Question Time: Get life insurance young, as its cheaper? Keep my bank account but get switchers’ bonus? When to STOP investing?

This week Martin tackles a packed agenda of your questions—ranging from savings decisions in your twenties to navigating the tax system, investing timelines, and even a light-hearted consumer rights query. Martin answers a question from a 25-year-old wondering whether to lock in life insurance early while premiums are low. We look at how to bag lucrative current account switching bonuses without losing your main bank account. Martin explains how you can collect multiple bonuses while keeping your primary account untouched. An NHS employee asks whether moving into the higher tax band means they’ll need to file a self-assessment tax return. A listener calls in with concerns around their investing strategy: wanting to know if they should stop investing five years before needing your money? Things take a lighter turn when a listener asks about their “consumer rights” over obtaining a Question Time audience badge. And, strongman Eddie Hall asks Martin: “What’s the biggest thing you’ve ever lifted?” 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 ice cream flavour, if he’s ever pondered the meaning of life, or have a very complicated question about your personal 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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• 0:54Speaker 01

  Coffee?

• 0:55Speaker 02

  Love a cup of tea. I'll have tea too.

• 0:57Speaker 01

  Tea for me, please.

• 1:03Martin Lewis?

  You've got to check the terms and conditions each time, but there are lots of people who do this and who make thousands of pounds.

• 1:09Speaker 05

  Hey Martin, it's Eddie Hall, the world's strongest man.

• 1:11Martin Lewis?

  It is actually cheaper, even though you don't need it now, if you would need it later for you to get it now. You don't ever want to be in a position where you need the money today and today is a bad day to take your money out.

• 1:23Martin Lewis?

  Hello and welcome to the cunningly named The Martin Lewis Podcast. I do wonder what that's going to be about. This is our Question Time episode, where you, our esquires, extra savvy questioners, get to ask me your questions on absolutely anything and everything, open brackets within reason, close brackets. This week, you ask me, should I get life insurance earlier than I need because it's far cheaper when you're young? How do I keep my current bank account but still get bank switching bonuses? I work for the NHS. If I go into the high rate tax band, will I have to submit a tax return? Should I stop investing when I'm five years from needing the money? And finally, what are my consumer rights over getting a Question Time Corrus batch? Play the theme tune.

• 2:24Martin Lewis?

  Hello and welcome to this Question Time podcast. You know the one where you can ask me questions on anything and everything, open brackets, within reason, closed brackets. And you often do it. It's seat of the pants time, as I'm not sure 100% what's going to be coming in and what we're going to be doing through the podcast. The person who is sure, though, the person who knows exactly what's happening, the person sitting in the driving seat to this, this week, is PPS, podcast producer, Simon. How are you, Simon?

• 2:53Speaker 06

  I'm excellent. I'm delighted to be back. It's a sign of how good I do this job that you're allowing me, given that my name isn't Matt, to produce you.

• 3:01Martin Lewis?

  True, yes. I mean, so it is normally curator of questions himself, Matthew Burnham, but who has been skiving for a number of weeks now, and is going to regret it when less people address it to Dear Martin and Matt than they used to. It's his own fault. The detritus is his programme. And then last week, we had another Matt, not normal Matt, another Matt, another Matt did very well. Though he did an Australian accent.

• 3:21Speaker 06

  Oh, I mean, that cash back stuff.

• 3:23Martin Lewis?

  Did you like that?

• 3:24Speaker 06

  It's good stuff.

• 3:26Martin Lewis?

  I mean, I'm properly laughing out loud. But just checking, I wasn't planning to do it. Do you have any accent based skills?

• 3:33Speaker 06

  Ah, you see, now, unlike Matt Lansley, I'm not naive enough to ever be pushed into that sort of stuff from a presenter. So, no, you won't be getting any of that from me.

• 3:42Martin Lewis?

  I thought he did it. He had.

• 3:43Speaker 06

  He did. He did it very well.

• 3:44Martin Lewis?

  If you missed it last week, poor, poor Matt, who was in for his first, he had actually done it once a long time ago, never done Question Time, been for his first Question Time. And as regulars will know, Question Time, anything can happen on Question Time. There are no rules here. We're not on the radio. We're podcast only. We can do what we like. I made him because we didn't have any callers. I decided he had to pretend to be a caller, not literally pretend, we would never actually lie to our listeners, but he had to do it in an Australian accent. It was very funny.

• 4:11Speaker 06

  I mean, to be fair, if you do listen to it, there's no danger of anyone thinking, oh, this is a real caller from Australia.

• 4:16Martin Lewis?

  No.

• 4:17Speaker 06

  We're in any danger of that happening.

• 4:18Martin Lewis?

  There was no danger whatsoever.

• 4:19Speaker 06

  Although I did notice at near the start, you started listing sort of Matt's at the BBC.

• 4:24Martin Lewis?

  Yeah.

• 4:24Speaker 06

  And he's completely ignored that my new boss is also called Matt.

• 4:28Martin Lewis?

  Really?

• 4:28Speaker 06

  And of course, Matt Britton, if you are wanting to become an ESQ, you are entitled to send in a, an email question.

• 4:34Martin Lewis?

  Of course, the Director General, yeah, Director, I'm not sure Director General could get a badge.

• 4:39Speaker 06

  DG ESQ.

• 4:41Martin Lewis?

  DG, so you, obviously you become an extra savvy question if you ask, but I just think within proprietary reasons, I think the DG coming on, asking a question. I mean, I would say he's doing that in his job role, so he doesn't get a badge.

• 4:52Speaker 06

  Well, there you go.

• 4:53Martin Lewis?

  But then again, it's not for me to decide, it's probably for him to decide. He's marking his own homework. I'm annoyed with him already. I'm, I'm not liking this scenario. It's not happening. I'm putting my foot down. Director General, you're not welcome. On this show particularly, obviously in the question time, because it would break the whole ESQ thing. Shall we get on with it?

• 5:11Speaker 06

  Yeah, well, and, and on that antagonistic note, uh, we'll move on to the questions. We've got a gentle one to start with. Jo has been in touch. She is saying, dear Eminem.

• 5:22Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, Martin and Matt.

• 5:24Speaker 06

  I love listening to the podcast. Thank you for all the good work you do.

• 5:27Martin Lewis?

  Sweet. Sticking with the Eminem theme.

• 5:30Speaker 06

  I don't want to close my Lloyds Bank account as I enjoy the free cinema vouchers I receive as a reward. However, I would be happy to open a second spare account with your top switch suggestions. I would like to enjoy the switch benefit by switching just a couple of direct debits. Is this possible or too greedy? I'd then obviously use the account to move to another bank every few months or so. Thanks in the hopeful anticipation. Kind regards, Jo.

• 5:55Martin Lewis?

  Jo, everything you say is absolutely possible and is the textbook way for savvy money savers to do this. Now, I stress that this is not your, I'm just going to go and do it. This is, this takes a little bit of work and a little bit of planning. But if you're willing to do that, I'm willing to explain how you do it. So this is effectively the concept of using a mule account, sometimes called a burner account, in order to get bank switch bonuses. So you have your main bank account that you're enjoying, you use as your main one, and then you get a second account, which you're going to use as the burner. Now bizarrely. The first second account that you need to get, you want to go and get the type of account

• 6:39Martin Lewis?

  that really doesn't have any perks and isn't going to offer any perks in future. So a bank accounts like Monzo and Starling, digital banks that are really easy to open. And then, once you've got that bank account, the reason for doing that is to get the perks, you almost always need to use the new bank's seven day switching service, which is where it closes the old account for you. It switches over your direct debits and standing orders automatically, and it auto-forwards any payments made to your old account. So you want to have some, you know, not normally an incentive based account that you're going to start off with. And then, once you've got that set up, you then need to use that as your burner account to move in order to get the bonuses. But there will be criteria.

• 7:23Martin Lewis?

  The most common are that you will need to be shifting across two direct debits, normally of at least two pounds a month. So just take a couple of your lower direct debits that you have from your normal bank account, making sure you're still fulfilling the criteria Lloyds, and put them into this account and make sure you've got money in order to be able to pay them. Put them into that first burner account. You will, in some banks, but not all, also have to fund the new bank. Now, some might say you need to have £500 a month in, so that's just having your salary going in there. Others will say you need to put a total of £1,000 in in the first 30 days. Well, that's all pretty easy. As long as you've got the funds in Lloyds, you can transfer it across from Lloyds. You can have the money going into there, and that should fulfil the criteria that you need in order to get the bonuses.

• 8:08Martin Lewis?

  Once you've got the bonus on your second second account, if you see what I mean, you've got your first second account, and then it's your second second account will be the first one with an incentive. Once you've got the bonus, you've got that money, then you can move your second second account to be the third second account, and you can go and do it all again, while all the time keeping your standard day to day with Lloyds. You can hear from the explanation, you've got to check the terms and conditions each time, but there are lots of people who do this and who make thousands of pounds. I'm just looking, because we always have. Her who actually talks quite a lot, but doesn't talk in this podcast. Her who is spoken about, but never speaks. Rosie, who fact checks me through this. Rosie, I think you've done the odd sort of bank switch and got across for making profit.

• 8:51Martin Lewis?

  Would they have it? Yes. So Rosie, who is listening in here, who is casting her ever watchful eye over the entire podcast, she's giving a nod that this all works well. And actually, many people in MSC Towers, my offices, many of the team there have made decent money at a switching bank accounts. And there are a lot of mules and a lot of burners going on in MSC Towers.

• 9:15Martin Lewis?

  Okay, we're going into question two and you've just heard the sting. But what you didn't hear during the sting is I accidentally referred to podcast producer Simon as Matt. I've got so conditioned to Matt's being the producer of this podcast, even though Simon and I work together every week doing the big issues podcast, that I've just called you Matt. You're not a Matt, but do you fancy changing your name? It would make life easier.

• 9:40Speaker 06

  Look, don't worry, Adrian. We all got names wrong sometimes. I'm not big on it.

• 9:44Martin Lewis?

  All right. So following the format, Matt's format, Simon, it's got to be a caller.

• 9:49Speaker 06

  I am of course going to follow producer Matt's schedule and have a caller.

• 9:53Martin Lewis?

  We are all very scared of breaking producer Matt's schedule. We don't even know if he's listening while he's having these few weeks off, but we're all absolutely petrified.

• 10:00Speaker 06

  He'll come back with an iron fist. But we have Georgia in Manchester on the line.

• 10:05Martin Lewis?

  Hello, Georgia.

• 10:06Speaker 00

  Hi, are you okay?

• 10:07Martin Lewis?

  Good, yes. What can I do for you?

• 10:10Speaker 00

  Great. My question is around life insurances and protections, really, and personal protection. So I'm 25 years old, currently privately rent with my partner. So we don't own a home, but we've also got no debts or dependents either. And then we don't expect this to change anytime soon.

• 10:28Martin Lewis?

  Okay.

• 10:28Speaker 00

  I always see adverts about taking out life insurance and how the earlier you take it out, the cheaper it is. But I was wondering if I take it out now and in the future my situation changes, so I buy a house or have children, does that policy then come by it? Um. Given I've got nothing to insure currently and I've got a healthy set of insurances through my employer. I just didn't know whether to take any out now and I didn't want to leave it until I'm much older and then it'd be much more expensive.

• 10:56Martin Lewis?

  Wow, what a really, really interesting question. First of all, can I say lovely to have someone aged twenty five on and to be thinking about your finances at this age. So well done you for that. Okay, life insurance and protection is complicated. It depends what you're trying to protect for. Now, there it is absolutely right that there are certain protections where you get it younger, it can save you money. And the most obvious, we'll focus on one of those, the most obvious and the most simple form of life insurance, and there are lots of different forms of life insurance, is what's called level term assurance. Now, it's interesting, you said you have nothing to insure. Well, we are literally, you do, we're insuring your life. Um, you know, so you do have something to ensure that. Now, what level term insurance does is it says,

• 11:41Martin Lewis?

  if you were to die within a set period, you would get paid a fixed lump sum, you couldn't have it escalating sometimes with inflation, but let's stick with a fixed lump sum in that period. So, for example, you might say, I'm going to have a two hundred thousand pound level term insurance lasting for twenty one years. So if I die within the next twenty one years, that firm will pay out two hundred thousand pounds. If I die twenty one years in a day, I don't get a penny. And the reason you would lose, use level term insurance is you would use it to provide funds for your loved ones and your dependents if you were to die in the term. The reason I mention twenty one years is people commonly will do it until their children leave full time education.

• 12:27Martin Lewis?

  That's why it would be twenty one years. And this is about the fact that about one in thirty children will lose a parent before they're eighteen. And I was one of those one in thirty. And when a parent goes young, not only is there obvious horrendous emotional and grief consequences, but there is also a potential lost income that can have knock on effects and compound all the problems. So that would be one of the reasons for getting level term. Are you with me so far, Georgia?

• 12:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, with you.

• 12:53Martin Lewis?

  Okay, so.

• 12:56Martin Lewis?

  Where this gets interesting is, it seems to me you're indicating, certainly you've already got four times life cover through your firm, which is decent. You would normally want, the normal rule if you're getting level term is you want to cover roughly 10 times the highest earner in a partnership's income. And the reason we say highest earner in a partnership, even if it's not you, that if your partner were higher, if something were to happen to you, well, they may have to stop work in order to provide for the dependents, which is why it tends to work on that type of basis. But of course, all of this is ridiculously early. So, most people would say, all right, stop there. I mean, it's ridiculous. You don't need it right now. You don't have any dependents to protect. But now I'm going to do some numbers. And through the magic of podcast, I will produce those in a couple of minutes.

• 13:45Martin Lewis?

  Okay, I've got some quote details here. Absolutely fascinating. So, let's imagine we want to cover you with a level term policy of £200,000 until the age of 65, right? If you were to get that now, I'm assuming you're a non-smoker, and I've gone through the very cheapest way to get this, so these prices can vary. We're just seeing this as sort of an emblematic of what it can be. You would pay a fixed price of £5.78 a month. And you would get it for 40 years, because it needs to go until you're 65. £5.78 a month for 40 years is around £2,800 is in total what you would pay. If you were to

• 14:29Martin Lewis?

  wait 10 years to get the cover until you were 35, you would then only need a 30-year policy. And assuming you haven't had any health issues in the meantime, that would cost you £9.52 a month. And the total cost would be £3,400. So, it would actually be more expensive to cover 30 years at age 35 than 40 years at age 25.

• 14:53Martin Lewis?

  And if you were to do it at age forty five, so we had to wait twenty years and get the same £200,000 for a twenty year non smoker, it would cost you £17 and eleven, which means you would pay in total £4,100 to do it once you were age forty five. So now we can see that in basic terms, it is actually cheaper, even though you don't need it now, if you would need it later for you to get it now. There is one final complexity here, which is inflation and the value of money. £200,000 now might cover ten times your income, but you know what inflation is, Georgia? Yeah. Yeah, prices rise.

• 15:35Martin Lewis?

  But £200,000 in forty years' time will almost certainly be a lot less than £200,000 now. So the problem with this, that's when people say it's cheaper to get it younger, they're absolutely right if you're comparing on a current price level. But if you were to get insurance in ten years' time and were to stay ten times the highest earner, you might actually need more insurance to do it, because you might suddenly have to be covering £300,000 or £400,000. And by the age of forty five, you might be covering £500,000 or £600,000. And so some of the reason is that the value of money in forty years is not as high as the value of money right now, and all of that has to be factored in. Which brings down to whether you do it or not, which is a really interesting question. I mean, the first thing I'd ask is, do you have the cash available right now to do it,

• 16:20Martin Lewis?

  if you wanted to? Yeah, definitely. It's really interesting. I'm sitting there thinking, you, we want to do ten times cover, right? That's what you want, and you've got four times cover through work on level term life insurance. So if you could get six times your current salary... And you could do it for a few quid a month for forty years and you know there'll be health and the quotes will be different and all of that type of stuff. And you need to go and there are some the good guides out there on how to get cheap level term life insurance that you should be reading when you do it. You may want to say, how much am I prepared to pay right now? Maybe you say, I'm prepared to pay three pounds a month.

• 17:05Martin Lewis?

  Yep, because it's not very much. Cover for myself for the next forty years, which will then, you know, hopefully if you do decide to have children and have dependents later, we'll give you some level of cover. Because we don't know what you need to cover. We don't know whether you'd have a mortgage you want to cover as well. We don't know any of that. But when you do get to the point that you need it, you've already got some in place very cheaply, that might be helpful. But I'm not sure I'd go much further than that. I need to mull on it. What's your thinking?

• 17:32Speaker 00

  Yeah, I think that makes complete sense. I guess my worry was if I stay with my employer for a long amount of time and maybe left employment either short term or for good in, you know, a couple of decades' time, that then I'd be in a position where I'm now having to pay for my own life cover and maybe that the work life cover was never sufficient anyway for kind of what my needs might be in the future. So I think for kind of anything less than a ten or a month, it feels like a no brainer for me, like the cost of a couple of coffees, to really just give myself that assurance that should I choose to move employers and I'm in between jobs and something happens

• 18:14Speaker 00

  or it just becomes one of those admin jobs that you put off later in life and, and God forbid, something happens and before you end up covering yourself. It does feel like now while I've got the brain space to actually sit down, think about it and do it, and I've got the disposable income, it feels like it's the right thing to do. And that actually the workplace provisions are, yeah, an added bonus if anything.

• 18:42Martin Lewis?

  So, look, many workplaces do give you sort of four times life cover. That's a pretty common thing to do. It is a really tricky one. And one of the things you said in your question, what if things change? Well, one of the great joys of level term assurance, the reason I went for the simplest one, is unlike many terms, many policies like critical illness, what is a critical illness? It has to be a predefined term. With level term life insurance, being blunt, you're either dead or you're not. You know, and barring certain clauses where, you know, being honest people, and I don't want to trigger anybody, but the exemptions and the debate or dispute would tend to come around if somebody took their own life. But other than that, it's pretty clear cut. Now, if you were 10 years older and you had a couple of young children and you were calling me about level term

• 19:27Martin Lewis?

  insurance, I would be pretty strong saying, for me, it's really important that you consider it. I hope it will be a waste of money. I hope it will never pay out. And the same is true with you, Georgia. I hope, you know, that you're still going strong at 65 and therefore all this money has gone away. But simply because of the maths that you can get a policy very cheaply because you're starting at 25, even though it isn't inflation proof, the term you're getting. I mean, I'm not sure you necessarily want to put a tenner away. Remember, the problem with level term insurance is if you stop paying, it goes. So you paid for 20 years, you really, the most important time is the last 20 years of the 40 years. If you stop after 20 years, then it's all gone. So you're committing yourself to life. So you might just want, at this point, because you don't really

• 20:08Martin Lewis?

  need it, it's sort of a soft toe dip in the water of a few quid a month, I think is probably absolutely fine to do, but it's not necessary to do.

• 20:16Speaker 00

  Yeah, that sounds really sensible.

• 20:18Martin Lewis?

  Really interesting thought question. It's a really interesting thought question. I would be interested to know from other listeners, have you done this? Did anyone out there get level term or similar insurance before they needed it in order to take advantage of the fact that you were really young when you started it? It'd be lovely to know. Georgia, thank you so much. Hold on, hold on, before we go, Georgia, do you know about the badges?

• 20:42Speaker 00

  I've heard about the badges and I've heard that they may or may not be quite ready yet. And I was wondering about the validity of the badges and whether they were just a carrot to be dangled or whether they will. Come to realise.

• 20:55Martin Lewis?

  You have actually accused me there of potentially getting callers by deception. The badges.

• 21:02Speaker 06

  But to be fair, I think you're accusing producer Matt of getting callers by deception.

• 21:06Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, but I have to take responsibility. My name's above the door, Simon. My name's above the door. The badges are real, but producer Matt, whose idea the badges were, decides he's going to go and take this long period off work just after we've promised everybody the badges. And he is the one responsible for producing the badges. You will get a badge. I just can't say when.

• 21:25Speaker 06

  Well, so I can.

• 21:25Martin Lewis?

  A badge will happen.

• 21:26Speaker 06

  I can reveal. So it's been very rare, Georgia. It's just a sort of peculiarity of it that me, Martin and Matt have worked the same week in the last month. But me and Matt were both in together on the same day recently. And I overheard him talking to editor Tom. I think badges are getting close.

• 21:42Martin Lewis?

  Badges are on the way. Badges are on the way, everybody. Badges are on the way. You heard it here first. Not sure where else you'd hear it, so it's pretty obvious. But you heard it here first. Georgia, thank you so much. Your badge, now according to Simon, will be coming.

• 21:54Speaker 00

  Brilliant. Thank you both so much.

• 21:56Speaker 06

  All right. Cheers.

• 21:57Martin Lewis?

  Just a reminder to everyone, the rules are this. You're allowed to refer to yourself officially, legally, within the canon of this podcast, not outside the wider canon of this podcast, as an asquire, an extra savvy questioner, if your question or comment is read out in the Question Time podcast. You only get a badge if you come on as a caller or you do a voice note. There is a hierarchy here. You only get the asquire badge if you're actually vocally on air. This isn't Bohemia, you know. This is a tight ship.

• 22:27Speaker 06

  And if you want to be one of those lucky callers, you can, of course, email us your questions. [email protected]

• 22:38Martin Lewis?

  So that was a really interesting question from Georgia there. Nice to have a younger voice on the podcast. If any of you are listening and you are younger too, and you've got a question, we'd love to have you on. This is a podcast for the ages of all ages. I think I might have over grandised it a little bit there. So, Simon, got to be a read next. Who's our next ESQ?

• 22:57Speaker 06

  Yes, it is. And we've got a question in from Emily. She says, Dear Rosie, Matt and Martin. I won't say that personally, Emily. I let things slide. It's been a day.

• 23:07Martin Lewis?

  I just think it's, I'm starting to note Rosie coming first now, on occasion. You know, and it was a big debate between myself and Matt and the fight will continue once he comes back about who goes first. I don't think any of us had foreseen Rosie going first. I don't know how I feel about it.

• 23:24Speaker 06

  The silent assassin of podcasting.

• 23:25Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, she's over there. She's got this sort of, she's got a Mona Lisa smile on at the moment. I'm trying, it's really difficult to read how she feels about it. Now she's laughing and looking down in a slightly, a little bit nervous way, but she knows she's not allowed to speak because that would ruin the shtick that Rosie never speaks. So I can't actually ask you how you feel about it, Rosie. I think she's subtly pleased. I think she's happy. So, okay, read it out. Let's go.

• 23:51Speaker 06

  So, well, she also follows up with, big shout out to Rosie and for everyone who works behind the scenes everywhere.

• 23:56Martin Lewis?

  Here, here, and couldn't do the podcast without, and Rosie does brilliant work.

• 24:00Speaker 06

  Emily has recently made it to the top of band six in the NHS Agenda for Change pay scale, which has made her very happy but feeling quite old.

• 24:09Martin Lewis?

  I bet she's really young. Go on.

• 24:11Speaker 06

  Her annual salary is now £48,117. So still comes in the basic tax rate payer bracket, but she also does quite a lot of bank work. The bank work is variable. Some months earning additional £200 to £400 a month and others earning none.

• 24:27Martin Lewis?

  Now, I think in this context, I think it's probably worth pointing out that bank work in the NHS, it's a bit like overtime in slightly separate departments, I think is how you would phrase it. So she's talking about other NHS work, not working in a bank.

• 24:42Speaker 06

  It's also not guaranteed over the year and only ad hoc due to service needs. But the bank work combined with any interest from savings not in an ISA, cling film wrapper, might just tip me into the higher tax rate.

• 24:54Martin Lewis?

  Now, can I just say, I love the little Easter egg in there of the cling film wrapper. What Emily's doing there, she's already referenced Rosie. Now she's referenced cling film wrapper and I talk about that is my explanation of ISAs. Emily is suddenly telling us, I've asked this question and I am a regular listener, therefore I need some respect. Respect given, Emily, respect given. Carry on.

• 25:17Speaker 06

  My question is, how does this work if I do tip over? Is it like a big pot where the government keeps track of how much income goes into the pot from the 5th of April each year? And when the pot is full and up to £50,270, anything else added into that pot goes through a 40% tax sieve? Sorry, I'm really rubbish when it comes to money and tax and things, so analogies help.

• 25:39Martin Lewis?

  I like analogies.

• 25:39Speaker 06

  I think you're smashing it, Emily, yeah, yeah. I'm 30 this year.

• 25:42Martin Lewis?

  I told you she was young. I told you she was young.

• 25:45Speaker 06

  I would refuse to read the question if I'd know we're referring to 30 years old.

• 25:49Martin Lewis?

  Okay.

• 25:50Speaker 06

  30 this year, so please don't tell my parents. Or do I have to do a tax return at the end of the year to add up if I owe any extra? Or will it be added to some pay slips and not others? In my whole life, I never thought I would have to think about this as a higher tax rate has always been a million miles away and other people's problems. Thank you for all you do for people like me who weren't born for the complexities and nuances of the financial and economic world. All the best, Emily.

• 26:16Martin Lewis?

  Oh, well, Emily, thank you so much for saying that. Now, the most important thing here to say, Emily, is that it's great that you're asking this question. It's far better to understand how it works than not. So there's a few different concepts we need to get in here. I mean, the big question it seems you're asking me is, do I need to do anything? My hope is not. My hope is as you pay tax through pay as you earn, P A Y E, it should all be done for you. If you're doing bank work, I would think that would be P A Y E, just like your normal work is P A Y E, but it may well have a different tax code, a second job tax code, so that you have to pay 20%. As long as the tax codes are right, you should be paying the right amount of tax.

• 26:58Martin Lewis?

  And actually, the people to talk to about this are the payroll department in your work. And as you work for the NHS, that should be relatively simple to do. They will have big payrolls just to check that everything's going right. I am, I have to say, delighted that we're having to talk to you about you paying higher tax because it means you're earning more and you work for the NHS and I'm sure you're doing wonderful work and helping many people. So, thank you very much for that. I mean, the one negative here, of course, is the reason more and more people are being dragged into the higher rate tax threshold is because of what's called fiscal drag. And that's where, even though earnings are rising and prices are rising because of inflation, the tax thresholds are frozen, which means each year more and more people will pay more tax

• 27:43Martin Lewis?

  than they would have done otherwise because the tax thresholds aren't rising. And that's drawing more people into it. Now, the one big thing that we do need to be careful of, and everyone who is an employee needs to be careful of, is is your tax code correct? Or in your case, are your tax codes correct? You'll get a tax code, it'll normally be four numbers and a letter. So, the standard one is 1257L. What that means is add a zero to the number, so 1257 becomes 12,570. And that is telling you what your tax-free personal allowance is, the amount you can earn before tax. So, if it was 1257L, it would be that. It can change and vary depending on what employment perks that you get. The

• 28:24Martin Lewis?

  L, the number, the letter, rather, is far more complicated. L is the simple one. But there are tax code calculators online that can decipher your tax code for you and then hopefully help you work out whether you're roughly in the right tax code or not. And that is worth checking, especially if you've got a second job. That's where the mistakes can happen. So, do, go and make a friend in the payroll department and talk to them about it so they can work it out for you. Now, if everything is working right and you're on PAYE, your tax should automatically be taken at the right rate. And if you slip into the higher tax band, then it'll be 40% taken of anything above that. It's of course important for me to say, I'm sure you know this, most people know this, but not everyone, tax in the UK on income tax is marginal. So, that means you only pay the higher rate

• 29:09Martin Lewis?

  on the amount above the threshold. To be really practical, if the threshold's 50,270 quid and you earn 50,300 quid, you only pay the 40% on the 30 quid above, not on the rest below. That stays at the other rates. If you are going to be going into the higher rate tax threshold, well, there are a couple of things that might be advantageous to you. You could increase your pension by that amount because you get that 40% tax relief as you're paying higher tax. You've actually, because pensions come from pre-tax income, you'll get 40% tax relief on it. So you might want to increase your pension contribution because it means that instead of it costing you 80p per pound you're getting in your pension, it costs you 60p per pound you're getting in your pension. Now, the reason you may not want to be a higher rate taxpayer apart from the paying

• 29:51Martin Lewis?

  more tax is crucially because if you become a higher rate taxpayer, your personal savings allowance drops. There's a cliff edge here. You earn one penny into the higher rate tax band and instead of being able to earn a thousand pounds of interest a year tax-free, you're now only able to earn 500 pounds of interest a year tax-free in all forms of savings. Cash icer in stress doesn't count to this. So you actually lose quite a nice chunk of your ability to earn interest tax-free. Now, if you're not earning interest on savings, it doesn't really make much difference to you at the moment anyway, but it might do in future. But certainly, if you're only dripping a tiny bit into the higher rate tax threshold, then you could utilise increasing your pension contributions, for example, to reduce your

• 30:35Martin Lewis?

  salary so that you're no longer a higher rate taxpayer and that would mean you'd keep the 1,000 pounds a year of interest that you can get tax-free from savings. So there are lots of things to think about. I can't, I mean, if the system works right, it should all be fine for you, is the basic summary. There is always a chance when you go into the higher rate tax threshold that the revenue sends you a self-assessment form. The rule is pretty simple. If they tell you you need to fill in the self-assessment form, you need to fill in the self-assessment form. The rest of your affair has seemed pretty simple, so hopefully that won't happen. But if it does happen, shrug your shoulders, swear a bit and get on with it. And I think that's probably where I'll end.

• 31:12Martin 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. No, Dear Matt. Dear Martin. Dear Matt. Or Simon, maybe Simon.

• 31:34Speaker 06

  So next up, we've got another caller and we are continuing our efforts to get around the country on this week's pod. So we have John in Paisley, who is on the line.

• 31:43Martin Lewis?

  Ah lovely, coming from Scotland. Hello, John. How are you?

• 31:47Speaker 00

  Hello, Martin. How are you today?

• 31:49Martin Lewis?

  I'm good, thank you very much. Lovely to hear from you. What is your question?

• 31:53Speaker 00

  So my question, I know you covered this topic recently, Martin, but it was just to clarify a point that I was thinking about that I was wanting answered for myself. It's a question on investing and I've very recently started investing £50 a month in a Moneybox Stocks and Shares ISA. Am I allowed to say that?

• 32:15Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, that's fine. It's true.

• 32:16Speaker 00

  Yeah. And I'm just doing a £50 payday transfer to a Moneybox Stocks and Shares ISA. My question is-

• 32:25Martin Lewis?

  So Moneybox is one of those, it's a bit sort of robo-investing, or you pick your level of risk and it does it for you, so you're not making the investment decisions yourself. How risky did you go?

• 32:36Speaker 00

  So, see, because this is money that I'm just dabbling with, Martin, and I don't really need the money.

• 32:41Martin Lewis?

  That's the rule.

• 32:42Speaker 00

  It's kind of dipping my toe in the water. I've gone for the adventurous-

• 32:46Martin Lewis?

  Nice.

• 32:47Speaker 00

  Their kind of adventurous portfolio, which I can't remember the three things. I know that one of them is Fidelity Global Shares and I can't remember what the other two are.

• 32:56Martin Lewis?

  Okay. But it means if it's adventurous, it'll be a share-based and equity-based type portfolio that's giving you a broad spread and access to markets and that you're hoping, you know, everybody knows my investment rule. If it's money that you don't need and you're putting it away for more than five years, savings is the poor relation to investing, so you should consider investing. And it's great that you're dabbling your toe. I don't think you can dab your toe, dipping your toe in the water. Yes, so where are we?

• 33:23Speaker 00

  So just on that point, Martin, just to reassure you, I pay money into savings as well, and I've also got a workplace pension that I've been paying into for 21 years as well. So back to the question, the question was, I was planning on accessing this money when I'm 60, and I'm 47 at the moment. Now, I've heard you say in the past that any money that you invest, you should be prepared to put it away for five years. In that case, should I stop investing into that account when I'm 55 to allow that money more time to grow? Or is it okay to pay into an investment account like this up until the time that you want to access the funds?

• 34:07Martin Lewis?

  A really interesting question. Let me just sort of decode why I say what I say, and then we can use how we apply it to your circumstances. The reason for saying five years is because markets move up and down. That's literally the point of them, they're volatile. You know, they will go up, they will go down, they will go up, they'll go down. What you're more interested in over five years is the long-term trend, rather than it was higher two weeks ago than it is right now. Because that is just the nature of how markets move. And you might find there's a time where they dip quite substantially, or they drop substantially, and then everybody goes, oh no, I've lost a fortune. Well, you've only lost a fortune if you sell at that point. If it's just a fluctuation in the market, it may well come back, and we've seen that recently. The reason we talk about a long period is to ride out the short term.

• 34:52Martin Lewis?

  And also, what you don't want is you don't ever want to be in a position where you need the money today, and today is a bad day to take your money out. Right, so that's the philosophy. Now, it sounds to me, first of all, you've said to me this is money you don't need.

• 35:07Speaker 00

  Great, yeah.

• 35:08Martin Lewis?

  So you taking it out at the age of 60, I'm guessing is a soft 60, not a hard 60. Is that fair?

• 35:15Speaker 00

  That's an arbitrary length of time, yeah.

• 35:18Martin Lewis?

  Exactly.

• 35:18Speaker 00

  That would coincide with my planned retirement date, and you're maybe wanting to, you know, go on a nice holiday or do something that you wouldn't normally do when you retire. So it is a soft year, yeah.

• 35:32Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, well, in that case... You know, first of all, you might not use the money. Now, I say five years, which is relatively conservative. There are many investment specialists who would say three years, and it's just worth you being aware of that. The reason I go for five years is because my audience is generally beginners investors, and so I go for a more cautious approach. People who have a bit more experience, they tend to be thinking three years, they can see the patterns and ride it out and know what they're doing a little bit more on that basis. Now, it's also worth noting, you've gone for an adventurous portfolio. If you're going to want to access this money and it isn't crucial to you, you could shift to a less adventurous portfolio once you're getting, you know, closer to that 60.

• 36:16Martin Lewis?

  You could start to go to a cautious portfolio, which will probably be more in bonds than in shares, and giving you less growth, but hopefully less risk of losing the money, which is what we're talking about. So, all of those, I think, I don't think there is any blanket moratorium on you continuing to invest nearer the age of 60. I mean, and certainly, the age of 60 itself is not relevant. You're still relatively young. It is about the fact that you're going to want to take the money out. You're going to want to cash in at that point, which is what makes it relevant that you being 60. So, I mean, you could certainly, especially if you're going more cautiously and you're only talking about money that you're dabbling with, you could push it up to 57, 58. Or if you might also think, and this is worth thinking about, you might also think, well, I've still got the money.

• 37:01Martin Lewis?

  I'm going to want to take some out when I'm 60, but I might not take it all out when I'm 60. I might keep putting some more in at that point for it to grow and me to use later and to keep the pot growing. So, I see it as a soft guidance concept rather than a hard rule. Does that make sense?

• 37:18Speaker 00

  Yeah, that makes perfect sense, Simon. And what you said about moving the money to a less risky portfolio, a less adventurous portfolio, would that move all the money that was in that fund? Or would it just move? Subsequent additions to that fund that you make from when you move it.

• 37:36Martin Lewis?

  That would be your choice.

• 37:37Speaker 00

  Right, yeah.

• 37:38Martin Lewis?

  Right, you would be able to easily, you, I think right now you're able, I would presume you can say what percentage of your fund you want in each level of portfolio.

• 37:46Speaker 00

  Yeah.

• 37:47Martin Lewis?

  So you would be, and you know, and we're talking functionality on all of these things will be far more in another five, six, seven, eight years with AI. I think you'll have a lot more flexibility. Therefore, the choices, you could decide again, in your head, I'm taking all this out in three years. And you've got a nice pot in there that hopefully, and of course, there are no guarantees with investing, hopefully has grown very well and done you very well. And you might be sitting there going, you know what, I'm happy with what I've got. I don't want it to go down anymore. I'm going to get much more cautious at this point. Just in case, so that something doesn't happen in the next few years before I retire, that, you know, gets rid of my nice dreams of going and having a wonderful thing and I have to curtail my spending on the back of it. That's a perfectly reasonable thing to do when you're getting into the period before withdrawal to decide I'd want to be more cautious.

• 38:32Martin Lewis?

  So all of it is fine. There are no hard rules here. I think it's also worth me saying, I think if I'm talking to John aged fifty five, who has been doing this for eight years, I think you will, and I know you've only just started, I think you will be a lot more educated about the situation then and sort of more confident in making your own decisions at that point, which is why it's great that you've started. You know, you're doing this dabbling. Some of this is learning money. You should perceive it as learning money, if that makes sense.

• 39:04Speaker 00

  There's so much, I mean, even the platforms that you use for investing on, they've usually got a a little segment or a tab that you click on and it's kind of learn. And it's got various articles on investing and for you to look at and kind of educate yourself about it, yeah.

• 39:22Martin Lewis?

  You know, one of the learnings will be at some point between now and when you're fifty five, I'm pretty sure there will be a day or two where the markets really go down hard. Right, and you're, and then you'll go, oh, sugar. Right, or was this all the right thing to do? And that's going to happen because that's what investing is about. You know, and it is about that there is a roller coaster, but we hope when it comes to the investing roller coaster, unlike a physical roller coaster, the aim is that eventually you get off at a higher point than you started on, but there might have been a lot of ups and downs on the way.

• 39:52Speaker 00

  Yeah, yeah.

• 39:53Martin Lewis?

  All right, that's lovely, John. Thank you so much for recording.

• 39:55Speaker 00

  Awesome, great.

• 39:56Martin Lewis?

  I hope I've helped.

• 39:56Speaker 00

  Thanks a lot. You know, that was, that was a lot, a lot to think about, but what you've said makes perfect sense and delighted to be on the show.

• 40:04Martin Lewis?

  Always lovely to have you. And there's a badge coming as well, the biggest profit of the investing after all. I mean, who cares if the money goes up 10, 20 grand? Getting a badge. I mean, that's what counts.

• 40:13Speaker 00

  The badge alone is worth it. That's right, that's right.

• 40:17Speaker 06

  And my genius often gets overlooked on this podcast, John. There was a lovely moment when you were giving your answers and you referred to me as the expert instead of Martin.

• 40:25Martin Lewis?

  I heard that too, but I decided not to correct.

• 40:28Speaker 06

  No, good on you, John.

• 40:29Martin Lewis?

  Yeah, you could, well, let's keep that in, Simon, shall we?

• 40:31Speaker 06

  You could be on every week, John.

• 40:32Martin Lewis?

  Well, keep that in. And what will happen, I tell you the little, is lots of people will have spotted that and they'll be going, he just said, he just said Simon, not Martin. And they'll go, they'll spot that and then they'll get to the end and go, oh, they, they noticed as well. So it'll be very nice. Thanks, John. It was lovely, buddy.

• 40:47Speaker 00

  Great. Listen, thanks a lot.

• 40:49Martin Lewis?

  My pleasure, mate.

• 40:52Martin Lewis?

  Right, Simon. So it is that point of the podcast where people get to ask me, well, we call it a funny, but I'm going to say it's in a skance question, a different question and not falling onto the normal railway tracks of what we do in the podcast question. And by the way, if you have one of these, if you've got a question for me, whether it's on the normal money saving stuff, or you want to go a little bit wee and a little bit whoa and a little bit woo, then just get in touch with [email protected]. So having done a build up, I presume you have something?

• 41:21Speaker 06

  Yes, other producers would have this as a read, but we're going to have it as a voice note instead.

• 41:25Martin Lewis?

  So subtext, everybody listening, Matt normally does a caller and a voice note or two callers in a programme. Simon is going here going, I've got two callers and a voice note. There's a little bit of producer top trumps going on.

• 41:41Speaker 06

  Well, Jeremy has got in touch and he knows his rights. Dear Martin and Simon, I wonder if I can ask for your advice on something?

• 41:49Speaker 05

  I'd like to ask if I've got a claim via section 75. You see, I'm a previous caller to the podcast back in December 2025, when I told you my success in saving money by ditching O2 and moving mobile contracts. I was wondering, though, in light of the recent announcements about titles and badges, if I have a claim to a badge via this route at all. I am willing to try chargeback too, if you think this would work. I've also sought out the ombudsman for this sort of thing, but my searches have come a bit short. Thank you for providing such a superb, niche nerdy corner for all things financial and the opportunities to hear how podcasts are constructed. I realise there wasn't any actual financial transaction here and I'm simply trying my luck, but thank you.

• 42:33Martin Lewis?

  Oh, I like that, Jeremy. Now, this is actually fascinating, because you've heard of a self fulfilling prophecy. That is a self fulfilling complaint. You see, I can say very strictly that because he was on the show before we introduced badges for callers and voice notes, he absolutely is not entitled to a badge. We are not doing this retrospectively. There is no section 75 because there's no credit card involved and there's no chargeback because there was no plastic involved. And the financial ombudsman does not regulate podcasts. You would have to go to Ofcom, but I'm telling you, I don't think there would be an Ofcom complaint. Having said that, though, the fact that your voice note complaint

• 43:16Martin Lewis?

  has been read out, your voice has therefore been on the pod subsequent to us putting in the rule that all callers and voice notes get a badge. And therefore, your complaint qualifies you for a badge due to your complaint about not getting a badge for your first call. So the net result is you do get a badge. Congratulations. Well done. When the badges are finally made, you will be on the list. So well done, Jeremy, for that. I did enjoy that. And Simon, that puts a little bit, little bit of just emphasis on you because you're now, as your PPS, you have to do the very final and finally on the show, the PPS. Do you have one?

• 43:56Speaker 06

  I've got one. Please stay listening.

• 43:58Martin Lewis?

  Let's be honest, you probably, we're just indulging ourselves now. We're at the end of the Question Time podcast. We've done the meet, you've had your questions answered, this is for us. We'd love you to stay here and join with us, but if you want to leave right now, you can. But it's Simon's PPS. What's your PPS? Sub PPS?

• 44:14Speaker 06

  So last time I was on with you, my PPS was a question from England fast bowler Mark Wood.

• 44:19Martin Lewis?

  Yep.

• 44:19Speaker 06

  We've now got a question from the world's strongest man, Eddie Hall.

• 44:24Speaker 05

  Hey Martin, it's Eddie Hall, the world's strongest man. What is the heaviest thing you have ever lifted in your life?

• 44:31Martin Lewis?

  The weight of a nation's finances on my shoulders.

• 44:39Martin Lewis?

  Uh, sorry, I couldn't resist. It does feel like that sometimes. Oh, that's good. What a deep voice, I feel. I can't do the deep voice. The heaviest thing I've ever lifted, well, that I know the weight of it, was I set myself a bench press challenge to get to 100kg single bench press. And I did it, it was about a year and a half ago, and I got to 100kg single bench press, which I'm very, very happy with. People who listen a lot will know, I've been on a press up challenge this year to do 25,000 press ups in a year, but I'm afraid I've actually had to recently cancel that because I've done my shoulder in. So I'm going to stick with my past glory of my 100kg bench press, which I don't think was that bad for a man in his 50s.

• 45:20Martin Lewis?

  Have I lifted anything else really heavy? Hmm. No, I can't think. Oh, and Eddie, thank you so much for the question. I love that. Loved it. What about you, Simon?

• 45:29Speaker 06

  Well, you know, you lift my spirits every week.

• 45:31Martin Lewis?

  Oh, you sweetie.

• 45:34Martin Lewis?

  I'm gonna stop. Let's just stop. Stop. Podcast is over.

• 45:42Martin Lewis?

  That's it for this week. Don't forget to subscribe so you know when we release a new episode. We put out 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 make sure you send in your questions to [email protected]. And don't forget, as if you could, having listened to this show, where it's basically been the theme running throughout, if you come on the show, we'll send you an exclusive Martin Lewis Podcast Question Time badge. Woo. Who wouldn't want that?

• 46:30Speaker 02

  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 martinlewispodcast at bbc.co.uk. 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.

• 47:06Speaker 01

  In Our Time is a world-class seminar every week. Why was Jeremy a lonely snail? What were lines doing in York in the third century? I'm Misha Glennie and every week I'm joined by expert guests to explore the ideas that shape our world.

• 47:22Speaker 02

  It's one of the first times really that you consistently see someone painting teeth. I know that sounds bonkers.

• 47:26Speaker 03

  If I was going to define mathematics, I would say it's the study of structure.

• 47:30Speaker 01

  In Our Time, listen on BBC.com or wherever you get your podcasts. Tea or coffee? Love a cup of tea.