hargreaves and landsdown exit fee

Is an exit fee normal?

No. Most platforms dont charge on exit.

Is anyone else skeptical?

No. its a factual charge that is in their published terms.

w00519772 wrote: »

I am planning to transfer my small portfolio to Hargreaves and landsdown. The only thing I am skeptical about is the exit fee which i believe is £25.

My current provider is Halifax and they do not charge an exit fee. Is an exit fee normal? Is anyone else skeptical?

As others have said exit fees are not universal but nor are they unique to HL.

However from memory HL's exit charges can be considerably more than £25. They are something like £25 account closure plus £25 for transferring out cash plus £25 per stock transferred. So if you had 10 separate investments you could be looking at exit charges of £300.

In my view you are right to be suspicious of a firm with such high exit charges. I would invest with a company that was confident its ongoing service was good enough to retain its customers rather than using high exit charges to prevent customers leaving.

Also HL have, in the not too distant past, increased their ongoing charges for some customer very substantially yet still levied its exit charges when those adversely affected customers wished to exit solely to avoid the charge increases.

So remember if HL increases its charges and you wish to transfer to a cheaper alternative it may be an expensive transfer process.

If your portfolio is small in size then HL's ongoing fees may not be too onerous. However if your funds ever become sizable then there are much cheaper alternatives. But again it may be expensive transferring to a cheaper alternative because of the exit fees.