Guide
Every Quidsmith acronym, explained: ISA, GIA, CGT and the rest
Game context, not financial advice. This article explains how things work inside Quidsmith, a personal-finance simulation game. The numbers are illustrative and the model is simplified for play. It is not personal financial advice. For decisions about your own money, speak to a regulated adviser.
Personal finance is buried in initials. Quidsmith uses the real ones, because that is what you meet on a bank website or a pension statement, but nobody is born knowing them. This is the plain-English key to every acronym and bit of jargon in the game.
You don't have to memorise these
Inside the game, finance terms carry a faint dotted underline. Hover or tap one and a short definition pops up, so the meaning is always a second away without leaving the screen. These glossary hints are switched on by default in Easy and the Tutorial, and off in the tougher modes where you have likely found your feet. You can turn them on or off for good under Accessibility at any time.
Accounts and tax wrappers
A "wrapper" is not an investment itself. It is a shelter you put investments inside so the taxman leaves them alone.
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| ISA | Individual Savings Account | A wrapper that shelters savings or investments from UK tax. You can pay in up to £20,000 a year across all your ISAs combined. |
| Cash ISA | — | An ISA holding cash savings. The interest is tax-free, but it tends to trail inflation. |
| S&S ISA | Stocks & Shares ISA | An ISA holding investments (a fund or individual shares). Growth and dividends inside it are tax-free. |
| LISA | Lifetime ISA | An ISA with a 25% government bonus, meant for a first home or age 60. Take the money out for anything else and a 25% charge claws the bonus back. |
| GIA | General Investment Account | A plain, taxable investment account with no deposit limit. Where you invest once the ISA allowance is used up. |
Investments
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| ETF | Exchange-Traded Fund | A single fund that spreads your money across hundreds of companies at once, so no one firm can sink you. The game's Global ETF is its main growth engine. |
| Gilt | — | A bond issued by the UK government. It pays a fixed yearly coupon and hands your money back at maturity. Steadier than shares, and the ballast in a portfolio. |
| Sovereign | — | A UK gold coin that is legal tender, as is the Britannia. Because they count as currency, a gain on them is free of Capital Gains Tax. |
| Bullion | — | Gold in bars or ingots, valued for its weight and purity. Investment gold has no VAT in the UK, but a gain on bars is subject to Capital Gains Tax. |
| Spot price | — | The market price of gold right now. Dealers sell a little above it and buy back a little below it, which is their margin. |
| ETC | Exchange-Traded Commodity | A fund traded like a share that tracks a commodity such as gold, for a small yearly charge. It can sit in an ISA. |
| Coupon | — | The fixed yearly interest a bond or gilt pays, quoted as a percentage of its face value. |
| Dividend | — | A share of company profits paid out to shareholders. Tax-free in an ISA; taxed above a small allowance in a GIA. |
Saving and borrowing
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| APR | Annual Percentage Rate | The yearly cost of borrowing, including interest. Higher APR means the debt grows faster. |
| Premium Bonds | — | Government-backed savings that pay no interest. Instead each £1 enters a monthly prize draw, and prizes are tax-free. |
Tax
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| CGT | Capital Gains Tax | Tax on the profit when you sell an investment or a second property held outside an ISA. A tax-free allowance applies first, then 18% or 24%. |
| NI | National Insurance | A tax on earnings that also builds your State Pension record. Employees pay 8% of pay between £12,570 and £50,270, and 2% above. |
| SDLT | Stamp Duty Land Tax | A tax paid when you buy property. Second homes and buy-to-lets carry an extra surcharge on top. |
| LBTT | Land and Buildings Transaction Tax | Scotland's tax on buying property, in place of Stamp Duty. Buy-to-lets and second homes add an 8% supplement. |
| LTT | Land Transaction Tax | Wales's tax on buying property, in place of Stamp Duty. There is no first-time buyer relief, and second homes pay higher rates. |
| Section 24 | — | The rule that limits landlords to a basic-rate tax credit on their mortgage interest, rather than deducting it in full. It bites hardest on higher-rate taxpayers. |
| Marginal rate | — | The tax rate on your next pound of income (20%, 40% or 45%). It sets how much pension tax relief is worth to you. |
| Student loan plan | — | Which repayment rules your loan follows. Plans 1, 2, 4 and 5 differ in threshold, interest and how long until it is written off; all take 9% of pay above the threshold. |
Property
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| BTL | Buy-to-let | A property bought to rent out for income and long-term price growth, usually with a special mortgage. |
| LTV | Loan to Value | How much of a property is mortgaged rather than yours. A lower LTV usually earns a cheaper interest rate. |
| HMO | House in Multiple Occupation | A rental let room by room to several unrelated tenants. Higher yield, but more rules and more managing. |
| ERC | Early Repayment Charge | A fee for overpaying a fixed-rate mortgage beyond its yearly penalty-free limit. |
| Void | — | A stretch when a rental sits empty and earns nothing while its costs roll on. The hidden drag on rental yield. |
Pensions and later life
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| SIPP | Self-Invested Personal Pension | A private pension you control and choose the investments for. Contributions get tax relief; the pot is locked until 57. |
| Drawdown | — | Taking an income from your pension pot in retirement by selling a bit at a time, rather than buying a guaranteed income. |
| Annuity | — | A product bought with a lump sum that pays a guaranteed income for the rest of your life. Sits outside your net worth. |
| Auto-enrolment | — | The rule that puts employees into a workplace pension automatically: you pay at least 5% of qualifying pay and your employer adds at least 3%. |
| Tax relief | — | Tax you do not pay because money went into a pension. It is how the government tops up pension saving. |
| State Pension | — | A weekly payment from the government once you reach State Pension age. In the game it starts at 68. |
| FIRE | Financial Independence, Retire Early | Saving and investing hard enough to stop working long before State Pension age, then living off your investments. |
| FI number | — | The pot that could pay your yearly spending for good: spending divided by your withdrawal rate, so 25 times at 4%. |
| Safe withdrawal rate | — | The share of your pot you take each year in retirement. 4% is a rule of thumb from past US markets, not a promise. |
| Coast FI | — | Having enough invested that, with no more saving, growth alone should reach your FI number by State Pension age. |
| Decumulation | — | Spending your savings down in retirement, ideally from the accounts that cost least in tax first. |
| Qualifying years | — | Years of National Insurance paid or credited. You need 35 for the full State Pension and at least 10 for any. |
| Barista FIRE | — | Retiring from full-time work but keeping some part-time pay, so your investments only need to cover the rest of your spending. |
The economy
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| CPI | Consumer Prices Index | The standard measure of inflation, how fast prices rise. It erodes the real value of any cash you hold. |
| Base rate | — | The Bank of England's interest rate. Savings rates and mortgage rates move up and down with it. |
| Nominal vs real | — | A nominal figure is the headline number; a real figure strips out inflation to show what it actually buys. A £2m house in 65 years is a much smaller sum in today's money. |
| Inflation | — | How fast prices rise each year. Money that grows slower than inflation buys less over time. |
| Today's money | — | An amount adjusted for inflation back to the prices you started with, so figures decades apart can be compared fairly. |
Family
| Term | Stands for | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| SMP | Statutory Maternity Pay | Pay during maternity leave: 6 weeks at 90% of your average pay, then 33 weeks at £194.32 a week or 90%, whichever is less. Statutory Adoption Pay works the same way. |
| SPP | Statutory Paternity Pay | Two weeks of pay for a partner after a birth or adoption, at £194.32 a week or 90% of average pay, whichever is less. |
| Child Benefit | — | A weekly payment for each child under 16, or 20 in education: £27.05 for the eldest and £17.90 for each other child in 2026/27. |
| HICBC | High Income Child Benefit Charge | A tax that claws back Child Benefit when your adjusted net income is over £60,000: 1% for every £200 above it, all of it from £80,000. |
| Tax-Free Childcare | — | The government adds 20p for every 80p you pay a registered childcare provider, up to £2,000 a child a year, while each parent earns under £100,000. |
| Funded hours | — | Free childcare hours from the government. In England working parents get 30 hours a week in term time from 9 months; Scotland gives 1,140 hours a year from age 3. |
| ANI | Adjusted Net Income | Your taxable income after pension contributions. It decides the Child Benefit charge and the £100,000 childcare cliff, which is why paying into a pension can save more than tax. |
| Junior ISA | — | A tax-free savings account a parent opens for a child, up to £9,000 a year. The money is the child's and they take control of it at 18. |
Where to go next
Now the words make sense, put them to work: ISA or pension weighs the two big wrappers, pensions explained covers the retirement side, and how to play ties the whole game together. The full library is on the articles page.