Best Invest v Hargreaves Lansdown

kar999

I notice that Best Invest are offering £300 cashback for switching £50k+ to their Select S&S ISA. I’ve currently got mine in Hargreaves Vantatge and there doesn’t seem a vast difference in charges for funds and share/ETF purchases look cheaper with Best Invest although they do have a fixed quarterly fee for these. I have 3 ETF’s c.£4k and the rest of my portfolio is in a dozen unit trusts and I have a monthly regular Direct Debit of £150.

I’ve been very pleased with the service from HL but the £300 looks tempting. I haven’t studied each company’s small print in depth yet but does anyone have any comments positive or negative again them or spotted any major differences in charges?

Thanks.

le_loup

Don't forget H-L's loyalty bonus.

kar999

Thanks Le Loup but they also offer up to 0.5% loyalty bonus as well. I dont know if it's something new from them.

Our annual loyalty bonus offers some of the best annual savings on funds. This can be worth up to 0.50% p.a. of the value of your funds and is paid from the commission we receive from fund managers

Lokolo

Although its a couple of years away, the charges for post RDR would impact whether it is worthwhile in moving. But I suppose when it comes to it, you can always change when the information is released.

kar999

Thanks Adrian (and others) for contributing. As I'm not going to be out of the market by switching, and if the charges aren't any more, then £300 is £300 for a bit of form filling. I understand my exit fees would be paid for leaving HL as it wont cost more than £500. I'm not sure if I'd lose my accrued loyalty bonus I've gained with HL.

I just need to do some more reading of the T&C's. I think I'll be charged £12.50 + Vat per quarter Total for holding all my (non-commission generating) ETF's compared to 0.5% with max £45 from HL but I'm not sure if that is for each or all of my 3 ETF's.

I need to also check criteria for monthly investing i.e.the minimum amounts per fund.

Sparky47

kar999 wrote: »

I'm not sure if I'd lose my accrued loyalty bonus I've gained with HL.

Just send in the form available on their site to withdraw your loyalty bonus to your bank account before switching.

saveonarola

kar999 wrote: »

I think I'll be charged £12.50 + Vat per quarter Total for holding all my (non-commission generating) ETF's compared to 0.5% with max £45 from HL but I'm not sure if that is for each or all of my 3 ETF's.

I need to also check criteria for monthly investing i.e.the minimum amounts per fund.

It's £12.50+VAT per quarter custody charge for each account that contains non-commission paying funds, regardless of how many unit trusts, ETFs, shares or whatever are in it. If all of your investments are in the same ISA, or the same SIPP, then you pay one custody charge, regardless of how many non-commission paying funds you hold. If, however, you hold some non-commission paying funds in an ISA and some non-commission paying funds outside the ISA in your regular Investment Account (for reasons of functionality - so that loyalty bonuses can be paid without messing up the ISA limits, for example - all Bestinvest clients are set up automatically with an Investment Account, but they don't have to use it), then you would pay a custody charge on both accounts.

All charges are shown here:

https://select.bestinvest.co.uk/medi...vices-fees.pdf

Custody fees are section 4(b)i

If you want to transfer out at some future point, it's £50 for closing the account, plus £25 per stock. No additional charge for transferring out in cash.

Minimums (strangely not shown on the Bestinvest website) are currently £100 lump sum, £100 top-up, and the minimum for regular direct debit (the system for which is not set up yet but expected within weeks) is expected to be £100. There is no minimum for share dealing.

Hope that's clear. No, I don't work for Bestinvest (!); I just called them to check up on all of this before opening my ISA, so the information is only as good as the person who gave it to me. It all seems logical, except perhaps for the minimums: most brokers seem to do a higher minimum for lump sum and lower (£50) for monthly. Hopefully they won't change these to the disadvantage of investors in the future. And that £50 account closure charge is a bit of a sting in the tail, but I suppose they're trying to build up their business. If you find out anything different, do post it here.

gadgetmind

Sparky47 wrote: »

Just send in the form available on their site to withdraw your loyalty bonus to your bank account before switching.

Yup, and it's not as if any HL investor will *ever* run out of their postage paid envelopes!

kar999

I thought I'd give HL the chance of retaining my buisiness but they weren't prepared to offer me any incentives despite currently offering up to £500 for new customers (albeit that's for £200k and £100 for £50-£100k) whereas Best Invest is £300 for £50k+. Same old business model I suppose... incentivise new customers at the expense of exisitng ones. Perhaps that's why I'm a rate tart anyway. It's my hard earned cash so I need it to work hard for me rather than anyone else.

I'm considering moving just £50k of investments to BI and leave the rest with HL to see how they perform before I burn my bridges. I might have to be selective on which funds I move so I just need to check I dont cop for two lots of charges on some of my investments like ETF's.

gadgetmind

kar999 wrote: »

Perhaps that's why I'm a rate tart anyway. It's my hard earned cash so I need it to work hard for me rather than anyone else.

Nowt wrong with that; rate tarts are a key part of the capitalism system.

Oh, and HL now charge platform fees for anything that doesn't grease their palm enough.

Bestinvest looks good!

max11

Sparky47 wrote: »

Just send in the form available on their site to withdraw your loyalty bonus to your bank account before switching.

Is the loyalty bonus not authomatic?