Lloyds TSB Private Banking - Any Good?

FLAPJACK

Can only agree with Dunstonh's last post...never seen the same person twice, (not quite the picture their sales blurb paints). Remember they approached YOU....YOU are doing them a favor giving them the business!....If (as happened to me) your investments (that they recommended ....as could have an IFA) dived ...the answer I got was "It was a legitimate market loss".Well I could have made the exact investments and lost the exact same amount but without paying someone to lose it for me.

Having money in my experience is as a bigger problem as not not any. To be honest it's up to you what you do! You really have to look at any investment as a LONGTERM thing..it's just a real downer when it dives within months of investing...

If a deal seems too good to be true ...it probably is!

Loughton_Monkey

Personally, with that amount of money, I would go nowhere near a bank with it for investment advice. The overall charges will eat significantly into the money whatever they 'do' with it on your behalf. And their investment knowledge would probably be mediochre at best (for the guys who would work on your type of account anyway).

Lettuce_Sauce

Very late in the Day, but including my experience of Lloyds Private Banking for people who may read this in the future.

Background: I am in my early 20's and inherited some money which was managed in Trust through Lloyds Private Banking using the Discretionary Portfolio Service. I also have some money managed by an IFA invested in OEICs.

Lloyds Private Banking:

My overall experience has been pretty poor. I am now working in the Investment Management sector and regard Lloyds Private Banking service as poor. I have had four different managers in the last two years and receive little/no communication from them other than the 6 monthly valuation (which actually costs £25 in postage fees per year!).

You do not get to speak to the Investment Managers directly - I have what one could probably call a Relationship Manager (although they don't really seem to know what that means - very brash and arrogant in emails due to my age and assumed lack of knowledge about the sector!).

Recently pulled them up when checking through my latest valuation - around 12% of the portfolio was sat in an extra interest account at 0.1%. When asked why this was - apparently it wasn't considered part of the portfolio by the Investment Managers. Alarming incompetence. Now invested in standard FTSE 100 Bluechips I'm sure at my expense - could have done this myself, or been a little more creative! I think they work off pooled research and I'm sure must run model portfolio's alongside each other, not tailored to my needs at all. This could be due to a few problems with attaining a legal age to take control of the fund - but still disappointing. Also, the fund was split between various family members through the will.... again alarming incompetence with the divide as I received a far greater share than I should have - which was then removed and sent to the other persons portfolio after it had been in mine for 6 months and they hadn't noticed - it took a phone call from our family to question it!! They also didn't split the fund evenly with shares being divided equally meaning that our portfolio's now perform differently, which has unfortunately been at the detriment to my own gains.

Have seen pretty poor results over the 2010 year - about a 2% income from dividends after fees.... the chap was very keen to point out the 4% capital growth over the last year (out of recession where the FTSE 100 was up 6.6% over the 2010 year and they should be picking the best ones out of this!!!). So I am up about the same as at ETF for the FTSE 100!

My advice would be to avoid the big retail banks - either find a more boutique style investment service, or use an IFA... comments on IFA's to follow.

I do not intend to stay with them once I have full control of the portfolio - from the email responses I have had I'm not sure my Relationship Manager is too keen on me staying either due to the badgering I give him every now and again to pull his finger out, as he always reminds me that I can take the portfolio as cash on attaining a certain age!

IFA's:

Agree with the comments above - service levels in IFA's range from very good to very bad.

My experience - check all the fees before you start and the actually investment vehicles that are on offer. Plus check the IFA's actually knowledge of investments/economics etc with a few pre-prepared questions. Answers you don't want to hear which I have had: Do you think I should still invest in Japan even after the tsunami devastated the economy? "Well, I heard on the radio this morning that they think it will be ok." Choose your IFA carefully. If they are slow (which I have experienced) or incompetent, make sure you move away from them. Check any agreements fully before you sign them and set out your own realistic deadlines which have to be met or you walk without paying any fees. - By realistic I mean realistic in the way that don't expect superhero service.... if problems arise you should at least expect good communication and reasonably prompt action.

With the popularity of Fund Supermarkets now - I am going to be moving some of the money to be managed by myself. Won't name the platform but using just OEIC's I have calculated that total fees will be 1.5% plus any dealing charges - sure you can get a better price for this though. The approach is good enough for me as my opinion is that OEIC's carry less risk than individual shares so my own risk tolerance is more suited to paying perhaps 0.5% more in fees for a better piece of mind that I won't see such huge volatility in capital.

I hope this gives a balanced view to the question.

Summary: Find a smaller boutique investment house that will have your needs at the heart of their business and tailor a portfolio to you. Find a decent IFA through recommendations. Or DIY the portfolio. Avoid big banks.