to, we'll probably have to have some production thought, won't we, Matt? And do we play a clip of the question from the first time and how we deal with it in that sense?

• 30:46Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 30:47Martin Lewis?

  And you and I will chat about that.

• 30:48Speaker 05

  We shall.

• 30:49Martin Lewis?

  But I think it'd be quite a nice part of the show. What does Rosie think?

• 30:52Speaker 05

  She's looked at me, she's smiled, she's laughed. Yeah, she's nodded, she's nodded alongside me.

• 30:58Martin Lewis?

  Fine, so we are all of agreement. Yeah, so get your questions in, if you'd like a question. Get your Askan's Funny questions in, if you would like one of those. And get your responses in too now, we'll say, all to [email protected] and address them to Dear Martin.

• 31:17Speaker 05

  Or you could say Dear Matt.

• 31:19Martin Lewis?

  Dear Martin.

• 31:20Speaker 05

  Dear Matt.

• 31:21Martin Lewis?

  Or Dear Rosie. Matt, I think we can squeeze in one more quick question. Shall we have a fifth?

• 31:28Speaker 05

  Yeah, I've got one. I've got one from Mike. He has emailed in. He says, hi, Martin. Please can you tell me what happens to both cash and stocks and shares ISAs at death with regards to the tax implications?

• 31:39Martin Lewis?

  I can indeed. Let's start with inheritance tax. ISAs aren't special for inheritance tax purposes, is the easiest way to say it. There is no, the ISA wrapper does not protect you from inheritance tax. Any cash or stocks and shares held inside an ISA form part of your estate when the total value of your estate is totalled and counted. And therefore, if it is above the amount that you can leave tax free, then it's It is taxable, the fact it's in an ISA won't help that. The interesting thing, though, is while you can't, you don't get any ISA benefit on inheritance tax, specifically in the case of a spouse or civil partner, someone who's been through a legal civil partnership ceremony.

• 32:21Martin Lewis?

  Not if you're just cohabiting, even if you've been cohabiting 20 years and have seven kids, this doesn't work for you. The spouse or civil partner can inherit the ISA allowance of the person who has died. Now, interestingly, you can do that even if you were not left the assets or the cash that was in the ISA, you can still inherit the allowance. It means as well as your normal ISA allowance, you can add a tax-free amount up to either the value they held in their ISA when they died or the value of their ISA when it was closed, to the amount that you can save or invest tax-free each year. Now, this, I know some people say, "What about kids?" It doesn't work for kids, this is only for spouses.

• 33:05Martin Lewis?

  But you can effectively increase your ISA allowance, it's on top of your normal ISA allowance that you can put those new assets in. Now, it may be that you're utilizing money, cash, or shares that have been left to you and you're going to put that in an ISA wrapper, or maybe you're using assets that come from elsewhere. You still get this extra allowance. To do it, contact your ISA provider or the provider of your late spouse or civil partner's ISA for details. Did that all make sense to you, Matt? It's a bit complicated.

• 33:32Speaker 05

  Yeah, made total sense, really.

• 33:33Martin Lewis?

  Phew.

• 33:36Martin Lewis?

  So, do you have a funny slash a scance question for me this week?

• 33:41Speaker 05

  Of course I do.

• 33:42Martin Lewis?

  Good. Good, well, I mean, you don't say, "Of course", we're missing a quarter, it's not necessarily a course.

• 33:47Speaker 05

  It's not a guarantee, but this week, I do.

• 33:49Martin Lewis?

  Okay, good, what is it?

• 33:50Speaker 05

  I've got one from Duncan. He says, "Hi, Martin Etelle."

• 33:54Martin Lewis?

  Who's Al? We don't have an Al, we have a sign, we have a Matt, we have a... Anyway, carry on.

• 33:58Speaker 05

  "Thank you to the whole team for all you do. I've listened every week for ages, can't even remember how long, for years."

• 34:05Martin Lewis?

  Not the question-type podcast, because it's only started last September, but the main pod has been going now... Yeah, I think, I think it's over 20 years.

• 34:13Speaker 05

  Wow.

• 34:14Martin Lewis?

  Possibly. It might not be. I'll have to check.

• 34:16Speaker 05

  When you do, can you tell us? Because I'm interested to know how long it's been going on.

• 34:18Martin Lewis?

  It wasn't actually a pod originally. It was a radio. It was on the radio.

• 34:21Speaker 05

  Right.

• 34:22Martin Lewis?

  It's concert and then it turned into the pod. I will find that out.

• 34:25Speaker 05

  Okay. I'll read Duncan's question. He says, I've also listened to the comedian Richard Herring's years of output too. He's created several books of what he calls emergency questions to help him if he has a blank during an interview. What he's written recently is something I've asked a couple of famous people, as I'm fascinated by the replies. So I'd like to ask you in the style that Mr. Herring does.

• 34:45Martin Lewis?

  Okay. I love Richard Herring. That's cool.

• 34:47Speaker 05

  Martin Lewis, if all the world's museums and art galleries got together and said, okay, Martin, you've done so much for good, you can choose one artifact or piece of art to keep and do with as you wish, what would you pick? He then says, many thanks and sorry to bother you.

• 35:03Martin Lewis?

  Oh, you're not bothering us. I like it, Duncan. I like it. So instant off the top of my head answer is a terrible answer. It's a money answer. I believe there is a block of gold in the Bank of England Museum. So I think it's probably 10, 15 kilograms, because it doesn't have to be big to be 10, 15 kilograms. So it's probably worth over a million quid. But that's, that's a bit triked, isn't it?

• 35:25Speaker 05

  Yeah.

• 35:26Martin Lewis?

  Okay. So give me a second. Oh, I know what I'll pick. It's, it's the thing that I'm almost always mesmerized by when I see it. And I know there are issues with it and which country it should be in, but it is in the British Museum and it is the Rosetta Stone. Have you ever seen the Rosetta Stone, Matt?

• 35:44Speaker 05

  I've not seen it, but I obviously, I know what it is.

• 35:46Martin Lewis?

  So the Rosetta Stone is what they originally used, I think it was in the 18th century, maybe it was a bit later, to work out what hieroglyphics meant. And of course, hieroglyphics were sort of a picture language as opposed to a letter-based language, because on three different sides, they realized it said the same thing. One side was ancient Greek, one side was sort of Egyptian demotic, which is a sort of script more like modern language, and one side was hieroglyphics. And they knew the ancient Greek and I think- I may have this wrong, they knew a bit of the Demotic and they used the ancient Greek to work out what the Demotic was, and then they used both to work out what the hieroglyphics

• 36:29Martin Lewis?

  were. Now, in our modern day of huge mass computing power, that doesn't seem so remarkable. But when you consider they were doing this, the brain power it took, doing this on pen and paper, to totally deconstruct a language just by a relatively short piece of text on three sides of this great piece of rock, I think it is just one of the greatest testaments to human ingenuity anywhere in the world. And it is staggering when I look at it, because I wouldn't have a clue where to start. What geniuses these people must have been. So if I got my gift from any museum, I wouldn't take the block of gold, I would take the Rosetta

• 37:13Martin Lewis?

  Stone, and I would look at it every day and just wonder, because it is wonderful in all senses of the word. Now, the amusing thing is, because she is never off duty, even though I just gave what I thought was a very nice peroration to finish my awe at what the Rosetta Stone is, I just got a fact check note from She Who Must Be Obeyed, Rosie, to say that on the Rosetta Stone, they're not actually on different sides. I remember it being on different sides, but hey, memory can fool you on certain things. The writing is all on the same side above each other, so they have the writing of the three different languages in a row,

• 37:56Martin Lewis?

  which enabled them to do so. Thank you for the fact check, Rosie. Not as romantic as my ending, but hey, we need to be technically correct.

• 38:05Martin Lewis?

  So Matt, I think that's it, isn't it?

• 38:07Speaker 05

  That's it. The only other thing, you can probably hear the rustling in the background. The only other thing is, as Rosie's here, and the badges are here, I want to give Rosie a badge, and I can give her one for you to take as well.

• 38:19Martin Lewis?

  But can we just say technically that means Rosie gets a badge before I do?

• 38:23Speaker 05

  Technically, yes, but you just need to come up to Manchester.

• 38:25Martin Lewis?

  Okay. No, I'm delighted. Rosie deserves a badge.

• 38:28Speaker 05

  So.

• 38:28Martin Lewis?

  Absolutely. Rosie badge will take a speech in writing because under the canon of the podcast, Rosie isn't allowed to say thank you or speak. I'm sure she's smiling and saying, are you actually pinning it on Rosie?

• 38:39Speaker 05

  I'm not going to pin it on her because that's a health and safety hazard and the BBC's insurance would cover me to do that. But I do want to see her reaction when she looks at the badge.

• 38:48Martin Lewis?

  Okay.

• 38:49Speaker 05

  So Rosie, could you please open the envelope and pull out a badge? Because I would describe what she's doing. Here we go.

• 38:56Martin Lewis?

  We can hear the rustling.

• 38:58Speaker 05

  She shook her head. She looked at it. She shook her head. She's not impressed.

• 39:03Martin Lewis?

  Is she going to wear it in public? That's what we want to know. Are you going to wear it with pride on the streets, Rosie?

• 39:08Speaker 05

  She's nodding and she said she's going to wear it on the tram to the train station.

• 39:11Martin Lewis?

  Oh, marvelous.

• 39:12Speaker 05

  So everyone, if you're on the tram, you will see the badge.

• 39:15Martin Lewis?

  I hope people don't see my face and think it's like, you know, they wear the baby on board badges. It's like a, I'm now old, give up your seat for me, Martin Lewis badge. That would be rather worrying.

• 39:25Speaker 05

  I'll make some of them as well.

• 39:26Martin Lewis?

  It seems a good place to stop.

• 39:30Martin Lewis?

  That's it for this week's Question Time. Don't forget to subscribe so you know when we release a new episode. We put out a new Question Time each Monday alongside the Big Topic podcast with Adrian on Thursdays. Aren't you lucky? Two doses of money-saving tips and tricks a week. Do ensure you send in your questions. You can email [email protected] And don't forget, if your voice is used on the show, we'll send you an exclusive money can't buy and many wouldn't want to Martin Lewis podcast Question Time badge. Woo! Give me a woo, Matt. Woo! Bye bye.

• 40:20Speaker 06

  Martin Lewis is the founder of moneysavingexpert.com. But of course, other consumer and price comparison websites are available. You can get in touch with Martin's podcast production team by emailing [email protected]. The offers and rates mentioned in the podcast are correct at the time of recording. However, if you are listening on demand, it's worth double checking as details can date. Remember to subscribe on BBC Sounds and leave us a review however you listen.

• 41:00Speaker 01

  Welcome to The Haunted Library. Join me, Colin Morgan, as I read Frankenstein by Mary Shelley.

• 41:10Speaker 01

  A story of science and ambition, loneliness and longing, and what it truly means to be human.

• 41:20Speaker 01

  Listen to The Haunted Library wherever you get your podcasts, or find us on YouTube.