Is this worthwhile? And can anybody explain the charges to me?

indierocker85

Hi guys

I have been trying to look into Stocks and Shares ISAs and have found the following at Halifax.

http://www.halifax.co.uk/investments/funds_uk_equity_income_high_income.asp

It seems to have holdings in the best performers and wondered if it was worthwhile putting £500 into it?

Also, could somebody please explain what charges I will pay. As this is what worries me.

Thanks

Reaper

See this document about the charges, and other info you should be aware of.
http://www.halifax.co.uk/investments/pdfs/1_337792-1.pdf

Briefly there is no entry/exit charge. There is an Annual Mangement Charge (AMC) . As you are investing under £25k it is 1.5% each year.

More useful is the Total Expense Ratio (TER) which includes that plus transaction costs. That is 1.56%, so not much worse.

There are plenty of other UK Equity Income funds around which can be purchased at similar rates from any of the discount brokers.

27col

At Halifax, you will pay £11.95 each time you make a purchase into your stocks and shares ISA. Also stamp duty of about £2.85. You will also pay £11.95 each time you sell all or part of your holding. I have just dipped my foot into buying a few shares. Spend a few hours browsing their web site. You can also ask questions which they are fairly prompt in answering, either by email or on the phone. You can buy almost any share using them. You have to set up an isa share dealing account and fund it. This can be done in a matter of seconds. Then all you have to do is to choose what shares you want to buy. I have bought shares in 5 different companies. Electricity and gas, construction, insurance and a pub chain. You can check the value of your share holdings on line,and you can choose to have the dividends reinvested( this is free or very cheap) or you can choose to get the money sent to your bank account. I would not have thought it worthwhile to buy less than £500 of shares at a time, due to the dealing cost. Or you can feed money in at regular intervals to add small amounts of shares. This is £5 a time I think. Anyway, its all on the website, you just have to be patient and explore it thoroughly. I have found it quite good fun.

cardsharps

indierocker85 wrote: »

http://www.halifax.co.uk/investments/funds_uk_equity_income_high_income.asp



Also, could somebody please explain what charges I will pay. As this is what worries me.

If you look at this fund's top 10 holdings it's the usual suspects -big companies that pay big dividends- BP, Vodafone, Glaxo, Shell, etc. Why do you need to pay them 1.5% per year to buy these shares when you could do it yourself via a FTSE-100 tracker..

Reaper

27col wrote: »

At Halifax, you will pay £11.95 each time you make a purchase into your stocks and shares ISA. Also stamp duty of about £2.85. You will also pay £11.95 each time you sell all or part of your holding.

This only applies to shares, not funds which the OP is interested in.

dunstonh

It seems to have holdings in the best performers and wondered if it was worthwhile putting £500 into it?

Halifax funds tend to be poor performers. There are number of better UK equity income funds.

Also, could somebody please explain what charges I will pay. As this is what worries me.

Remember you pay charges on everything. Even savings accounts. Some you dont see (like savings accounts) others you do see (like investments). So, whilst charges are an important consideration, don't make the mistake of thinking that some things dont have charges.

27col

I stand corrected.