Is this right??

pebbles392

My elderly mother is a customer of Towry Law and before that was with Edward Jones until Towry Law took over the buisness, she was contacted by her old finacal advisor from Edward Jones who has started a new investment company with other ex collegues and was asked to come in to speak to him about possibly transferring over her investments to them, she was asked by the man if she could write a letter to him to say she was interested in investng with them and not to mention anything to Towry Law that they contacted my mother about the there new investment buisness. Can anyone tell me why this guy is covering himself and getting my mother to lie and is it illegal?

Thankyou

Aegis

Because the contracts with ex Edward Jone advisers state that they may not solicit business away from Towry Law. However, if your mother chooses to do business with her ex adviser, that's her choice.

johnmaynardkeynes

Hi pebbles, Aegis is correct in that the purpose is that no solciiation may occur (There are legal cases pending suing Ex Edward Jones advisers for this) so the adviser is trying to cover themselves from this action.

The question to ask really is that if the adviser is asking for your mother to lie on their behalf, do you trust them to deal with you in an honourable manner? For your information, the adviser will have a restrictive covenenant which I believe is 12 months from the date that they left EJ?TL to not solicit contact with your mother to do business with them, this is not long in investment terms and it does not mean that they cannot be in contact for regular chats - they may be able to even keep an eye on your mothers investments from afar but not move them BUT it obviously depends on your mothers individua l circumstances.

Your mother shouldn't move her investemnst just yet, especially not to the Towry Law funds in my opinion but itmaybe relevant in a couple of months when i understand that Towry intend to cease statement provision.

pebbles392

Thankyou Aegis and John, very much appreciate your views on this matter, got a meeting on Wednesday with my mother's ex EJ advisor so i am going to be very cautious. Tried to tell my mother its going to be a sales pitch but because she trusts him even though he has asked her to lie for him she wont believe me , really dont want to see her a loser in
this.

John my mother is with Towry Law at moment and what is statement provision? sorry for being a novice but i really need to know these things as i am startng to take over the running of things for my mother and dont want to mess it up and lose.

Thankyou

dunstonh

Tried to tell my mother its going to be a sales pitch but because she trusts him even though he has asked her to lie for him she wont believe me , really dont want to see her a loser in
this.

It may not be a sales process. If the adviser was being paid to provide servicing on her investments and she appreciated that service, then the old adviser may just be going through the process to continue with their new company. Indeed, it will probably be cheaper than TL doing it as TL are expensive (dont buy their fee only rubbish. Yes, technically, its a fee but its double the commission rate). If the old adviser will continue the portfolio on the old terms with no charges to move over then that is fine. If they start talking about large up front amounts to move it over then its time to consider moving on.

johnmaynardkeynes

Hi there, above post is spot on, if your mothers ex ej adviser just wants to move the investments with them it should not cost your mother anything financially, it is moving them to a place where if anything does need to change the adviser would have the power to do so. If they talk about anything regarding reinvestment and fees then this may not be the right thing, nothing has changed drastically enough in the past six months to merit this - of course this applies to the Towry Law fund too.

The monthly statemet provision issue is just that i understand that Towry Law intend to send investment statements on a quarterly or six monthly basis rather than on a monthly basis.

pebbles392

Went to the meeting today with my mothers ex EJ advisor and it was a sales pitch from the guy, i have been given the table of charges ie annual fee, mutual funds and investment bonds charge etc etc, is there anywhere i can go just to find out if it is a good deal with them or not, just want a bit of honest advice and basically not see my mother be overcharged.

Thanks

dunstonh

pebbles392 wrote: »

Went to the meeting today with my mothers ex EJ advisor and it was a sales pitch from the guy, i have been given the table of charges ie annual fee, mutual funds and investment bonds charge etc etc, is there anywhere i can go just to find out if it is a good deal with them or not, just want a bit of honest advice and basically not see my mother be overcharged.

Thanks

Go to an established IFA. if the investments are above say £50k (as a rough guide) then look at fee basis as the method of remuneration. First meeting will be free and they can explain who much and what they will do.

Like any industry, some will be expensive (even greedy), some will be better than others but you can usually tell the good ones by the quality of the information they give.

Aegis

pebbles392 wrote: »

Went to the meeting today with my mothers ex EJ advisor and it was a sales pitch from the guy, i have been given the table of charges ie annual fee, mutual funds and investment bonds charge etc etc, is there anywhere i can go just to find out if it is a good deal with them or not, just want a bit of honest advice and basically not see my mother be overcharged.

Thanks

Post them here. You'll get a lot of opinions!

pebbles392

ok here are the fees and charges- sorry pound sign not working on my pc.

Transaction fees for new investments

Equities- 0 - 5,000 pounds 1%
5,000 - 10,000 0.75%(on the amount over 5,000)
10,000 and above 0.5%(on the amount over 10,000)

Fixed income- 1% on all buy transactions

Mutual funds and investment bonds- 2% initial charge

Direct Fees

Managed funds/Collectives/Unit trusts- Initial fee-0%
Annual Management
Charge- 0.3 - 0.75%
Exit Fee - 0%

Nominee fee
Ascentric Platform - Dealing fee 12.50 per trade (buy or sell)
Optional model portfolio 60.00 per account ( maximum 180.00)
With dealing fee 2.00 per trade (buy or sell)

0.25% per annum (minimum 150.00) levied monthly in arrears from account.

Stamp duty where applicable

Non-investment business- With regards to non-investment business such as pensions, pension reviews and protection needs, clients will have a choice between a fee based approach or commission.


Hope this helps and all advice is very much appreciated from myself and my mother, by the way when we went to see this advisor he had no brochures or website to look at about this company when he has said it has been going since feb this year, just not at all happy about something and my mother has 100,000k to invest.

Thankyou

jamesd

With 100k to invest she should shop around. Those charges aren't cheap and she certainly can do better on fee basis from a competitive IFA. Better than Towry Law as well.

Or she could ask this adviser to accept £1,000 initial fee, zero charge or only minimum permitted platform charge for money being invested and 0.25% trail commission for ongoing rebalancing and servicing work. With less sales work than required for completely new business this isn't likely to be a bad offer.

The bit about being quiet about this wasn't only the contracts. The adviser has presumably breached data protection law by stealing personal information - your mother's contact and perhaps investment details that were provided for a purpose other than the new business, without disclosure of that intended use at the time the information was provided.