Endowment Mis-selling - Don't give up!

vinno65

Hi Dunstonh,
But weren't the new rules governing sales brought in in 1988 why were standards different then only 11 years ago?

regards Vinno

dunstonh

vinno65 wrote:

Hi Dunstonh,
But weren't the new rules governing sales brought in in 1988 why were standards different then only 11 years ago?

regards Vinno

The changes didnt happen overnight. There was a continuing increase in regulation and requirements over the years. For example, the qualifications requirement didnt come in until around 1995.

It wasnt until around 2000 that complaints went on a file against you which followed you. Before then, an adviser could go from company to company and get the slate wiped clean each time. Any complaints that came in years later on the old company were not attributed or recorded against the adviser. The impact of that rule has slowly started to hit. Especially with tied agents with poor records who suddenly found that they couldnt go to another company as the new company wouldnt take them on. When the large salesforces started to close and these bad apples lost their jobs, many of them found they couldnt get a job or had to move to mortgages only which didnt (and still doesnt) have the same regulation.

When regulations started coming in, the recommendation report was called a reason why letter. Over the years it became known as a reasons why not letter as a lot of focus was put on the reasons why you were not doing other things. Indeed, the FSA renamed it a suitability report. No doubt due to the negative slant that it had become. Since around 96-97 onwards there has been a growing realisation that you do have to document things much better and the advice does have to be of a higher standard. I look at reports I did 2-3 years ago and whilst they were compliant and covered what they needed to, todays reports are twice the length and far more detailed. Another thing of course is that computers and software allow for better research, better audit trails and more detailed reports and many consumers expect to see that now whereas years ago they didnt.

vinno65

So what you're saying then is that basically prior to 1995-96 there a good chance you were miss-sold by someone using sharp practice. Or am i getting the message wrong?

regards Vinno

dunstonh

vinno65 wrote:

So what you're saying then is that basically prior to 1995-96 there a good chance you were miss-sold by someone using sharp practice. Or am i getting the message wrong?

regards Vinno

I wouldnt say there is a good chance but I would say that its certainly more likely to occur on older cases than modern cases. Perhaps thats in part relation to most of the insurance company salesforces closing down in the late 90s/early 2000s.

In relation to endowments, the documentation supporting a 1990 case, for example, would almost certainly be not good enough by todays standards and could more easily end up in redress being given. Whereas 1997 documentation would be stronger. Still maybe not strong enough and certainly not by todays standards but certainly an improvement.

I dont know if the following stat is true but I have heard it mentioned a few times in the past and that is that there is only a third of the financial advisers compared to 10 years ago. Many of these problems are legacy issues from people that are not around today. Its todays advisers that face the problems that they left behind.

moneywise_2

the problems is when people got sold endowmenet that is the only avaliable option they got at the time with their mortgages, as most of the financial company present because they know they can make more money out of a endowment policy then term life .

reggie

I think we will 'complain', if only to make a point - not much comfort I know.
What I would like to know is how sound was it to take out a 17 year endowment to cover £25k at nearly £80pm - which is what we did! The mortgage we had was less than 3x salary, so we wouldn't have been stretching ourselves to go for repayment plus we had good life cover in place already.
I'm not holding my breath and when I look back I'm amazed at the trust we gave the guy but there you go.

aligandalf1

Hi I have a slightly obscure question but hope that one of you wonderful people would be able to help out. I'm stuck on the question of income and monthly outgoings way back in 1997. I've tried asking my ex - husband but he's not responded and unfortunately he took care of all the financial stuff when we were married. My question is; is there perhaps a website that could give approximate costs of living in years gone by or does anyone know of a formula that the mortgage companies use to work these things out?
I know this is a long shot, but you have been so helpful I thought I'd try!

thanx

Ali

dunstonh

aligandalf1 wrote:

Hi I have a slightly obscure question but hope that one of you wonderful people would be able to help out. I'm stuck on the question of income and monthly outgoings way back in 1997. I've tried asking my ex - husband but he's not responded and unfortunately he took care of all the financial stuff when we were married. My question is; is there perhaps a website that could give approximate costs of living in years gone by or does anyone know of a formula that the mortgage companies use to work these things out?
I know this is a long shot, but you have been so helpful I thought I'd try!

thanx

Ali

#

If you dont know, you don't know. Do not guess or make something up. State on the form that you do not remember.

vinno65

Hi Aligandalf,
Is this question pertaining to a Mortgage questionaire for the purposes of an endowment complaint? If it is then I suggest you answer the question truthfully in that you don't know. Who would know their exact incomes and mounthly outgoings 10 years ago!. You might also add to your answer that the if the firm you are complaining to had done their job properly at the point of sale then they should have all this info on file anyway!

regards Vinno

webb2511

Hi all you experts on this Endowment Compensation
About a year ago I used one of the companies that offers to investigate the mis-selling claim (I didn't pay them a penny). After several months I had a reply with copy correspondence from Norwich Union saying they were satisfied that they had followed all the regualtions and we had been made aware of the pitfalls(I don't think we were) and therefore no compensation was due.

Is this the final say on the matter, or does anyone know if I can try again?