Why the qaa and 30DAA?

They attract thousand's of savers, who deposit £millions into these "savings accounts" AC can now use these funds to underwrite new loans, thus saving on traditional u/w fees & those difficult questions on DD & risk/reward/rate. Self funding growth & removing any truly independent oversight is much more profitable & speedy than the traditional, previous underwriting model & must be admired as a triumph of design.

There is a risk for AC with these accounts - they only work under normal market conditions. If people decide to withdrawl at once and cannot it will effect confidence.

I thought not. All excess money is retained by the PF. No?

The short version is that AC have re-invented fractional-reserve banking.

They offer savers/investors the illusion that their money is available on zero or 30 days' notice (depending on the specific account), when in fact most of it is invested in loans that will take months or years to repay. This illusion is maintained by keeping a fractional reserve in cash which is available to service the anticipated level of withdrawals from the account during the short term.

It all goes great, as long as an adequate cash reserve can be maintained so that all withdrawals can in fact be serviced in a timely manner... but if, for any reason, investors' withdrawals get too close to using up the cash reserve, it could potentially become necessary for withdrawals from the QAA and/or 30DAA to be suspended, restricted or rationed in order to avoid the cash reserves falling below the minimum amount necessary for basic operation of the platform. At that point it would likely trigger a problem equivalent to a "run on the bank", as the restrictions would tend to result in "panic" withdrawals (that would not otherwise have been requested) by at least some investors.

AC would, I believe, get the PF surplus when the account finally gets wounds up and there's no loans left to worry about (assuming there is surplus). No?

AC of course seeded the PF in the first place. Can't recall if they have reclaimed that cash yet.

The cash reserve is to facilitate prompt withdrawals, and is small, so if there is a panic it will fail, this is clearly stated in the T&Cs.

If a loan fails, the PF steps in, but only after all other efforts have been exhausted, so if the cash reserve is empty, then some money could be stuck for some time, but due to each investor's money being spread widely this is not a major issue.

There is no FSCS protection m hence the rates, and risks, are higher than a normal savings account.

As Assetz rates are currently much higher than RS, it's currently the only Platform where I'm increasing my investment.