Each deposit you make is placed with one or more UK-regulated banks, each of which offers up to £120,000 in protection per person, per bank under the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS).

Multi Shield allocates your funds across multiple banks to maximise your protection up to £360,000.

The participant banks are currently: HSBC Bank Plc, Lloyds Bank plc and Santander Financial Services Plc. In that order. The first £120,000 is deposited with HSBC, the next £120,000 at Lloyds and the third £120,000 at Santander Financial Services.

Multi Shield offers a variable AER based on the blend of partner bank rates. You’ll always see the current blended rate before you deposit. The first £120,000 is always deposited at the highest rate partner bank, the second £120,000 at the next highest rate bank, and so forth.

No. Sidekick, via our partner Bondsmith, handles everything for you. Funds are automatically allocated across institutions to maximise protection and returns - no paperwork, no bank hopping.

The current minimum deposit is £10,000. Multi Shield is designed for larger balances to help maximise coverage and protection.

Multi Shield is an easy access product. Withdrawals take 1 working day for the funds to move from the underlying banks back to the Sidekick wallet or your nominated bank account.

Deposits take 1 working day for the funds to move from Sidekick to the underlying banks. Once they arrive at the partner banks, that is the point at which they earn interest.

For 6 month, on balances up to £120,000, you'll earn an additional 1%, boosting the rate from 3.23% AER (variable) to 4.23% AER (variable). This bonus is paid by Sidekick within the first 2 working days of each calendar month into your Sidekick wallet. From here you can choose to add it into your Multi Shield account or withdraw it or to fund any other product we offer.