Act now on mis-sold endowments: new article

Tardis_2

Thank you defender...i have just posted off your comments across the Channel....many thanks on his behalf.

ciba_man

Hi,
in 1987 I had taken an endownmment through Scottish Mutual, this transaction was carried out from the estate agent I purchased my home through, the mortgage was with the Halifax over 25 years, the agent I believed was working for Scottish Mutual.
I have been warned of a -£4k in the final pay out, to this I attempted to claim from Scottish Mutual, the claim was rejected due to the Estate agent not being in business any more and the policy was sold by an independant advisor.
I still have the mortgage with the halifax but I am concidering selling my endownment and move to a cheaper motgage provider to help offset my loss, is this the best option?

I was young at the time of purchasing my home & was told by the estate agent & endownment seller that it was the bees knees of a deal, I am to blaim for being nieve.

I hope I can recieve some good advise on this forum, there maybe a way to challenge Scottish Mutual again or the Halifax, I can't believe that they won't share some blame.

I will gratefull of any help

regards

ciba man

dunstonh

I hope I can recieve some good advise on this forum, there maybe a way to challenge Scottish Mutual again or the Halifax, I can't believe that they won't share some blame.

It would be highly unfair if Scottish Mutual or Halifax were liable for any blame as they didnt give you any advice. They had nothing to do with the decision for you to go endowment.

As it was pre-regulation and not tied to a provider, you have no protection under the FOS, FSA or FSCS. Its the end of the road.

ciba_man

dunstonh
Many thanks for your reply, I really thought it was the end of the road, but it was a long shot.

regards

ciba man

mayb_2

Hi vinno
You mentioned on the report missold endowment successes thread the chances of taking my own claim through a small claims court if it was under £5000. As this is about misselling I thought I would post this here.

Unfortunately vinno this was more in the region of £23000 than £5000 but was an endowment not attached to a mortgage. The normal misselling rules applied to a mortgage don't appear to apply to these. The advice I received regarding this was that the Ombudsman would never find in my favour because to do so would be to open up the floodgates to all the other people who were missold these.

Despite a wealth of evidence we didn't have a leg to stand on. We never received any updates on how this was performing so no amber/ red or any other colour letters and presumably no time bar rules either.

My son has just received a payout on one of these policies with the same company. Having paid them £1200 over 10 years, he is about to receive the princely sum of £1340. This is a relatively small policy but it was started with the idea of providing him with some money (should have been over £3500 as promised at the time) to help pay the expenses when buying his first house or key money on a rental. Again no projections sent until about 2 years ago. This is a quote from the accompanying letter.

We all have hopes and dreams. It may be that when you first took out your investment with us you had specific plans for how you would use the money. But over time circumstances change and so do our dreams. With your policy about to mature, now is a good time to think carefully about what you want from your money. By choosing to reinvest some or all of the funds with us we could help you realise more of your hopes and dreams in the future.

:rotfl:

Well we had a good laugh at that one and there was more in the same vein. It is nice to know these companies retain a sense of humour. Unfortunately I struggle to keep mine these days.

mayb_2

ciba man although dunstonh is probably right about having no protection because of the year it was sold to you. I did file a claim for misselling although I was sold an endowment through an estate agents and the company I had the endowment with had changed hands. They paid out without any argument, so it is always worth a try if anyone else finds themselves in that situation with a newer endowment. Some of them don't look for any old loophole to avoid their responsibilities and they made it a very simple process for us.

You are not to blame for being naieve you asked a person who knew what they were doing to give you advice. Sounds pretty sensible to me - shame they didn't give you the full picture at the time and even more shameful if they can't be held to account for that.

robcro

Hi , i have three endowement policies , 1st taken in 1994 , time barred , 2nd taken in 1996 , currently being assessed , 3rd taken in 1999 complaint upheld . All policies designed to payout in 2019. when we took the 3rd endowment it was for a 20year term and increased the endowment premiums to £251 per month. Our complaint was that we were never advised that if we have converted all our mortgage to repayment the total cost per month was actaully the same (within a couple of £'s) and had no risk and the term would be the same and the mortgage would be completely paid off. We will obviously get compensation on this 3rd policy , but my view is that the financial advice we received in 1999 directly effected our decision to continue with the earlier policies which are also predicting a short fall and compensation should take into account other policies effected by the advice given, any body have any views/experience

dunstonh

but my view is that the financial advice we received in 1999 directly effected our decision to continue with the earlier policies which are also predicting a short fall and compensation should take into account other policies effected by the advice given, any body have any views/experience

Was the advice in 1999 tied or independent?

If tied, the complaint wont get you anywhere. Tied agents are not authorised to discuss other providers products and whether or not they are suitable (beyond ineligbility).

If independent, did you ask for a review on the existing policies or not?

robcro

it was a company discounted mortgage , with financial advice provided by their insurance arm , all endowments are with the same company, seemed to be the norm to sell the endowment as the best option

mayb_2

If you got compensation for the third policy it must have been that you had proved that you did not understand the nature of what you were purchasing. In other words you would not have purchased it if you had known it was an investment and may not pay off your mortgage.

As all three policies were sold by the same company - proving the last one was missold surely also proves that the others were missold. If you understood about the first or second one you could not have been missold the third one. Or am I finaly going mad?