AutoInvest from Free Funds has been Removed

đŸ„§ Pies & AutoInvest
1

Trading212 have removed the option to set up AutoInvest from Free Funds. :woman_facepalming:

Now you have to set up an external payment method for any AutoInvest orders you set up.

This is a negative move backwards. I only want to fund from the account balance.

You can set it to pay from available balance first once you’ve set an external payment method, but if there it is insufficient available balance, it will then use the external payment method.

I don’t want this. I only want funding to come from the Trading212 account balance.

2

This is a poorly implemented change, as with many changes I have seen to the user interface in the past few months, before being rolled back or changed again.

I tried to setup a new pie last week and was asked to nominate a deposit method for autoinvest.

I have my full ISA allowance balance for the year sitting in cash, so this is irrelevant for me.

But anyway


I selected my bank account already on record, and got an error “This payment method doesn’t support recurring deposit. Please choose a different one to proceed”

So I tried to add my account, which resulted in an error “You have already connected all of the available bank accounts”

There is no way to remove an existing bank account, to be able to re-add it.

So I tried to add my visa debit card, to find that my bank was blocking it for too many authorisation requests - so that didn’t work - not that I wanted to use that anyway as I don’t want deposit fees and cannot go over my annual allowance.

I just want to fund from my free funds cash balance.

There is so much friction to get this set up. Great work on implementing a completely useless feature, T212 :slightly_frowning_face:

3

Hi @RebeaTui @pwalter :waving_hand:

Investing directly from free funds was removed as a standalone option, though a version of it still exists under a different setup. The difference is that it now requires you to link an external payment method to your Pie. This change was made partly due to how failed payments were previously handled when an account had insufficient free funds at the time of a scheduled deposit.

If you already have a standing order or other recurring payment set up to reach your Trading 212 account, you can enable AutoInvest to use your existing cash first by activating the “Use my cash first” option in your AutoInvest settings. This way, the linked method is only charged if the available cash doesn’t cover the scheduled deposit. You can also pause your plan at any time and resume when you’re ready.

For Stocks & Shares ISAs specifically, your £20,000 annual allowance is protected even with AutoInvest switched on. If a scheduled deposit would take you over your remaining allowance for the tax year, it’s blocked automatically, regardless of the linked payment method. This ensures that no funds are taken and that nothing is added to your ISA. You’ll also receive a notification the first time this happens.

For this specific issue, please reach out to our team via the in-app chat or this form, and DM me your case reference ID once you have it. I’ll make sure it’s forwarded for review and resolved as quickly as possible :raising_hands:

4

Have same issue.

We don’t like this, and it’s not just resisting change.

None asked for this please but the free funds option back, people can make adjustments to their deposit arrangements rather than forcing it

5

If there are insufficient funds in my Trading212 account for any reason, I don’t want an external payment source to be charged.

In the case of insufficient Free Funds in the Account, the AutoInvest should just fail to action.

6

Wow this is wild!
I also do NOT want that T212 directly transfer money from my bank account. If this stays like this i will not create any new Pie in the future and if it affects already existing Pie (e.g; if we pause and then resume autoinvest) i will also stop using them altogether. Unacceptable to try forcing this practice into clients. I have never seen this on any brokerage account i have used.

7

Personally, I think removing the ability to autoinvest from free funds in your account is a backward step. That is all.

8

I don’t see the benefit for either trading 212 or the user in the scenario. It should be brought back.

9

But that only works if your Trading212 S&S ISA is your only ISA. Personally, I split my allowance between S&S ISA, and a Cash ISA with another provider, so I reach the ÂŁ20k allowance without Trading212 systems being aware. This is an extremely poorly thought-through and totally unnecessary change and you should just revert to what you had before. As others have said, if a recurring investment from free funds has been set up, but there are insufficient free funds, the autoinvest should fail and raise an alert with the user.

10

Hi all, just back from holiday and catching up. My auto-invest still says source is ‘free funds’, are existing pies not impacted? Or is there any update that I’ve not had yet and it will be changed? I completely agree that removing the funding from ‘free funds’ is not a positive step forward.

11

It remains an option if you have it already selected, but if you change that to a different payment method and set it, you won’t be able to change back.

I’ve had that confirmed by T212 Support via Chat.

If you try to set up a new Pie/Stock, you can still draw from Free Funds to initially invest into it, but Free Funds are not an option to set up a new AutoInvest order.