RE: CONUNDRUM26 Mar 2021 11:12
I have opened about 10 ISA's with Interactive Investor [ii] as I handle (under third party authority) several members of family and friends so I might be in a reasonable position to tell you how it works with ii.
Briefly, looking at some answers given in all good faith there may be a couple of mistakes in some of the advice given unless I am not reading correctly.
First in direct answer to cj62's £20k as it is "sitting", ready to go you cannot put the £20k in now, "ready" unless you have not utilised your £20k allowance for this year already; you could only transfer the cash on the 6th April.
Secondly there was a reply about opening a trading account first. You do not have to do this. You can open an ISA account on its own and use that account number for logging in.
Third, the form (on line or posting but you probably want to do it online if time is of the essence) is simple; 2 pages and you need your N.I. number handy; the rest is straight-forward.
Fourthly, to Bed 'n ISA ii do offer this service and if you get it done early in the morning (on line, not by phone) you will, in most cases see it all done and dusted within hours. However I have seen them take longer so a call is worth making to follow up your online transaction to "nudge them along". The fee, as correctly pointed out by a poster, is £7.99 and I have to say I am not up to date if it has changed in last few months but it is charged as one transaction and free on the other. Incidentally it's £50 to do it by phone hence better to go to the drop down menu and simply complete the bed 'n ISA request. It's very simple.
Fifth, when I did this 5 months ago for another friend the account was setup (ISA only) literally same day.
Summing up, it "may" be useful to have a trading account open as well (same procedure almost with all their forms on the website) as you don't need to use it but means you could put the £20k in before 6th April and go the menu that says "Transfer to another account" and do it immediately, so there is an advantage in having a Trading account but as stated earlier, not a requirement. Another reason for having a Trading account is you could add more to that over and above your £20k's worth and sell when the profit hits the CGT tax threshold (about £12k) or just pay the tax of course and it means the transaction fees (the £7.99) is not taken from your ISA account as you cannot put cash back in it obviously after it has been "utilised". (Incidentally you can set up a direct debit with ii for the monthly fee or transaction fee if you ever were in debit so no fees come out of your ISA balance).
Hope this is useful and covers some of the topics on bed 'n ISA raised today under this thread title and I am pretty sure I am correct but open to hear back if anyone disagrees.