Act now on mis-sold endowments: new article

vinno65

dunstonh wrote: »

The idea was to reduce the amount of opportunistic complainers who knew about the risk but wanted to wait to see what was the best outcome for them. Remember that timebars also exist in law so its not an unusual or uncommon thing.

You fail to point out Dunston that when the legislation was introduced (2004) it was not made retrospective. At a stroke, hundreds of thousands(who recieved red letters in 2000) lost their right to complain. Hurrah for the consumer biased FSA!!!

regards Vinno

davidreah

Hi
I'm a newbie at this but I wonder if someone can clarify our situation for us.
We made a complaint about endowment mis-selling last year and have received several letters saying they hadn't been able to progress our complaint yet.
Now we've received a letter telling us the broker has not responded to the FOS attempts to contact it and so the FOS may not be in a position investigate our complaint. We did tell the FOS at the outset that we believed the broker has either ceased trading or the business has been sold.

Can anyone tell us whether FOS has a process in place to cater for this eventuality?

We supplied all the information we had with our initial submission to the FOS so where do we go from here?

Thanks

Dave Reah

dunstonh

Can anyone tell us whether FOS has a process in place to cater for this eventuality?

Yes and No.

If the FOS find that the advising firm no longer exists and there is no network to take on the responsiblity or the adviser was not self employed or a partner then its the end of the road for using the FOS. You then take your complaint to the FSCS who then handle complaints against firms no no assets. That is providing that the advising firm was authorised by the FSA or PIA previous to the FSA. If it was a Lautro firm who ceased before 1994 then the FSCS do not cover it.

BellaBargains

I've just contacted Standard Life for the details of the IFA that I purchased through - however they have informed me that I've past the deadline for complaints, they tell me it was 20th December 2007. I realise that if I've past the date, I've past the date and that's pretty much it, but how am I supposed to have known this date, I can't find it anywhere in the stuff they have sent me. I get my statements in the summer so logic would have suggested to me that the deadline would also be in the summer as that is the only time they write to me. Anyone know where / how I would have been told about this date.

Many thanks

BB

dunstonh

but how am I supposed to have known this date

It is with the statements they send. The clock starts ticking from the point you were notified of a high risk of shortfall. As you get closer to the end you are given two warnings that you are timing out. These are typically in the statement pack you are sent.

BellaBargains

dunstonh wrote: »

It is with the statements they send. The clock starts ticking from the point you were notified of a high risk of shortfall. As you get closer to the end you are given two warnings that you are timing out. These are typically in the statement pack you are sent.

Thanks - I did eventually find it, although as far as I can see I was only given this date once, it's snuck in on page 6 of my statement from June 07. Can't see any sign of me being told this date a second time.

mayb_2

I thought you had two years (maybe 3 can't remember right now) after a statement saying there was a high risk of a shortfall - so plenty of time for a claim to be made.

dunstonh

Its three years from first notification of a high risk of shortfall or red warning letter. The final warning is given 6 months before it times out.

BellaBargains

I accept that I'm out of time - but I do think that it would be fairer to put the time bar date at the beginning of the letter/statement in the same area as the warning that it is going badly - frankly, I never got to page 6 of the statement as all the financial bits were on page 1 (and I lost the will to read!) and I no longer had a mortgage associated with the policy so thought that all the advice was about upping your payments etc. I also originally thought I was only 2 years in as they first red letter was June 05 but when I look at June 04 it says "high risk" which I gather is the same thing. All in all, I'm disappointed but as there's nothing I can do I have to just get on with it (and decide whether to dump the policy or continue throwing my money away for another 9 years).

dunstonh

A lot of Standard Life policies pay surpluses even though the projections suggest otherwise. Projections are not very reliable at the best of times as they can often leave things off or assume rates which are much lower than those being achieved. Although with some companies (not SL) the rates used actually overstate the potential.