Sanity Check

grey_gym_sock

hmmm ... is 0.69 the exact number of unit you have, or is it just rounded to 2 decimal places on this screen?

i'd think the prices should match on the trade date, 27/09/12. (and your purchase price is 0.65% higher, not 0.25%.)

JohnRo

TCA wrote: »

JohnRo, probably not related to your query, but out of interest, how and when do they deduct the quarterly custody charges? Looks like you just pay for the funds themselves as part of signing up to B.I?

A "periodic charge" of £15 was taken by DD from my investment account (not the ISA) on 22/10/12, whether the charging schedule is universal or individual though I couldn't tell you, sorry.

hmmm ... is 0.69 the exact number of unit you have, or is it just rounded to 2 decimal places on this screen?

i'd think the prices should match on the trade date, 27/09/12. (and your purchase price is 0.65% higher, not 0.25%.)

Yes, I can only assume it is rounded to two decimal places, even so I would have expected to receive £99.75 worth of units given the 0.25% purchase fee / dilution levy. That does still tie in with decimal rounding though at 0.6947, it's just a shame I can't see a 4 decimal place value on BI's platform.

TCA

JohnRo wrote: »

A "periodic charge" of £15 was taken by DD from my investment account (not the ISA) on 22/10/12, whether the charging schedule is universal or individual though I couldn't tell you, sorry.

Just so I get the mechanics of this right (as thinking I might follow suit and use B.I.) - was the payment for the first funds purchases taken by debit card and you just had to set up a direct debit for the fees? Or is pre-loading of your investment a/c required for all these transactions?

JohnRo

First task was to apply and get account details, as part of that process a direct debit mandate for the investment account(s) was completed.

Opening an ISA account with them means you'll get two investment accounts, a taxable investment account and a tax free ISA account.

• I've also opened two additional designated investment accounts which is a superb feature they offer but that's not relevant to your enquiry.

I'll waffle on about what I did it might help, a manual bank transfer funded the ISA account initially and then used that to purchase the Vanguard trackers, which took a few days longer to complete than I was expecting, while waiting for the ISA transfer to take place.

Both accounts (Investment & ISA) operate in exactly the same way for moving cash in and out from a central user portal, the ISA allowance rules obviously apply to the ISA account.

It seems all service charges are processed through the Investment account by DD, as expected, then it doesn't affect ISA allowance but I can't recall having to fill in any more than just the one DD mandate.

When purchasing a fund on the hoof it looks to me like the account you want to hold it in needs to be pre loaded with enough cash to make the purchase, so you can't (I may be wrong) just purchase a fund in an account with an "available to invest" cash balance of zero and have them process an automated DD to take the amount required.

However the monthly savings plan does just that so quite what the difference is exactly, I'm not sure.

The difference between a purchase is a £100 minimum where the planned monthly saving feature allows a £50 minimum investment.

Hope that helps, or have I managed to avoid the question entirely

saveonarola

TCA wrote: »

JohnRo, probably not related to your query, but out of interest, how and when do they deduct the quarterly custody charges? Looks like you just pay for the funds themselves as part of signing up to B.I?

The quarterly charge is paid in arrears, deducted around 20 January, April, July and October if you held a non-commission paying fund at any point and for any length of time in the preceding quarter (1 October-31 December, 1 January-31 March etc).

Like JohnRo, I just filled out a direct debit mandate when I signed up and the custody charge is taken automatically.

EDIT: I'm pretty sure this charging system is universal, but obviously do check before diving in because it makes a difference. If you're investing close to the end of a quarter, you can save £15 just by delaying until the next quarter.

TCA

Thanks to JohnRo and saveonarola for the replies. I'm therefore not sure if the procedures are the same if you're opening a normal investment account, as opposed to an ISA. When you apply for the former, the only options are to "buy funds" or "transfer your funds" (I'd be buying), and then you have to select funds. Seems odd to do this if pre-loading with cash is required anyway. I haven't seen anywhere on the website about monthly savings plans either, unless I'm going blind from looking at this stuff.

Will try their "Chat" facility and see if all becomes clear.

Edited: Here's the answer post-chat. And it was like pulling teeth. Excruciating.

1) Make selections for investment account and pay on the spot by debit card. It took about 10 minutes to get through to the guy that this wasn't a direct debit and that the latter can take up to 2 weeks to set up.

2) Said direct debit can then be used for a monthly payment plan and presumably as said above, for the custody fees. He confirmed they are taken quarterly in arrears but towards the end of the calendar quarter, not immediately on account opening.

And before I could get any more questions out I got:

"I must now go into a meeting but it's been a pleasure speaking to you. If you have any further issues, please email best@bestinvest.co.uk. Thank you."

I guess he finished at 5 o'clock!

JohnRo

I think it's straight forward, the problem is just getting to grips with how they operate.

Apply for the account(s) (GIA, ISA, SIPP) which includes setting up a direct debit.
Fund the accounts using your debit card to make direct fund/stock purchases.
Use their monthly savings feature to purchase via DD on 25th of each month
Expect any platform fees to be taken by DD via the GIA account.

TCA

JohnRo wrote: »

I think it's straight forward, the problem is just getting to grips with how they operate.

I get it now. I just find the staff and their answers on these chat things drive me mad. Starting with the first response and I quote: "the first payment is via Direct Debit payment" - wrong as I ultimately find out after half a dozen more attempts, and vague stuff like "you provide the bank details and we take it from there" - talking about a debit card payment.

Anyway, end of rant. It doesn't put me off them but doesn't fill me with confidence either. I imagine they're all much the same. It would help if the website itself was a bit clearer about account set-up and operation I suppose.

JohnRo, any idea of the charges for buying an ETF under the monthly payment scheme?

JohnRo

transaction costs are £12.50 reduced to £7.50 once your account balance exceeds £50K

https://select.bestinvest.co.uk/media/16102/keyfacts-services-fees.pdf

They don't have the right platform for ETF trading - it's very basic and quite slow.

I was looking at IWeb.

TCA

Thanks. I thought perhaps maybe there was a low cost option for regular monthly purchases, like Interactive Investor and TD Direct at £1.50 per ETF, but I guess not. Was working on the basis that I couldn't see any info at all about monthly investing so maybe it was just hidden. Unit trusts it is then!