Methodology
What counts as evidence here, and what does not
The rules we apply to every figure we publish, the sources we accept, the ones we refuse, and how we handle the gap between them.
What we accept
- Provider rate tables and summary boxes. The FCA requires banks to publish these for savings products, and they are the single best source in this market — they show balance tiers, conditions and often historic rates.
- Published tariff documents. The PDF, not the marketing page.
- Provider product pages, where a tariff document does not exist.
- The CMA service survey. Independent, regulator-mandated, surveyed by BVA BDRC (now part of Ipsos) across roughly 1,200 customers per provider.
- The FCA Financial Services Register, for authorisation status and firm identity.
- The Bank of England base rate, where a provider prices explicitly against it.
- Pay.UK, for Current Account Switch Service volumes.
What we refuse
- Other comparison sites. Useful for discovering a product exists. Not evidence of what it pays. We learned this the hard way — see the revision log.
- Provider press releases and marketing claims, where they conflict with the tariff.
- Headline “up to” rates presented without their conditions.
- Introductory and promotional rates, in scoring. A four-month teaser is not a rate.
- Aggregated review scores as a substitute for the CMA survey where a provider is surveyed.
- Anything we cannot re-check. If we cannot find it again, we do not publish it.
Verification status, in numbers
18 of 18 savings rates have been read from the provider’s own published material. Every rate we publish is now primary-sourced.
That figure can fall as well as rise. Adding a provider adds an unverified row until we have read its rates, and we would rather show the ratio dropping than quietly carry an estimate as fact. Where we do publish an unverified figure it is labelled on the page and in the CSV, and should never be the basis of a decision.
How figures are scored
Interest is scored on net yield, not headline AER:
net = (rate × balance − extra annual plan cost) × access factor
The plan cost is the additional subscription needed to reach that rate over the cheapest usable plan. Access factors are instant 1.00, notice 0.90, fixed term 0.82, non-deposit 0.70. We model a representative £25,000 balance and publish net yield at five balance levels in the savings dataset.
Service quality comes from the CMA-mandated survey, which covers 17 of the 18 providers we track. The other 6 are below the survey threshold or are not banks; their service score rests on public review platforms alone, and we say so on each of their pages.
Deposit protection is scored from the FCA Register and each provider’s own disclosures. No account without FSCS protection on its everyday balance can score above 3.5 out of 5.
Dates, and what they mean
- Checked date — when that specific figure was last read from its source. Shown on every provider page.
- Last full review — when we last worked through every provider in one pass. Currently 6 August 2026.
They are different claims and we keep them separate. A page can carry a recent checked date on its savings rate while its fee table is older.
Corrections
When we get something wrong we change it and log it, with the cause. The revision log currently has 17 entries, 6 of which are our own errors rather than market changes. If you find a mistake, tell us.
What we do not claim
We are not a bank, a broker or an adviser, and we are not authorised by the FCA. Our figures are researched carefully and checked against sources, but providers change pricing without notice and we cannot guarantee currency. Confirm anything that matters with the provider before you act on it.
Common questions
What counts as a source?
The provider’s own published material — rate tables, summary boxes, tariff documents and product pages — plus regulator and regulator-mandated data such as the CMA service survey and the FCA Register. Nothing else.
Why exclude other comparison sites?
Because we published a savings rate from one that turned out to be more than double the provider’s actual figure. Comparison sites are useful for finding out that a product exists; they are not evidence of what it pays.
What does "unverified" mean?
That we have not read the figure from the provider’s own source. It is a working estimate, labelled as such on the page and in the CSV, and should not be relied on for a decision.
How is net yield calculated?
Interest on the stated balance, minus the extra annual cost of the cheapest plan that unlocks that rate, multiplied by an access factor: instant 1.00, notice 0.90, fixed term 0.82, non-deposit 0.70.