Hi

With rising interest rates and the prospect of being taxed on interest in my savings, last year I moved some of my cash savings into a 1 year fixed cash ISA in November

With the new tax year started, I want to now open an easy access cash ISA. I want to put a sum, less than the annual ISA limit, into this upon opening. I then hope to transfer the balance of my 1 year fixed ISA into this easy access ISA once the 1 year rate has ended.

In principle this seems fine and I believe within the ISA rules? You can hold more than one cash ISA but can’t open/contribute to more than one in the same tax year - my 1 year fix is from last tax year and the new easy access will be from this tax year. I also understand that transfers of old ISAs from previous tax years into new ones do not count towards the 20k annual allowance.

However looking at sites such as MSE and bank/building societ websites it is unclear for certain when transfers are or aren’t allowed. MSE rightly flags some accounts as only allowing transfers at application (weird that HMRC allow these banks/institutions to apply such arbitrary restrictions but fair enough). However with other accounts where such a restriction is not clearly stated, it can be assumed that opening the account and funding it now and later transferring another ISA in, in November is acceptable?

I’m wary of stumbling over some HMRC rules or the terms and conditions of the account and ending up being penalised/taxed for breaking rules or being stuck my fixed rate ISA being converted to some no doubt undercompetitive rate account at maturity. So just looking for some reassurance that my understanding is correct?

Annoyingly quite a few of the best rate easy access ISAs are limited to transfers at the time of application. I’m currently looking at Coventry Building Society (3.25%) and Sainsburys Bank (3.29%) as they don’t seem to clearly list any restrictions on when a transfer in can be performed, but similarly don’t clearly state you can do this whenever you want for the life of the ISA.

Thanks