Martin told you Icesave had a "dodgy compensation scheme"... his comment on 4 News

LesU

Any warnings or otherwise in April were too late for me and many other people who put in for fixed rate 1 year savings.
I have £75,000 in Icesave, most of which was due to mature in November. These were taken out long before Northern Rock etc etc. There was no inkling of a hint in those days that banks were going to fail.
I'm hoping I will see £50,000 back and just put the £25,000 loss down to sheer stupidity at thinking that saving money was a good approach to life. I won't be building up my savings again in a hurry.
BTW I saw the Channel 4 News and I was appalled at the crude mud slinging and ignorance shown on the program, and the bringing out of the disabled saver was just about the lowest.
I was surprised, C4 News isn't normally delivered at gutter press level.

odowdchr

For the record, I invested in KE solely because of the full UK protection and avoided Icesave because of the passport scheme, all due to information read on this site.
I didn't regard this as personal financial advice given by Martin (because it clearly wasn't), just useful information to help decision making.
Anybody who invests large sums should get true professional financial advice relating to their own circumstances, that's surely just common sense?

nicholbb

earlgrey wrote: »

I think too that you should be taking more responsibility for some of the hugely misleading advice given here. The cop out of saying that the board isn't monitored isn't good enough. If it really isn't monitored then it should be, people's saving and future are at risk.

This is an open free forum to talk about money, perhaps you would like to pay for membership to a forum which is monitored and offers advice? If so I'm sure those services exist.

If you do lose money when you tell people you're be saying "I don't understand how I could have lost money - it was on the internet" Does that seem sensible?

earlgrey_3

mobfant wrote: »

What very few people foresaw is that Iceland itself would be close to bankruptcy...

That isn't quite correct. The massive problems and hyper-inflation of Iceland and the possible financial crisis has been well documented since the beginning of the year on other financial sites and in newspapers. A tiny population with a massively leveraged economy was an accident waiting to happen as any "expert" would have known.

Eager_Saver

I do not wish anybody to lose money in Iceland but some people here really have a selective memory and push the 'shift the blame to someone else' game a bit too far.

I've only started looking at saving accounts in April - so can't speak for anything that happened before - and from what I read here, Icesave - and any other passport compensation scheme based bank - always sounded riskier than then UK FSCS compensation. And yes I too still have money in Iceland, but with KE for that reason.

On the commission based earning, MSE is one of the only - if not THE only - website I know of that actually expressly points out which links are earning them a commission and which are not AND feature the best buy not on the commission it earns but on actual facts. Go to money supermaket or other such site where best buy tables are available and you wouldn't see it so clearly (if at all). And MSE is THE only one who offers those links without the commission tracking.

As for the interview, Jon Snow really seemed to go out of his way to pressurise / put the blame on Martin as well which I find quite disappointing.

PugLady_2

I read the following summary from Martins how safe are your savings facts and myths on 1st October 2008

If, in the unlikely event Icesave were to collapse, it would probably be bureaucratically more difficult to get your money back than if a fully-UK bank went bust; but again not substantively so, and may actually be faster.

I don't personally blame Martin for my decision to save with Icesave, but from what I read above, I never thought I could be at risk of losing my modest savings completely.

randomnut

I don't blame Martin whatsoever for my (possible) loss. I was drawn in by the statements on Icesaves OWN site going on about how financially stable they were and how they weren't (for whatever reason) affected by global markets.

Granted, I fell for the pitch, but thats my fault, NOT Martins. I got what Martin said I would get, an account with a good interest rate. I don't ever recall him saying it was a fool proof, iron clad thing with no way of ever biting me in the !!!.

StevieJ

earlgrey wrote: »

If the UK government is required to use money from other taxpayers, some of whom will have no savings themselves at all, to compensate those with savings who invested in a foreign bank it will be a very controversial decision. That was the political point repeatedly made by some of us at the beginning of this year. It's made even more difficult if they were fully warned by "experts" such as Martin Lewis on this site as he claims but disregarded those warnings.

Let's hope it doesn't come to that and that it all goes smoothly. Easily said, but worrying about such things never helps.

I didn't think the govt had any money left, and the only place they could get the money was from borrowing i.e. people with savings.

Buster_Danog

nicholbb wrote: »

Just watched the C4 news and all he said was 'slightly dodgy'. However as the scheme looks like it will pay out the full amount it is said it would, I don't understand why people are worried about.

The Icelandic finance minister says so, and I hope so. The possibility of them not paying out is just refusing to dawn on me. I wouldn't appreciate the disaster to my small savings until someone actually says so.

earlgrey_3

Eager_Saver wrote: »

As for the interview, Jon Snow really seemed to go out of his way to pressurise / put the blame on Martin as well which I find quite disappointing.

Jon Snow's job is to interview and not to let people get away with porkies.

It isn't his job to have people on to plug their website as happens too often elsewhere in the back-scratching world of TV. We need more like Jon Snow.