Pension mismanagement, advise needed

debrabird

Brynsam said:

debrabird said:

AnotherJoe said:

debrabird said:

AnotherJoe said:

By "froze" do you mean "sold everything" ?

No, it’s turned into cash, and frozen at the amount it was worth at that point.

What do you mean, "no" ? So You sold the underlying investments and have left them as cash? They didn't turn into cash by magic.  Had you left them alone it's likely they would have substantially recovered in value and possibly even be worth more now. 

Unless you received advice to do that I don't see how you expect to get recompense. It was seemingly your decision alone to sell the investments and leave them as cash. 

This is partially true, however the substantial loss occurred, after I had requested that the pension be put on hold (held with the pension company at its cash value) whilst the complaint process unfolded, so that I could eventually move pension company. The loss occurred after I had made this request, which was not carried out, so had they fulfilled my request, then I would not have lost this money, therefore I feel that this direct mistake, on their part (caused as a result of the initial mismanagement), Is the reason I lost so much money. Surely, I should be compensated for a loss that wouldn’t have occurred had the pension actually be ‘paused’.

Responses are greatly appreciated.

So what is the basis of FOS finding for the pensions company? There has to be more to it than this.

Because I don’t believe that the FOS recognise that the initial issue of mismanagement contributed to the eventual loss of money. I think another complaint may need to be raised regarding the request to hold the pension (cash- see last post) not being being actioned, the loss of money being the direct result of this. 

debrabird

Marcon said:

debrabird said:

dunstonh said:

This was taken to the ombudsman in May 2019, and was waiting for there outcome, all this time, I had no advisor and no help whatsoever, when the markets dropped with Covid, my cautious fund, lost a lot of money, a lot more than I think a cautious fund should have lost.

And did it go up again after the markets recovered?

The ombudsman first decision is finding  for the pension company, which I have now, objected to, so it now going to a final decision.

This bit is confusing.    The company agreed to some redress but you turned it down as you wanted more.   The FOS has now ruled against you.  Is that in the whole outcome (i.e. you get nothing) or that the company's original offer was considered suitable?

 So much injustice has gone on here.

What injustice do you perceive?    It is unclear from your post as you appear to have been offered compensation but rejected it because you wanted more.    What exactly is the issue that is causing you problems?

Hi, because of having no advisor, I panicked and froze the fund, which is still the situation 
The company agreed at the very beginning to some redress, but I wanted the finders fee, also returned, they said no, and to take it to the ombudsman, which I did in May 2019.
So I have waited all this time for them to investigate the case, rightly or wrongly.
As far as the pension provider is concerned, the advisor had not actioned, any of my requests, to the draw down pension, I was a vulnerable client, as I had just gone through a very traumatic divorce, and he had lied and said they had been actioned, when he had done nothing of the sort, this left me in financial trouble, the trust with him and the company had been lost.
Hope this makes more sense.

This doesn't seem to tie up with your latest post. Not clear if you are complaining about the advisor or the pensions company.

If the situation is as simple as you describe - you asked for all your pension funds to be moved to a cash fund and no action was taken, and as a direct result of the lack of action you lost a lot of money - don't you think the ombudsman might have agreed with you?

The initial complaint was regarding the advisor, however what has happened as a result of the complaint (loss of money, see above) is the fault of the pension company, the FOS fails to see the connection, which is why I feel maybe a second separate complaint is required ie the loss of money. 

Thrugelmir

Retrospective choice of investment. Difficult to see that holding firm. Given it was your choice to switch to cash.  

coyrls

Thrugelmir said:

Retrospective choice of investment. Difficult to see that holding firm. Given it was your choice to switch to cash.  

As I understand it the grounds for a second complaint is that the request to switch to cash was not carried out.

dunstonh

As it was a chain of events occurring due to a specific event, the FOS would normally review it as a single complaint

Keep_pedalling

debrabird said:

AnotherJoe said:

So thats different to your initial complaint, but maybe you do have a leg to stand on due to their tardiness / ignoring your request to sell up.

OTOH from your initial post you did nothing for nearly a year to get them to go into cash.

What was the value in May 2019 and how does that compare to the value when you did eventually sell?

That is true, however the loss of money is as an eventual result of the first issue, as it occurred whilst waiting for the FOS decision, but yes, the direct cause being that the request to put the pension on hold was not actioned. The loss was in excess of £40,000 (that is not a typo). I have a letter acknowledging my request to put it on hold. However I’m unsure as to wether this is enough to get they money back. 

Putting on hold is not the same thing as converting to cash. If you used that wording on your instruction then it nothing would be sold or purchased.

John_

OP, what is it that you think that you are asking for when you wanted it “put on hold”?

Obviously the fund manager can’t stop the investments changing in value, but you say that you didn’t want them to be sold, so what were you actually requesting that they do?

Brynsam

debrabird said:

Marcon said:

debrabird said:

dunstonh said:

This was taken to the ombudsman in May 2019, and was waiting for there outcome, all this time, I had no advisor and no help whatsoever, when the markets dropped with Covid, my cautious fund, lost a lot of money, a lot more than I think a cautious fund should have lost.

And did it go up again after the markets recovered?

The ombudsman first decision is finding  for the pension company, which I have now, objected to, so it now going to a final decision.

This bit is confusing.    The company agreed to some redress but you turned it down as you wanted more.   The FOS has now ruled against you.  Is that in the whole outcome (i.e. you get nothing) or that the company's original offer was considered suitable?

 So much injustice has gone on here.

What injustice do you perceive?    It is unclear from your post as you appear to have been offered compensation but rejected it because you wanted more.    What exactly is the issue that is causing you problems?

Hi, because of having no advisor, I panicked and froze the fund, which is still the situation 
The company agreed at the very beginning to some redress, but I wanted the finders fee, also returned, they said no, and to take it to the ombudsman, which I did in May 2019.
So I have waited all this time for them to investigate the case, rightly or wrongly.
As far as the pension provider is concerned, the advisor had not actioned, any of my requests, to the draw down pension, I was a vulnerable client, as I had just gone through a very traumatic divorce, and he had lied and said they had been actioned, when he had done nothing of the sort, this left me in financial trouble, the trust with him and the company had been lost.
Hope this makes more sense.

This doesn't seem to tie up with your latest post. Not clear if you are complaining about the advisor or the pensions company.

If the situation is as simple as you describe - you asked for all your pension funds to be moved to a cash fund and no action was taken, and as a direct result of the lack of action you lost a lot of money - don't you think the ombudsman might have agreed with you?

The initial complaint was regarding the advisor, however what has happened as a result of the complaint (loss of money, see above) is the fault of the pension company, the FOS fails to see the connection, which is why I feel maybe a second separate complaint is required ie the loss of money. 

If FOS 'fail' to see the connection, it either suggests your complaint was made in a hopelessly confused/confusing fashion (in which case they would have asked you for clarification), or they have told you they don't see a connection. Which one is it?

Malthusian

After ringing head office, they said no requests had been made by the advisor, I then raised a complaint against the advisor, which was acknowledged by head office, along with my request to put the pension on hold, this was never actioned.

In the context "put on hold" would most likely have been taken to mean "stop the income" or "stop the transfer of the pension into the new drawdown plan", not "switch into cash". Although it's not clear what exact words the OP used at the time.

More to the point, this happened in March 2019 or earlier (as the FOS complaint was made in May 2019), long before the Covid crash, so one way or another the fact that the OP was not in cash in February 2020 was not the adviser's fault - they'd been sacked many months ago. And the OP hasn't said they actually cashed out in a panic and missed the subsequent recovery, so it's not even clear that any loss has arisen.

The OP would need rock-solid grounds to challenge the FOS decision in a judicial review and it seems unlikely from the information given that there are any.

debrabird

dunstonh said:

As it was a chain of events occurring due to a specific event, the FOS would normally review it as a single complaint

They seem to consider it as apart of the overall complaint, but see the loss of money as a related but separate issue.