Alliance and Leicester - Misselling

Fraserca

We took out a policy with Scottish Amicable in 1988. I have written three letters to Alliance and Leicester who sold us the policies and they have rejected my claim for miselling.

The main reason seems to be a leaflet from Scottish Amicable that says ' Any shortfall will have to be met from your own resources ' . This statement was buried in the information booklet among all the promises of great things to come from the policy .

A & L claim that they gave me at the time as part of the illustration. They have no records to prove that they did this and i have no records from the time apart from my own recollection that my own circumstances were never discussed - least of all my attitude to the investment. It just seemed the thing to do and I trusted them.

So my claim has been rejected.

Can anyone advise me if they have managed to get round this ?

Its clear to me that A & L are confident they have a trump card there.

Thanks

defender_of_the_weak

Standard cut and paste crap from A & L. They will cling on to any possible version of events to reject complaints. I see this rubbish week in week out. take the case to FOS and point out that you did not want to take a risk with your mortgage. They cannot rely on some vague phrase in a booklet, they may or may not have been provided before the sale was completed.

Go to FOS

When is someone from the FSA going to read the contents of this site and get round to fining some of these companies for telling porkies

dunstonh

If they have lost documentation, then it is their fault not yours. If they cannot prove beyond all doubt that they issued the docs, then usually the view is taken that they did not exist in the first place.

Attitude to risk can often be established by experienced advisers in a conversation style without you even realising that it is taking place. Indeed, many can complete a factfind without actually physically getting the factfind out because many of the answers come out in conversation or appear in documentation you may supply. So, just because you cannot recall a document, doesnt mean it didnt happen.

That said, DOTW is spot on in that their responses are weak and almost certainly wouldnt stand up to a FOS review.

When is someone from the FSA going to read the contents of this site and get round to fining some of these companies for telling porkies

What was that stat published a few months back. Something like 12 companies are responsible for 80% of the complaints? Makes you wonder why the FSA doesnt focus on those 12. They have damaged the reputation of the industry significantly with their actions and that is one of the things that the FSA is meant to stop happening.

Fraserca

I have just completed filling out the forms from the Financial Ombudesman Service. Posting tomorrow.

I just hope that they will sort it out.

I got nothing but whitewash from A & L.

I did notice though that Scottish Amicable were fined by the FSA for the way they sold policies around that time, so maybe their booklet was also misleading. Here's hoping.

Let you all know in 6 - 9 mts time when the FOS get back to me....

butterflymum

Did you ever get an outcome on this?

We bought a SA (now Prudential) endowment via A&L in 1990. I finally complained, but as I didn't want to do so via A&L, went directly to Prudential - an A&L adviser was, in effect, an appointed representitive of SA. It was upheld and dealt with quickly.