BestInvest New SIPP Fees

Alexland

gaz77 wrote: »

I had a look at Close Brothers: https://www.closebrothersam.com/individual/what-we-do/self-directed#self-invested-personal-pension

I've not looked at it in detail, but it seems to suggest 0 fees - surely that can't be right? Am I missing something?

Yes you haven't read the Pricing section below on the same page which explains the 0.25% platform fee, etc

jimmeee

Response received.

They are waiving transfer out fees as well as account closure fees for anyone transferring out due to the introduction of this administration fee.

Maelwys

Am in the same boat as the rest, and have recieved the below response this morning:

From: Best [mailto:Best@Tilney.co.uk]
Sent: 10 October 2018 10:08
To: 'Maelwys'
Subject: SIPP Fee

Dear Mr. Maelwys,

Thank you for your email.

Clients wishing to transfer their SIPP’s away from the Bestinvest platform will have the transfer fee waived due to the increase in charges.

Kind Regards

Sophie Toohey
Client Relations Executive

As yet they haven't addressed the account closure fee, which I also asked about, but at least this is something.

For my transfer targets, I'm currently trying to decide between Close Bros and AJBell's "Youinvest". Close Bros would obviously be cheaper for me, but AJBell's pricing model seems to be a bit more robust for small-scale SIPPs so they ought to have less need to introduce any similar account maintenance fees in the near future...

jimmeee

Maelwys wrote: »

Am in the same boat as the rest, and have recieved the below response this morning:



As yet they haven't addressed the account closure fee, which I also asked about, but at least this is something.

For my transfer targets, I'm currently trying to decide between Close Bros and AJBell's "Youinvest". Close Bros would obviously be cheaper for me, but AJBell's pricing model seems to be a bit more robust for small-scale SIPPs so they ought to have less need to introduce any similar account maintenance fees in the near future...

My email explicitly said transfer out and closure fees. So I assume that would apply to everyone.

Close Brothers vs iWeb for me. I think I'm going to go with Close Brothers. Their fee schedule currently shows that are no fees with closing their account and transferring out from them either.

mxo

How long does a SIPP transfer take? They will take the first £25 payment in November. It’s pretty cheeky of them to give such short notice. I used to be a big fan of BestInvest but I’m not impressed by this, they’ve lost a customer.

PParka

This is really disappointing, so it looks like I'll be transferring too. At least they are waiving the transfer and account closure fees.

If anyone else is transferring, watch out for fees to transfer in to another SIPP provider. iWeb will charge £60 to make a transfer in.

The kids have JISAs with BestInvest. I might transfer those to a cheaper platform as well.

PParka

cloud_dog

Both YouInvest and Fidelity are offering cashback for SIPP transfers (value depending on the size).

Just a comment on YouInvest... Whilst I believe YouInvest are a good SIPP provider with a pretty good website and functionality I chose to avoid them simply because of their previous history when implementing new charging structures.

Alexland

cloud_dog wrote: »

Both YouInvest and Fidelity are offering cashback for SIPP transfers (value depending on the size).

This can be very attractive if transferring large pensions and benefiting from their capped platform fees when investing in IT/ETFs. For example the £1,000 of YouInvest cashback on a £200k pension transfer could pay the £100 capped platform fee for 10 years (or longer when you consider the cashback is paid into your bank and you can contribute it into the SIPP to get tax relief).

Alex

Maelwys

mxo wrote: »

How long does a SIPP transfer take? They will take the first £25 payment in November. It’s pretty cheeky of them to give such short notice. I used to be a big fan of BestInvest but I’m not impressed by this, they’ve lost a customer.

AJBell's site says:

"As a guide, cash only should take 2 weeks, equities 4-6 weeks, funds 6-8 weeks and foreign holdings 10-12 weeks."

Very little of my BestInvest SIPP is cash - most of it's tied up in Funds and ETFs, so it might make more sense for me to sell them and THEN transfer the SIPP, and purchase them again afterwards (or take the opportunity to do a proper rebalance)...

gaz77

I got an email back this afternoon:

Firstly I understand your frustrations with the administration costs of the pensions now being directed to yourself to pay. Previously Bestinvest has always paid this fee on behalf of our clients however after the business conducted a review of all fees it was a decision made to pass this fee on to the client.

What does this mean going forward?

As of 25th November 2018 a quarterly payment of £25.00 + VAT will be applied to your account. This is the ongoing administration fee of the pension applied by EBS our custodians. Please note this has no relation to your investments in which we are very competitive with a Tiered service fee of 0.30%.

What will happen if I decide to opt out and seek another provider?

We understand this is a change to the terms & conditions you signed up for and we are willing to waive any transfer and exit fees based if you decide to change provider.

Once again I wish to offer my sincere apologies for the inconvenience this has caused. If you do wish to discuss in more detail please don’t hesitate to contact a member of the team on 020 7189 9999 or email best@bestinvest.co.uk

Kindest Regards

So at least there won't be transfer/exit fees.

Who exactly are EBS? Do they supply custodian services to other SIPP platforms? If so, it might be worth waiting a few weeks to see if others put their fees up too