CAPITA REGISTRARS ludicrous certificate fees.

sebado

Hi,

I am looking for advise on unfair charges for share certificates.

I have been paying into a company share scheme for the last 3 years which has recently matured. This is managed by a 3rd party company on behalf of my employer called Computer Share.

On maturation, I asked for the shares to be issued to me rather than sold. They then passed the request to CAPITA REGISTRARS to issue the share certificate to me.

After 30 days I still had not received the certifcate even though some of my colleagues had. I contacted Computer Share and they referred me to CAPITA REGISTRARS.

I engaged with CAPITA who assured me the certificate had been sent out first clas on the 16th of May. I assured them I had not received it.

I was told that to have the certificate reissued, it would cost £40 admin fee and £201.16 for the certificate.

I have never had any shares before and this is my first experience. They are wanting approximately 4% of the value of the shares to reissue a certificate I never received in the first place.

I am obviously unhappy at being penalised when my colleagues will have the full value of their shares. I have lived at the same address for over 3 years and no post has ever gone missing.

If this had been a purchase with a credit card and it was for a £500 ipad, I would have been covered but because it is for a bit of paper that I indirectly paid for, they can behave how they choose. They could ask for £2500 and it makes no difference.

I have suggested to them this is grossly unfair and asked why they didn't send the shares recorded delivery if the value of the certificate is so high.

They have offered to drop the admin fee as a gesture of goodwill so still want £201.16.:rotfl:

I am simply not going to pay for the new certificate and was wandering what advise anyone has on how to go about resolving this.

I have asked them for proof of sending which they said they will look into.

Should I look at writing to the various money sections of the national papers and see if one of them will follow it up for me?

Thanks in advance for your help.

jayship

Ask your employers to get involved as they have more clout as a company whist you are waiting for proof of delivery.

sebado

Thanks. Finding it tricky as to who can escalate this for me as it is such a large company and the HR is in the Philipines.

jayship wrote: »

Ask your employers to get involved as they have more clout as a company whist you are waiting for proof of delivery.

TheBanker

The £201.16 sounds like an insurance premium, to cover the possibility of the original certificate turning up.

Can you post back with exact details of what they're asking you to pay for?

oneye14

We are trying to set a precedent wiith Equiniti on this thread...
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/54194205#Comment_54194205

on the basis the Registrar has a vested interest in losing the occasional Certificate, and there is no/no need for indemnity insurance.

The requirement for indemnity insurance may be with your own company which you may be able to verify.

Sir_Lunchalot

oneye14 wrote: »

We are trying to set a precedent wiith Equiniti on this thread...

on the basis the Registrar has a vested interest in losing the occasional Certificate, and there is no/no need for indemnity insurance.

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense. Almost all UK companies will have a provision in their Articles of Association requiring the completion of an indemnity before a new share certificate is issued by their transfer agent as this protects the company against it's liability in the event of a fraudulent transfer. As 'The Banker' comments, this £201 is likely to be the premium to cover that indemnity.

You might think, like I did, that companies should issue certificates by secure post, but when I challenged our Company Secretary on this, he contrasted the high cost of doing so against the low number that are reported missing, and I have to admit that his case was pretty compelling.

@Sebado - you would be best to check with the Company Secretary of the company for whom you work, as they may have special employee arrangements in place with the registrar (my company does), but 4% does not sound out of line with my own unfortunate experience of indemnity costs.

jayship

Sir_Lunchalot wrote: »

You might think, like I did, that companies should issue certificates by secure post, but when I challenged our Company Secretary on this, he contrasted the high cost of doing so against the low number that are reported missing, and I have to admit that his case was pretty compelling.



If the cost of sending by secure post is expensive than they should at least get a certificate of posting to prove to the client that it was sent out. At the moment there is no fee for doing so.

cloud_dog

Sir_Lunchalot wrote: »

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense. Almost all UK companies will have a provision in their Articles of Association requiring the completion of an indemnity before a new share certificate is issued by their transfer agent as this protects the company against it's liability in the event of a fraudulent transfer. As 'The Banker' comments, this £201 is likely to be the premium to cover that indemnity.

You might think, like I did, that companies should issue certificates by secure post, but when I challenged our Company Secretary on this, he contrasted the high cost of doing so against the low number that are reported missing, and I have to admit that his case was pretty compelling.

My stance would be that the registrar took the risk of sending a valuable document via normal post and in this instance the valuable document never arrived. They bare the responsibility for ensuring delivery of such a valuable document.

At the very least they should have asked you if you would pay (originally) for secure posting but, as they didn't do this the onus is on them to replace the lost document.

EDIT: I would also take the stance that they have failed to deliver the document, as I assume they are required to do under their terms with your company etc. I would not enter in to did they or didn't they post it, merely that you have not received a valuable document they are responsible for providing. (Although you may be banging your head against a brick wall):wall:

oneye14

I'm sorry, but this is nonsense. Almost all UK companies will have a provision in their Articles of Association requiring the completion of an indemnity before a new share certificate is issued by their transfer agent as this protects the company against it's liability in the event of a fraudulent transfer

There is no need to apologise. I can confirm that Trinity Mirror PLC (in my case) have the required extracts in their Articles of Association.
However this does not exclude alleged fraudulent activity by the Registrar.

My stance would be that the registrar took the risk of sending a valuable document via normal post and in this instance the valuable document never arrived. They bare the responsibility for ensuring delivery of such a valuable document.

My position as well.

If the cost of sending by secure post is expensive than they should at least get a certificate of posting to prove to the client that it was sent out. At the moment there is no fee for doing so.

Precisely ......

wriggly

Sir_Lunchalot wrote: »

You might think, like I did, that companies should issue certificates by secure post, but when I challenged our Company Secretary on this, he contrasted the high cost of doing so against the low number that are reported missing, and I have to admit that his case was pretty compelling.

If a business makes a choice to save money by using a lower grade of post, surely they are then responsible for consequential losses due to making that decision.

In this case, the company (Capita) are attempting to benefit from using a cheaper and less secure method of posting AND to pass on the subsequent costs of loss to the receiver.

oneye14

I have it on good authority that, if the company Registrar (in this case CAPITA) does not provide evidence of postage then they cannot use the argument of being lost in the post. Furthermore, the Company Secrtetary has a fiduciary duty towards Shareholders to prevent possible fraudulent activity by the Registrar - the loss being intentional for financial gain.
This is a legal argument we are using against Equiniti.