Act now on mis-sold endowments: new article

dunstonh

chief_wiggum wrote: »

hi there ive been watching this thread and would like to say that as far as im aware from personal experience that when you claim money back you do not get compensation you get back exactly to the penny what you have paid over the years.
compensation should be extra and above what you paid for being mis-sold the product after all i could have had the money sitting in an account earning interest.
is it me who has been short changed or are people getting confused with the term compensation which it quite simply is not!

You dont get back the money you have paid unless the policy is voided (that only happens in a minority of cases depending on the complaint reason. In those cases interest is added.

For claims that a repayment mortgage should have been in place, then redress is paid on the difference between the surrender value and the current mortgage amount and what the mortgage would have been had you been on repayment from the start. So, interest doesnt apply there either.

Neil_Palmer

A friend recently received a 'Red' letter about the shortfall on his endowment mortgage. The last one had been 'Amber'.

The endowment previously had a spell in the 'Red' category, and he tried to claim compensation from the Bank of Scotland. The Bank stalled (sending out forms to fill in, claiming the last one was not correct, etc) and he gave up, as the letters were then turning back to 'Amber'.

Can he now start his claim afresh, as the letters have turned from 'Amber' to 'Red' again?

mayb_2

If the Bank never sent him a response to his claim then they have not dealt with his initial claim. I think it would be perfectly within reason, as the time bar will not have started on this until he gets another red, as they told him the first one was a mistake. I am pretty sure you can take it to the Ombudsman if they refuse to deal or claim the time bar has kicked in from the original/mistaken red letter.

In the end he will have to decide whether he feels he was actually missold - ie he did not know he was purchasing a risky product/did not understand there was a possibility it would not cover the mortgage. Then he will have to decide whether he wants to continue to take a chance with the Bank or change to a repayment mortgage to ensure he actually can pay off the mortgage at the end of term.

Phoenix3861

Me and my husband thought we were well past the cut off date for claiming against being mis-sold an endowment mortgage but last night we were contacted by a firm who said that as we never received any letter informing us of a 'cut off' date we are still entitled to claim.

Our basic story is that we got our endowment mortgage through Natwest (around 1991-92) who used Scottish Widows for the endowment part of the insurance (think that is right....) anyways we had an endowment policy that was issued by SW. When things went majorly pear shaped for us where we suffered horrendously financially we were saved by 1st Direct who took over the mortgage and converted it to a capital/intererst one.

A few questions then:

1) Has anyone else heard from a company saying they were still entitled to claim after such a long time also? Were they successful?

2) If it was back in approximately 1992 to 1993, how can I find out the policy document number to claim against when everyone I phone says it is too long ago to be on their active systems???

3) Could we easily process this ourselves without the intermidiary company??

The intermediary company is phoning back tomorrow night to see if we have located the policy number, but after 2 other house moves and clear outs I suspect we threw out the nightmare memories somewhere along the way!!

I have phoned SW who say it will take about a week to request the archived records to be put back on the system and even then they will require policy information to verify our identity (which we will have a lot of trouble remembering!!!). I phoned 1st Direct and they checked their systems and came up with nothing....I really don't want to call Natwest as I have never forgiven them for the trauma they put us through and feel physically sick thinking about contacting them.

So anyone have any suggestions as to where we could possibly source the policy document number from???

Your help is very much appreciated.

Thanks.

mayb_2

Your claim for a missale would have to be with Nat West as they sold the endowment mortgage to you originally and should hold records of that policy. If you no longer have a mortgage with Nat West then they would not have been sending you red letters about it. The time bar was introduced more recently for current endowment mortgage holders to claim within three years of receiving a letter saying their mortgage would shortfall.

You can only claim for a redress of the money that you lost by having an endowment over the period of time you had that policy. This will be compared to the situation that you would have been in if you had originally taken out a repayment mortgage and any real losses given back to you.

You can easily process the claim yourself but if you really feel that strongly about dealing with Nat West you may feel it would be better to use a company to do this for you, but it will reduce any amount that you may receive in redress. You may also be better advised to find a company for yourself and check how much other people would charge for this service.

dunstonh

Me and my husband thought we were well past the cut off date for claiming against being mis-sold an endowment mortgage but last night we were contacted by a firm who said that as we never received any letter informing us of a 'cut off' date we are still entitled to claim.

Most notifications were included with the annual statements. Have you checked your statements?

1) Has anyone else heard from a company saying they were still entitled to claim after such a long time also? Were they successful?

Over 3/4 of endowments are now time barred. So, statistically, the odds are against you. You can only get the time bar overruled if you have valid grounds. If the address is correct with the endowment provider then claiming you didnt hear anything about a time bar is unlikely to wash as they send out the information a minimum of three times. One may go missing, but 3 or more?

However, your situation is that you surrendered it so it may not have got as far as shortfall warnings.

) If it was back in approximately 1992 to 1993, how can I find out the policy document number to claim against when everyone I phone says it is too long ago to be on their active systems???

scot Wid will be able to tell you.

3) Could we easily process this ourselves without the intermidiary company??

Its a doddle to do it without a claims company. Indeed, you are statistically more likely to be successful with a personal complaint letter than a template used by a claims company.

However, you may not have grounds for complaint or if you surrendered before 2000, the chances of a redress payment are not likely either (endowments didnt really fall into shortfall positions until after 2000).

cherrylittle

Hi, is it worth me claiming on an endowment morgage taken out in April 97, and finished in 2000 with Bank of Scotland and Scottish Amicable?
My husband and i were young, with no financial / investment experience. I can remember salesman said"With an endowment you should end up with a pot of extra money after the morgage is paid off", when we asked about investments he said it could pay out less but you never hear of that in the papers/ media do you? We are definately cautious people with a low risk attitude to money.
We have not delt with this sooner as i always thought we had no case, and with a young family , little time. Should i have done something about this ? Are we too late now anyway?

dunstonh

Hi, is it worth me claiming on an endowment morgage taken out in April 97, and finished in 2000 with Bank of Scotland and Scottish Amicable?

Probably not as you didnt have it long enough to build up any real value and if you had a repayment mortgage, that barely drops in the first few years either.

when we asked about investments he said it could pay out less but you never hear of that in the papers/ media do you?

At that point, no endowment had ever failed to hit target. However, it does mean that you were aware that there was a potential risk. So, knowing there was a risk does usually mean that a complaint would not be successful.

chief_wiggum

hi again thanks for the info much appreciated

pencilpot

pencilpot wrote: »

In 1984 my husband and I took out an endowment policy with Legal and General on the advice that it would cover the needed life assurance against a repayment mortgage and would provide an investment lump sum.

We were sold a low start build up plan with premiums increasing over the first 5 years.


We were in our mid twenties and my husband had just changed jobs from a stable company to a junior sales position with no experience.

We had two or more reviews with Legal and General employees over the following years and on each occasion were advised to continue the policy rather than surrender due to the value of cover, its suitability for our needs and its projected outturn (in particular terminal bonuses).

The policy matured recently and paid out £19400 but we have our written quote from 1984 which has what was explained to us as a conservative projected value of £33084.00.

We are in contact with the Financial Ombudsman Service who forwarded a complaint to Legal and General for us. We would be grateful for any advice in submitting our claim especially since we had a repayment mortgage and my understanding is that we are not claiming for shortfall but for the poor advice given.

We have received an offer from Legal and General to settle our claim and they have offered us £2232.90 which we are going to accept.

Thanks to dunstonh and mayb and anyone else who offered us advice.