Serps

shallwehaveacoffee

Just been reading on facebook that the next big scandal could be the mis selling of serps.
There is a company called serps reviews that is saying if you had a serps policy you could be short and people are winning compensation.
Does anyone know if this is true as my husband has one of these policies.

mania112

http://www.ftadviser.com/2013/02/04/ifa-industry/companies-and-people/sesame-to-probe-member-firm-following-poaching-concern-oNRDWKgUvWc8KO2Vc3z9NL/article.html

greenglide

people are winning compensation

I really hate the term "winning" when used to describe compensation.

I also wonder what the true level of misselling of all these things (especially PPI) truly is and how much the rest of us are paying to keep the PPI and other misselling gravy trains going?

honizz

Hi, I haven't posted for a while but thought I would share my experience. I did contract out of serps and used a company to look into it.

I think I remember asking for some advice on here about it and was told, I believe by several including Duntonh not to do it as it wouldn't work.

After I won, sorry, after I was awarded compensation, a considerable amount, I was pretty happy.

I did fall into the group of people who should not have won ( sorry not awarded), however, the claims firm were really good and went through everything.

People who write on here don't know everything.

And for all you good folk on here, http://www.fca.org.uk/news/fca-fines-sesame

Sesame aren't white than white it appears either!
H

magpiecottage

honizz wrote: »

And for all you good folk on here, http://www.fca.org.uk/news/fca-fines-sesame

Sesame aren't white than white it appears either!
H

I'm not sure what relevance this is - it relates to a business called Keydata. A number of Sesame advisers did recommend it. However, as far as I'm aware, nobody used it to contract out of SERPS.

magpiecottage

honizz wrote: »

I think I remember asking for some advice on here about it and was told, I believe by several including Duntonh not to do it as it wouldn't work.

After I won, sorry, after I was awarded compensation, a considerable amount, I was pretty happy.

No doubt you are happy but I checked the record of Ombudsman decisions today. There is not one case where a complaint about contracting out of SERPS is recorded as upheld.

Around 15 complaints involving SERPS have been upheld. However, they have all been upheld for something else, not contracting out.

So I think DunstonH is right.

Two of those 15 were actually upheld for churning - replacing the policy and generating income (out of the customer's pension fund) for the adviser.

That MAY have been beneficial to the consumer in the long run, if the old plan had a higher annual charge. However, you would need to check this very carefully. If you are thinking of moving a plan, always ask to see projections of retirement benefits from both the old and new provider using the same underlying returns.

There may be good reasons for choosing a more expensive plan but without the projections, you cannot make an informed decision because you cannot tell what the long cost will be for you.

magpiecottage

On this thread, honizz says, "I definitely didn't want risk when I opted (coerced) out of Serps."

If that is true, then it would amount to a missale. However, in the absence of evidence that no risk at all is wanted, FOS looks at the "pivotal ages" of the provider at the time (this is the age above which the provider calculated it would not be worthwhile transferring).

If that had been passed at outset it would tend to uphold the complaint otherwise would consider whether the earnings were likely to produce sufficent payments into the plan to reasonably justify the costs. If it is high enough then it would look to reject the complaint.

An insurance company might have lower pivotal ages because of relatively high costs. This tended to be those relying on their own salesforce. Those using IFAs were competing with one another and so tended to have lower costs and higher pivotal ages.

As honizz claims to have never wanted any risk, it looks she should now have her funds entirely in funds guaranteed not to fall in value. She would need to take independent financial advice about which is best.

magpiecottage

If you think you have been missold a pension - whether a SERPS one or a transfer or anything else, it is free to complain yourself.

If you ask the insurance company, they will tell you the firm responsible for asking who a complaint should be addressed to and normally able to give contact details.
[EMAIL="emma.goldsmith@pifinancial.co.uk"][/EMAIL]

gadgetmind

My wife and myself contracted out of SERPS and it's one of the best things we ever did. It also looks like we contracted back in at the right time too.

When we moved our protected rights pots in 2011, they were worth £58k between them, and this was maybe two decades of contributions for me and only a few years for my wife. They are now merged with everything else but would be worth close to six figures by now.

Terry_S_2

Just to help, I saw a link for serps reviews on facebook and decided to try it out.
They seemed more interested in my pension and finding the best or better deal for me than my current arrangement.
Clearly this would come with a fee attached so, after sorting the pension I asked about the serps element and they said it didn't look like I had much of a case but I was welcome to try myself if I wanted to and they would send me the forms but it had nothing to do with them. So, me thinking I had nothing to lose I proceeded.
Initially I received a letter from my original pension provider, the one I was with when I contracted out, and it said that I was indeed entitled to compensation. It would be a very difficult process to calculate exactly how much I would be entitled to but should I wish to proceed then just sign the form and return....so I did.
About 3 weeks later I received an offer of £14,000 which I obviously accepted. A few weeks later the money was paid directly into my bank account.


So it does work for some.

sevenhills

I contracted out, and took out a small private pension, the pension was stopped when I changed my bank details.
I got £10k from my private pension and £33k from the serps. I cashed it in a few months ago, in order to put a deposit on a house.
So the flexibility of being able to cash it in at the age of 55 has been very usefull. I believe I still qualify for the full state pension, so nothing lost.