Clubfinance Skandia CRA

janeausten26

I'm looking into the Skandia CRA through Clubfinance and wanted to see MSE-ers thoughts on this service. I recall reading a post by Gatser who was very pleased with the service.

I noticed that the Skandia CRA is now on Charge Basis 3 following the RDR. (The fixed investor charge of £68.50 is no longer open to new account holders) The charges still seem pretty reasonable and the choice of funds is pretty outstanding. Can anyone comment on Clubfinance in general or the useability of the Skandia platform/charges etc.? Thanks!

Sobryma

They are very good outfit and the Skandia product is pretty good too. I only moved away as I wanted a Discretionary/Advisory route and they couldn't find a way to get that to work.

dunstonh

Skandia used to be a very good provider and they still do the actual job quite well (although all platforms do their basic job well). Their pricing isnt great at the moment. Although until superclean pricing is known, we wont know who are the winners and losers. Historically, Skandia had the highest platform payments. Whether they can get similar rebates post platform review only time will tell. Their website is falling behind others and too much needs to be done by paper. That said, I still have my pension with them but will decide once pricing on platforms and assets has settled. Although, I havent been placing any new business with them.

jamesd

Unless you have to start now for some reason, how about just waiting six months for more clarity about pricing from all providers?

What sort of money is involved? Maybe over £80,000, when the new Trustnet Direct might be a good deal - or not, it's not quite started yet. What sort of investments would you use, funds, shares, ETFs? Pricing differs for those things between platforms. What sort of trading level each year, again something where pricing differs?

If you need to do it this tax year, one of the stakeholder pensions with low transfer out cost might be a useful approach for a while.

Gatser

janeausten26 wrote: »

I'm looking into the Skandia CRA through Clubfinance and wanted to see MSE-ers thoughts on this service. I recall reading a post by Gatser who was very pleased with the service.
!

Thanks JaneAusten26.... and for the record I am still very happy with my Skandia/Club Finance arrangement.
I transferred part of my pension to them and ClubFinance were excellent in helping on this (it was not a straight forward transaction!)
My next test will come in the next 12 months as I look to commence the TFA and drawdown. I hope you find their fees as competitive but look forward to hearing your findings/decision.