Scottish Friendly

planteria

ok, i didn't realise he was breaking forum rules. my position is that i think it is good to see people from product providers opening themselves up to discuss products with forum users.

mind you, a lady came on here from another provider and when i expressed similar welcome i was accused of working for the company too:dance:

planteria

he/she has certainly been clear.

fwiw, i think if the rules prevent product providers from adding to the discussion, the rules should be changed. i'd be delighted to see Amex, MBNA, Barclaycard, HSBC, III, HL staff on here chipping in...and having to take it on the chin when appropriate too;)

Vortigern

planteria wrote: »

and with he/she has certainly been clear.

Not really clear at all. The link to Scottish Friendly can be seen only by those who bother to read his user profile.

planteria wrote: »

fwiw, i think if the rules prevent product providers from adding to the discussion, the rules should be changed. i'd be delighted to see Amex, MBNA, Barclaycard, HSBC, III, HL staff on here chipping in...and having to take it on the chin when appropriate too;)

The rules don't prevent company reps from posting, the reps just need to seek permission, and make it absolutely obvious that they are company reps. See postings by reps from Lloyds Bank, BT, Eon and others.

planteria

Vortigern wrote: »

Not really clear at all. The link to Scottish Friendly can be seen only by those who bother to read his user profile.

but nlovatt made it clear in his first post (now removed) that he was posting in a personal capacity, and drew attention to his user profile. there was nothing untoward, hidden or underhand here.

neillovatt

Thanks planteria. I was genuinely trying to have a product discussion to understand the position but sounds like the administrators aren't particularly interested in such a dialogue.

Seems bizarre as it's easy enough to create a hidden profile but I would have thought that more value could be added all round from someone who works in Scottish Friendly.

dunstonh

but I would have thought that more value could be added all round from someone who works in Scottish Friendly.

And that position requires the person to seek approval from the board and give the full disclosure so people know the status of the poster.

Archi_Bald

planteria, I am not intending to engage in a debate over nlovatt. As you have been a site member since 2007, you should be aware of the forum rules and not try to make new ones. We are all guests here, the forum is owned by MSE, and they make the rules.

Just a final few notes from me on the forum rules that are relevant to the posts that you are defending:

No employee of any firm is allowed to advertise products/services in any way on the forum, whether in a private or official role, and no matter how honourable you believe your intentions to be.

One of the rules nlovatt broke is:

Users are allowed links in profile pages, but please don't mention them in your posts or signature in any way

The official company reps active on the boards adhere to a strict code of practice that wouldn't allow the promotion of products such as a friendly society savings plan or a packaged ISA or a specific fund or a specific fund platform. To quote from the forum rules:

The primary aim is to allow reps to help MoneySavers who have issues with the company - providing redress or instruction on how to work with it better. It is not, and must never been seen as, an avenue to sell or promote products.

You can read the entire rules yourself: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/site/forum-faqs?_ga=1.170231720.946927082.1412175346#top

NB. As I was typing this, nlovatt appeared with his alter ego, neillovatt. So may be my one and only open post on this matter addresses both of you.

planteria

dunstonh wrote: »

And that position requires the person to seek approval from the board and give the full disclosure so people know the status of the poster.

i get you dunstonh and Archi, the rules are there to be observed, and it seems that nlovatt didn't follow the procedure. and as an employee of a financial services company, i can understand that he should have done. but he did draw attention to his user profile and i maintain that there was nothing untoward, hidden or underhand here.

planteria

Archi_Bald wrote: »

NB. As I was typing this, nlovatt appeared with his alter ego, neillovatt. So may be my one and only open post on this matter addresses both of you.

yes, i hope neillovatt gets approval to contribute to the forum. and that others follow suit.:T

bowlhead99

The idea of consumer discussion forums is that people can share experiences and opinions about the investment issues they face and how they might like to go about investing.

The experience is spoiled if the sales and marketing director of the product under discussion is going to join in and promote his products and kindly explain just why it is that his business thinks you might like to buy the product.

We can probably explain the products and the USPs between ourselves just fine: has relatively high percentage fees (necessary to accommodate small minimums and a desired level of profit margins for the provider); has a restricted product range (which some might like because you don't have to think about lots of different choices and opportunities); why 'with profits' schemes are perhaps OK (because the returns are in some way smoothed and potential losses minimised, even though you don't really know what you'll get out if you want to exit at any particular point and you might make a loss if you get out any time before or after year ten) and so on.

Personally I don't invest in this sort of thing as I understand investing concepts and have a portfolio that invests in a variety of different markets... I would be curious to know how the assets are allocated amongst shares, property, bonds, cash etc, but don't have much of a basis on which to make a judgement whether to invest into this one at all or what I should expect in different market conditions. If I click on 'the detail' it is extremely thin on detail. The product page doesn't really explain what the underlying investments are or give examples of how they have performed for their investors in the past.

It gives a pretty graph to see what returns you 'might get back from this policy'... clearly an exact return can't be projected but 'we can give you a rough idea'. That 'rough idea' amounts to a bar chart that says if the investments give a low return of 2% then after fees you will get a low return and if they give a higher return of 8% then you will get a higher return and there is a caveat that you might get an even higher return or an even lower return and you might lose an unspecified amount of money. So, the return could be pretty much anything.

The Key Facts explains that the underlying fund in which it's invested has a variety of assets, and "Any growth in the fund is determined by Scottish Friendly based on the profits we make and how we decide to distribute them to our customers. There is no guarantee that the price of the Unitised With-Profits fund will grow in the future, only that it will never fall", except elsewhere it does explain that they will make adjustments to your exit value if they need to, and actually it might result in you getting back more than you put in, so the fact that the underlying fund price will 'never fall' is scant protection.

So, basically this is an investment which might lose a bit of money or might make a bit of money. Seems like it won't set the world alight; the fees at 1.5% are relatively high so whether the underlying fund is high risk or low risk, there is quite a bit being skimmed off for the manager. Elsewhere you can find a fund platform at 0.25% a year with plenty of multi-asset portfolio funds from 0.25% a year to 0.8% a year on top of that core fee for running the platform inside an ISA wrapper. A huge variety of investment trusts can be bought straight from the fund managers at 0.6% to 1% a year and might not even require an ongoing platform or holding charge, just some transaction costs when you exit.

Obviously if you only have £10 available per month you might think that fee rate is OK because the other options are even more expensive or don't exist. But if you can afford to invest several hundred pounds a year you can probably find something more efficient and transparent for your long term investing journey, IMHO.

This type of investment scheme has its fans and its detractors and will be more suitable for some people than for others. Personally it's not for me. Someone else might say it is for them. There can be a reasonable discussion. But having the marketing director of the investment company pop up and offer to answer questions about why we might like to invest with him, does not make our interactions and discussions on this board any more useful. His opinions will be heavily biased towards his products and he is unlikely to give product information that isn't already being given on the website of his regulated investment firm. And if he is going to explain why he is better than other investment groups you might prefer instead, then it's only fair to have their CEOs and marketing directors on for a right of reply.

That rapidly becomes unworkable for a site that isn't trying to be misconstrued as promoting, or providing any kind of financial advice about, the availability or suitability or relative merits of different investment options for an individual user.