POST OFFICE DEPOSITS.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 76, 30 March 1928, Page 3

POST OFFICE DEPOSITS.

INTEREST LIMIT REDUCED. MAXIMUM NOW £2000. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON", Thursday. Formal notification appears in the "Gazette" of a reduction in the maximum amount of deposits with the Post Office Savings Bank on which interest will be paid. Tho change is to operate from April 1. In commenting on the notice, the Minister of Finance, the Hon. W. Downie Stewart, said there was no change so far as individual deposits up to £2000 were concerncd, and such deposits would continue to receive 4 per cent interest up to £500, and 3J per cent interest on amounts in excess of £500, as long as the aggregate deposits did not exceed £2000.

In regard to deposits in excess of £2000, up to the present maximum of £5000, however, it is specially provided that all such sums to the credit of any Post Office account on March 31 shall continue to receive interest at 3J per cent, as at present, until the same are withdrawn. That is to say, if a man has, say, £4000 in his account on March 31, he will continue to receive interest on that sum as heretofore, as long as it remains on deposit, but no interest will be paid on fresh deposits as from April 1 until the balance of the account has been reduced below £2000, and then only in respect of deposits up to £2600. The Minister said the Post Office and the Treasury had long been of opinion that the maximum ought to be reduced, as it was quite obvious that the Savings Bank was being used for purposes for which it was never intended, that was, to obtain interest on current account.