iii - For a simple portfolio

horace972897

Hi

I'm approaching the value in my SIPP where moving to a fixed fee rather than % fee online broker is required to keep costs down.

iii appear to be the cheapest for what I need however after reading the iii thread intermittently for nearly two years I'm kind of put off.

I get the impression that the mega thread about iii, which started off asking the questions I have about them, has really turned into a journal of the problems people have had.
That said (and i really have read a lot of the thread over the years so I'm not just fishing for the TL;DR) the problems people seem to have, appear to be with the more complicated accounts. (I know, I know, this should be simple stuff for them to deal with)

By more complicated I mean those than require: Switches to clean, dividends handled, tax calculations for non wrapped accounts etc. etc.

I just want to hold Vanguard LS and possibly a couple of other funds in the their ACC form.

Can they handle that? Does anyone have current experience of them for this kind of investment handling?

masonic

They should be fine for buy and hold, clean class, accumulation funds, that don't require tax reclaims. In other words, if they don't need to take any action on your behalf, then they don't really have anything they can get wrong.

le_loup

masonic wrote: »

if they don't need to take any action on your behalf, then they don't really have anything they can get wrong.

Don't bet on it.
You have to make at least six transactions with them:
Open account
Transfer cash
Buy units
Sell units
Receive cash
Close account.
in addition to paying their fees periodically.
Sometimes in life, cheapest is not always best.

TheTracker

I have no qualms with them as I use them very little. I make three transfers in per year (isa, sipp, trading) which have always gone fine. I buy a bunch of funds once or twice a year, occasionally selling to rebalance or use CGT. Reviews of any service vary hugely according to how you use the service and what you want out of it. Often people have chosen the wrong service for their needs.

Linton

Me also^^^^^^^^

masonic

le_loup wrote: »

Don't bet on it.
You have to make at least six transactions with them:
Open account
Transfer cash
Buy units
Sell units
Receive cash
Close account.
in addition to paying their fees periodically.
Sometimes in life, cheapest is not always best.

Although I've had a myriad of issues with iii, I've never had any problems with any of these things you list (I haven't yet tried to close an account, but I've done all the others). I don't recall others mentioning problems transacting etc. either.

horace972897

Thanks for the responses all

Surreyboy

I have been with them for over a year. Like you, I have a fairly basic mix of funds. You'll find the staff less informed and competent than HL for example. But if you are reasonably confident as an investor , you should be ok.

le_loup

masonic wrote: »

Although I've had a myriad of issues with iii, I've never had any problems with any of these things you list (I haven't yet tried to close an account, but I've done all the others). I don't recall others mentioning problems transacting etc. either.

Find my posts on the big thread.
No really, don't waste your time, you know these people are capable of (fuc) sorry, messing up anything.

colalba

One of the things which kicked off the big thread was the transfer in of isas/sips/normal accounts and you say your are transferring your sipp. Now admittedly there was a huge peak of transfers at that time and it was a long time ago. I don't know what the experience has been of recent transfers. Guess all I can say is I wouldn't recommend them to anybody I actually liked


Like others I haven't had any issue with buys/sells.


Also worth noting I think that they do the admin for Trustnet Direct.


If you do go with them I'd make sure your funds were clean class before doing so to remove at least one possible pitfall.

JohnRo

I ditched iii before the whole RDR thing kicked off the platform merry go round.

On the surface the website looks slick and the basic account service seems fine but behind the scenes I got the impression they're headless chickens and when things go wrong they usually do in a big way. They also weren't paying dividends anywhere near close enough to on time which irritated me enough to clear off.