vouchedfor - utter rubbish!

littlejaffa

Following the article here - I contacted a local IFA via the website 'vouchedfor'

The MSE article claimed 'vouchedfor' are "...offering free ..financial planning sessions .....a financial healthcheck ...to get advice on areas such as the best mortgage, saving for a home, or planning for retirement"

The IFA that contacted me was very clear in saying the 'free' session was for them to take my information only - gathering all the details they could about me - they would not give any information/advice/planning in this session at all - if I wanted them to do anything with all the information they'd gathered about me - i'd have to pay them.

If you actually want advice - it will cost.

Since when did MSE encourage us to give our detailed financial info to someone - and advertise it as a freebie that they didn't charge of to harvest our info?

Has anyone actually had a good experience with this company?
Not impressed MSE..NOT impressed.

(rant over!)

Gromitt

When did you call them?

Considering you are posting now I'm assuming you did not contact them 2 weeks ago when the offer was on. It ended on the 1st December.

dunstonh

The MSE article claimed 'vouchedfor' are "...offering free ..financial planning sessions .....a financial healthcheck ...to get advice on areas such as the best mortgage, saving for a home, or planning for retirement"

That is a bit of a marketing spin on the part of MSE and vouchedfor. ALL IFAs give the first session free.

If you actually want advice - it will cost.

Correct.

Since when did MSE encourage us to give our detailed financial info to someone - and advertise it as a freebie that they didn't charge of to harvest our info?

MSE has never told people not seek advice from an IFA when they need it.

The IFA wouldnt know anything about the vouchedfor/MSE offer and the offer is bogus as already mentioned that is the norm with any IFA. The first meeting is normally one to see if there is something the adviser could help on and maybe a concept and ideas meeting along with some information gathering.

Rollinghome

dunstonh wrote: »

That is a bit of a marketing spin on the part of MSE and vouchedfor. ALL IFAs give the first session free.

MSE was of course sold to Moneysupermarket.com and the consequences of that are becoming increasingly obvious. They will expect a return on the £87 million they paid for it.

Hominu

Saying that, I did get some useful information from an IFA on vouchedfor during the "Financial Planning Week" (26th Nov to be exact). Of course they tried to stretch out the session as much as possible as only the first 30 minutes were free, but I still got some useful pointers for which I checked up online afterwards.

Really it was more of a marketing/advertising exercise as there wasn't enough time to do anything practical for most people, but I guess thats the whole idea - to show you what an IFA can do for you, and then get you to pay them lots of money.

Now the financial planning week is over, I'm guessing they'll give no (useful) information whatsoever without payment.