Leaving HL without transfer charges

[Deleted User]

Hi,

thanks for all the advice.

After contacting them with a formal complaint, I have recently received my letter from HL offering 0.25% and to waive exit fees and charges for a month.

I have decided to transfer to II and have sent off the S&S Isa transfer form, so hopefully things go smoothly.

However I also have a Fund and Share account with HL, (shares in two companies) same account number as S&S Isa.

Does anyone know if offer in the letter covers the F&S account as well as the S&S Isa, as to transfer the F&S account is £25 per stock.

Thanks.

gowgowuk

[Deleted User] wrote:

Hi,
Does anyone know if offer in the letter covers the F&S account as well as the S&S Isa, as to transfer the F&S account is £25 per stock.

Thanks.

I don't have the letter in front of me, but my understanding is that the offer applies to both accounts.

masonic

[Deleted User] wrote:

Does anyone know if offer in the letter covers the F&S account as well as the S&S Isa, as to transfer the F&S account is £25 per stock.

Unless they have made the offer specifically in relation to your ISA, then it should cover any sub-accounts you hold.

There is an additional (different) transfer form over at II for unwrapped holdings.

[Deleted User]

Hi,

gowgowuk wrote: »

I don't have the letter in front of me, but my understanding is that the offer applies to both accounts.

masonic wrote: »

Unless they have made the offer specifically in relation to your ISA, then it should cover any sub-accounts you hold.

There is an additional (different) transfer form over at II for unwrapped holdings.

thanks for the replies.

The letter says, 'we will apply a flat percentage fee of just 0.25% on all funds held under your Vantage client number referenced above'.

Does 'funds' mean unit trusts etc, or shares also/

I'm thinking might as well transfer the shares as well to keep things tidier.

Thanks masonic, had already downloaded the form, but reneged on sending it with the ISA form.

masonic

[Deleted User] wrote:

The letter says, 'we will apply a flat percentage fee of just 0.25% on all funds held under your Vantage client number referenced above'.

Does 'funds' mean unit trusts etc, or shares also/

Looks to me like that does not cover the custody fee for shares, which has been set at 0.45% for as long as I can remember. 0.25% is still expensive for shares, since there is no charge to hold these elsewhere, and you'll pay no more if you decide to move them to II.

kfsimpson

What is the problem with new providers accepting an in specie transfer of new clean funds? I am looking to transfer from HL to iii, but first am trying to reduce the number of funds held and have asked HL to purchase new style clean units. I'm also trying to use my full CGT allowance this tax year and intend to do so again in April. These are all funds held in a non ISA wrapper.

This will mean that I will hold two classes of unit in some funds, so I was intending to ask HL to convert the existing units to new clean ones before the transfer. HL have advised, as noted below, that this will not incur a CGT liability.

This had seemed to be the best way to do it, but having discovered this thread and read the posts, I'm even more confused about the whole process! I'm especially worried if the transfer will take weeks or months, as I had been thinking to switch the ISA wrapper funds into cash and transfer as cash.

On R4 Moneybox last weekend they had were expressing the opinion that HL are likely to end up having to review their charges in the next twelve months in response to the competition. I'm beginning to wonder whether I might be better sitting tight for a while longer and letting the market settle down, but the temptation of £80 pa at iii compared to over £1000 at HL is considerable ....

Thanks to all who have already posted and to anyone who can explain more about the transfer in specie of clean funds. Always good to hear the experiences and thoughts of others!

liquidityftw wrote: »

First post for me and may I start by thanking all prevoius contributors for such excellent work here.

Seems to me there is a problem in the making with these superclean/exclusive share classes. Consider the situation where a H/L account holder has such funds and wants to transfer to another provider.

The other provider will not be able to accept them (at least the couple I have spoken to say this is the case) and logically the fund manager will not want to allow it either. So the option of an in-specie transfer dissappears and one will be obliged to sell and transfer cash and rebuy. This has cost implications - not least being out of the market for a (possibly protracted) period of time.

[As a side issue and as its a bugbear of mine I think this out of the market cost is often underestimated. Clearly markets could go up or down so in any specific situation one can gain or lose. but if we assume markets are going to rise (and if not why are we investing?) and if we assume 6% a year (not outlandish and makes the maths easy) then a month out costs .5% on average. so if shifting a 100k porfolio thats £500. Quite possibly bigger than the line by line transfer charges people are routinely focusing on. So do the sums before deciding to cash and transfer just to avoid a few £25 charges] rant over back on topic

If however the holding is in a General Investment Account as opposed to a tax wrapper the situation is worse as (if there is a gain) CGT will be triggered. H/L and some other forums have suggested that by buying back within 30 days the B&B rules will apply so eliminating the problem - but I think this is wrong. The B&B rules only seem to apply if the same class of share is being bought and clearly it is not. The HMRC guidance talks about an exception where conversions are done on behalf of the investor by a platform as being treated as CGT neutral but do mention that where an investor receives cash and then reinvests themselves this would not be the case. so by allowing the conversion at H/L one could enter an expensive trap.

I have checked with H/L and they will not be offering the "normal" clean class of a fund where they offer a superclean class so the option to do that conversion at H/L first then transfer in specie does not exist. It occurs to me it may be possible for a while to switch to dirty - then transfer that - then new provider converts to clean - but not sure that is possible - and in any event in a couple of years dirty will not exist.

Now I should add that the HMRC site is pretty opaque on the point and a lot of this information seems to be about a year old (there was a topic on the candid money site then) so i would be very intersted if anyone has a differnt view or more up to date info. Thanks.

masonic

kfsimpson wrote: »

What is the problem with new providers accepting an in specie transfer of new clean funds? I am looking to transfer from HL to iii, but first am trying to reduce the number of funds held and have asked HL to purchase new style clean units. I'm also trying to use my full CGT allowance this tax year and intend to do so again in April. These are all funds held in a non ISA wrapper.

Note that the first fund conversions are not expected to actually take place until June.

There is only a problem if HL has negotiated a special deal on the clean units it converts your funds to - if this is the case, it may not be possible to transfer them in specie because that class of units may not be available outside HL. This will only affect a small number of funds (HL's wealth 150+ ??)

Doctor_Who

masonic wrote: »

There is only a problem if HL has negotiated a special deal on the clean units it converts your funds to - if this is the case, it may not be possible to transfer them in specie because that class of units may not be available outside HL. This will only affect a small number of funds (HL's wealth 150+ ??)

Are the HL "superclean" funds a different share class, or have they negotiated a lower AMC on the standard "clean" fund? Transferring to another provider in-specie would be easy if the latter (you'd just pay a slightly increased AMC), but a nightmare if the former!!

masonic

It would appear to be the former, in some if not all cases.

bossymoo

It all sounds so complicated. I have a HL ISA and fund and share acc. Both hold a variety of funds. It says the exit fee is per holding - does that mean per fund? If so it would cost me a small fortune to transfer out. I also wanted to bed some from the F&S into the ISA come the new tax year.

I don't really know where to start tbh.