advice needed re reclaiming mis sold stock share isa

questagirl

Hi, in approx. 2000-2001 I was advised by nat west bank to invest in a minimum risk stock share isa. approx. £3,000, they advised that it was a very good investment and that the stock market was in very good status and that I would get a good return, Within the year -18 months it lost £1,500. I cancelled the ISA and transferred the remainder to my investment isa. In the newspaper recently an advert appeared by a firm of solicitors indicating that banks (inc nat west) may have given mis information or mis sold these ISA,s. As I know these solicitors charge I rang nat west bank and they have said without the ISA account number they cannot help me,they were unwilling to help me further. Please can anyone advise me of what I could try next? thankyou

pat_cashmoney

You should have left the money there for another 10+ years, then maybe it would have been a good investment.

dunstonh

In the newspaper recently an advert appeared by a firm of solicitors indicating that banks (inc nat west) may have given mis information or mis sold these ISA,s.

You will probably find they are not solicitors but a claims company.

Within the year -18 months it lost £1,500. I cancelled the ISA and transferred the remainder to my investment isa

Ok, that works against you as you already held risk based investments. Investment performance is not grounds for complaint. Incorrect risk assessment is but was the risk much different to the investments you already held?

As I know these solicitors charge I rang nat west bank and they have said without the ISA account number they cannot help me,they were unwilling to help me further

Even if you do find it, there is the probability that you are timebarred. You get 6 years from commencement or three years from being reasonably aware of a problem to make a complaint (which gives you the longer). 6 years was 2007 and three years from sale of investment was 2004/5. So, they could quite easily timebar you.

Wilkins

questagirl wrote: »

Within the year -18 months it lost £1,500.

About 50%, as did virtually every other equity based investment. Somewhere in the T&C's there would have been a disclaimer to the effect that a stock market investment can go down as well as up.

I cancelled the ISA and transferred the remainder to my investment isa.

So, you bought high and sold low, crystallising your loss. Had you waited a few years the price would have recovered and you would have had the dividend stream on top.

Please can anyone advise me of what I could try next? thankyou

If the T&Cs were not made accessible and it was not explained about stock market volatility, then you may have a case in principle, but at this distance I think you will find it hard to pursue it.

Investment performance by itself is not evidence of mis-selling. That only applies if you were actively misled as to the degree of risk you were taking on.

jimjames

questagirl wrote: »

Hi, in approx. 2000-2001 I was advised by nat west bank to invest in a minimum risk stock share isa. approx. £3,000, they advised that it was a very good investment and that the stock market was in very good status and that I would get a good return, Within the year -18 months it lost £1,500. I cancelled the ISA and transferred the remainder to my investment isa. In the newspaper recently an advert appeared by a firm of solicitors indicating that banks (inc nat west) may have given mis information or mis sold these ISA,s. As I know these solicitors charge I rang nat west bank and they have said without the ISA account number they cannot help me,they were unwilling to help me further. Please can anyone advise me of what I could try next? thankyou

What did you transfer into? A S&S ISA is an investment ISA so you have sold one investment and moved into another? Not a great move to do just because the price is lower.

Strange how when investments drop people sell but if Tesco drops the price of something everyone flocks in.

After 13 years I really can't see that you have a case and you only had a loss because you sold - if you still held it now you would be sitting on a very tidy profit.

questagirl

thanks to the members who kindly answered my plea for advice re: investment advice. As you probably guessed I am very "green" re garding investments and returned the remainder of my stock/shares ISA to my investment ISA account because I thought there would be no money left to gain interest. It appears I was Wrong. lesson learnt. So thanks for your valuable advice. x

bowlhead99

Hi,

I agree with the other posters who suggest that if you held a variety of stock market based investments, and you held one of them while it declined in value by 50% and then sold it at a low to buy another investment, you are not going to find it very easy to claim compensation from someone else for your poor investment choice within your own portfolio of investments. Especially if you don't have any actual record of the account which Nat West ran for you - account numbers, actual amounts involved etc.

You say you were mis-sold because you were 'advised that it was a very good investment'. Without a copy of the 'advice' that you said you received, and particularly that this was apparently almost a decade and a half ago (and at least a decade since you decided you would sell the investment and go and buy something else with the proceeds), it is extremely diffcult to see how you could now suddenly decide you didn't make as much money as you would have liked to make during that 1 year to 18 month window and to go and accuse someone of mis-selling you a product. Basically your chances of compensation would seem to be somewhere between zero and none.

I have recently got home from work via an extended session at the pub and so my brain may not be at its sharpest, so please do not take this as a negative comment. But I read your reply and see that:

questagirl wrote: »

As you probably guessed I am very "green" re garding investments and returned the remainder of my stock/shares ISA to my investment ISA account because I thought there would be no money left to gain interest. It appears I was Wrong. lesson learnt. So thanks for your valuable advice. x

I do not understand what you are trying to say. I understand each of the words as they are written in English which I speak but overall the paragraph doesn't make sense.

You had an investment in a stocks and shares-based ISA which could lose money; it cost you £3000 but then it reduced in value to about £1500. You sold it and put the £1500 into another investment ISA. OK, I can see how that would happen, and maybe the decision to do that was a good one or a bad one depending on how your other investment ISA deployed the £1500 versus how the £1500 would have stayed invested in the Nat West investment ISA over the course of the last 12 years or so, to deliver a financial return.

But what does 'I am very "green" re garding investments and returned the remainder of my stock/shares ISA to my investment ISA account because I thought there would be no money left to gain interest.' mean ?

You sold out of Stocks and Shares Investment ISA 1 to buy Stocks and Shares Investment ISA 2 because you thought there was 'no money to gain interest' ? How did you expect that Fund 2 would then make money for you instead, if not by investing the £1500 for some sort of return? Could Fund 1 not have done that for you? If there was no significant money left to gain any interest, how much interest did you expect that the new Fund 2 (or the old Fund 1) would be able to make for you, and how did you choose to take the decision to follow one plan or the other?

Did someone give you advice to move to sell Fund 1 and add the proceeds into Fund 2? With the benefit of hindsight, was it the best option? Without the benefit of hindsight, simply considering what options were available to people in 2002 with £1500 to spend, who specifically (if anyone) was it that wronged you? Or are you just saying that back when you had £3000, you made an investment in the stock market and nobody informed you that the stock market could go down as well as up, so your money was invested against your wishes?

Cheers

DiamondLil

I assume the op means cash isa when talking about "investment isa" ??
I don't know why, but many folk use the terms "invest/investing/investment" to describe cash isas.

Eco_Miser

I imagine it's because so many banks/building societies and National Savings used the term for their longer term deposit accounts.