Joint or single bank accounts for you and your other half?

Should be single accounts.

Posted from TSR Mobile

coming from someone with a history in banking, specifically complaints....

I always got the impression that people with joint accounts where either A) Whipped or B) Absolutely ancient, one partner still keeping money under the mattress etc.

There is literally no reason to have a joint bank account these days, unless one partner is paranoid to the extent of needing to look over the other's spending, by this point whether you have a joint bank account or not is the least of your worries.

Plus joint accounts can cause sooooooooo many problems when a couple breaks up. Any money spent by the other partner is no reclaimable, all bills and charges are legally spread between both parties regardless of who caused them. A partner can legally take all the money out of the account and then close it, the only thing you can do is set it up that both people have to sign (or give permission) to close the account, which doesn't stop the money being taken. Although banks do have marital dispute blocks, an individual is legally entitled to remove all the money up until those blocks are placed. It's easier via a divorce/separation to claim money via their own personal account than via a joint account.

The amount of times I had to deal with crying or distress people who partners had left them (one time had a crying wife whose husband had left her for a random woman) and emptied the joint account. Left pretty much penniless, needed to be given debt support, couldn't delay any payments for overdrafts etc as she had none and nothing we could do to help her as we where not liable (aka banks are only liable to help people who owe them money). Imo anyone who sets up a joint account is an idiot.

Reasons to have one makes life much easier so that equal amounts are paid from each person towards direct debits, it was so annoying have to constantly transfer into each other's accounts to ensure each bill and food shop was paid for equally. You re an idiot in your choice of a bad partner if they run off with your money .

Meh experience has taught me it's always those who least expect it who get stung the hardest. Nobody choices a partner if they think they can't trust them. There's a rate of something like 25-60% of being cheated on during the lifespan of the relationship (I think it's something like 6% per year or something similar).

You still have to transfer that bill money into the joint account anyway, instead both partners have to transfer money. Why not agree certain partner pays for certain things? Or take turns?

I had dealt with enough crying wives and distraught husbands to encourage me never to touch a joint account.

Taking turns with direct debits? Not like we can keep swapping the accounts from which the payment comes out without some hassle. None of the bills we have are the same price or anywhere near each other so that didn't work either.
Transferring money to the joint is easier than having to bacs money to each other each time the other person buys something, one click compared to setting up a bacs payment is much easier ( all of our accounts are with the same bank but not all of the bacs are instaneous whereas withdrawals from the single to a joint account always are).
I trust my partner completely and I'll always have a separate isa with savings in so its not like I ll ever be penniless

Or just have a direct debit set up from one account, with a standing order leaving the other single account. No need for hastle, and actually requires less setting up and transfers than having two single accounts and one joint account.

All done automatically, without having to manually set up a FPS. BACs have been illegal to use for the last 3 years, with most banks using FPS for even longer.

Meh experience has taught me it's always those who least expect it who get stung the hardest. Nobody choices a partner if they think they can't trust them. There's a rate of something like 25-60% of being cheated on during the lifespan of the relationship (I think it's something like 6% per year or something similar).

You still have to transfer that bill money into the joint account anyway, instead both partners have to transfer money. Why not agree certain partner pays for certain things? Or take turns?

I had dealt with enough crying wives and distraught husbands to encourage me never to touch a joint account.