Endowment Farce

Bamf100

Hi all,

I am in currently in the process of fighting to recoup money from a savings plan sold to my brother in law. He took out a repayment mortgage about 2.5 years ago and at the same time he was advised to start the concurrent plan to cover the capital repayment at the end of the term?????

The broker mistakenly thought the mortgage was interest only.

Fortunately I noticed this on reviewing his mortgage recently and he has now cancelled the plan and moved mortgages (Alliance & Leicester Top Marks at the moment).

On cancelling the plan I asked the broker for my B in L to be reimbursed all monies he had paid into the plan up until the cancellation date, plus interest.

My theory is it was their error, which caused him to take on the plan and therefore any management charges and commission fees incurred should be waived. My only concern is how liable is my B in L for agreeing to the plan in the first place?

Obviously it's a case of him not having the first idea about what he was doing, but surely that's what financial advisers are for?

What do you think?

Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Regards,

Naf.

Barney088

The general rule is if it's not written down, it doesn't exisit. I guess there are some people who would want an Endowment/Savings plan and a repayment mortgage. As it's unusual I would have thought that the broker will have written down the reasons why. I did one recently where the clients wanted to keep paying into a savings plan on a repayment mortgage to use the savings to pay for their childrens university.

I would perhaps get the notes from the broker and see what they say.

dunstonh

If the advisor had it documented on file as an interest only, then he sold the correct policy for the type of mortage. Even if it was an error and documented incorrectly, then it would be unlikely a complaint would be upheld as the product sold matches the documentation.

This documentation is supplied within the cancellation period of the policy and the letter does say that you should check the information to make sure it is correct.

Therefore, if this is case, I see no reason why he should refund anything. After all, who is to say that the advisor is at fault for him thinking it is interest only?