£35,000 cover Plus shares?

MrSinister

What are you covered for if you have £35,000 in Halifax plus they manage some medium risk shares for me totalling (£10,000 normal shares) & (£7,000 Isa tax free ones) so £16,000 shares in total. if the bank goes under when kind of cover could I expect?

Thanks in advance
Carl.

dunstonh

plus they manage some medium risk shares for me totalling (£10,000 normal shares)

What do you mean by them managing shares. Do you mean you used their sharedealing services to purchase shares or are you talking about investment funds in equities?

If shares, then shares have no protection. You own the shares or if using a nominee service they are ringfenced for you. If you buy your shares through Halifax then they are just acting as broker. you are not investing in Halifax (unless its Halifax shares).

If investment funds, then again the Halifax is just the administrator. The investments themselves are not in Halifax. They are in the companies, bonds and gilts etc that the the fund manager holds.

Investments (including life and pension funds) do have FSCS protection which is independent from deposits but if unit linked the protection is largely irrelevant. Probably why the investment and life and pensions protection is much higher than deposit protection.

MrSinister

dunstonh wrote: »

What do you mean by them managing shares. Do you mean you used their sharedealing services to purchase shares or are you talking about investment funds in equities?

I pretty sure their acting as a broker for me. one of my plans looks a bit like this :-

UK Growth Fund C
UK Equity Income Fund
Corporate Bond Fund
UK FTSE All Share Index Tracking Fund
International Growth Fund
Fund of Investment Trusts

it tells me how many shares I have in each, The other one I have does not give a break down like this one but its suppose to be a lesser of a risk investment.

dunstonh

I pretty sure their acting as a broker for me. one of my plans looks a bit like this :-

None of those are shares. And they are not acting as broker. You saw a sales rep who sold you Halifax collective investment funds. There is no management on the portfolio apart from the management within the individual funds. An IFA or discretionary investment manager would give you management but not a tied sales rep.

The protection on these within the ISA and unwrapped is the investments protection with the FSCS. However, the bit on unit linked funds applies to these.

MrSinister

dunstonh wrote: »

The protection on these within the ISA and unwrapped is the investments protection with the FSCS. However, the bit on unit linked funds applies to these.

OK Thanks for your reply, Buy in layman's terms does this mean all my money (Cash & investments) is covered or should I think about taking it out of the Halifax Collective investment funds?

dunstonh

MrSinister wrote: »

OK Thanks for your reply, Buy in layman's terms does this mean all my money (Cash & investments) is covered or should I think about taking it out of the Halifax Collective investment funds?

The investments in the unit trusts/S&S ISA are covered upto 100% of first 30,000 and 90% of next £20,000 (so basically £48k of £50k is covered).

As to whether you should switch investments, then that is a different question where the answer is usually yes you should be not on the grounds of financial security. On the grounds that Halifax investments are pretty rubbish. (your spread is not exactly diversified despite using 6 funds - 3 are more or less duplicates).

MrSinister

dunstonh wrote: »

As to whether you should switch investments, then that is a different question where the answer is usually yes you should be not on the grounds of financial security. On the grounds that Halifax investments are pretty rubbish. (your spread is not exactly diversified despite using 6 funds - 3 are more or less duplicates).

Well I have had both these funds for a little over two years and so far they have lost me over £1700. Where would you recommend I get advice for moving them as it seems the sales man that sold them me is not who I want to be asking?

dunstonh

MrSinister wrote: »

Well I have had both these funds for a little over two years and so far they have lost me over £1700. Where would you recommend I get advice for moving them as it seems the sales man that sold them me is not who I want to be asking?

Your options are to DIY and use a fund supermarket like Hargreaves Lansdown or to use an IFA to make the investment decisions for you. The UK database of IFAs is https://www.unbiased.co.uk (untick box in section 2 which only shows paying IFAs)