Jul 11 2006
Around one in three UK parents would be more likely to open a Child Trust Fund (CTF) quickly if they were able to do so online.
A poll of more than 300 parents by CTF provider engage Mutual Assurance found that 32.6 per cent would be encouraged to use their vouchers and open an account for their children online.
Engage estimates that 2.3 million vouchers have been issued to parents of babies born on or after September 1st 2006 to be invested in long-term savings and investment accounts for children, accessible when they reach 18.
Around 1.48 million of the CTF vouchers issued to date have been used to open accounts and parents who have not yet invested the money are being urged to do so to ensure that their children do not miss out on interest.
Karl Elliott, engage marketing director, commented: "A key aim of Child Trust Funds is to help busy parents to open an account as soon as possible and to encourage an early regular savings habit. This means removing barriers and making the process as simple as possible."
Mr Elliott claimed that the most effective step to boost early uptake of CTF accounts would be the introduction of an online processing system.
At present, parents must forward the paper voucher sent to them by the government to their chosen CTF provider and engage claims that many "often lose, damage or misplace CTF vouchers", causing further delays to the system.
