Aberdeen standard life charges!

jammersp67

I have been able to finally access my standard life shares which are now aberdeen standard life shares and there have been dividends over the years. To get these dividends i have to pay the following charges below.
Is this right - legally - can they charge this much, and has anyone else had similar dealings, and do i just accept this, as i am appalled quite frankly, as the dividends do amount to a lot of money.
Also, why didn't they investigate when these cheques were returned to them or at least stop the cheques being sent.
Any ideas thoughts please?

"There are 20 uncashed cheques on your shareholding totalling £xx. 

 Before we can reissue your dividend(s) we need you to pay a fee – this goes towards our administration costs and the charges we have to pay to stop the original cheque(s).

 For dividends over £30 we charge £12 each and for dividends over £100 we charge £15 each.

 The total fee we need is £xx

 Please send us a cheque made out to ‘xxxxx’.

Once we’ve received the fee we need we’ll issue your replacement cheque(s) within 21 working days."

 

eskbanker

jammersp67 said:

why didn't they investigate when these cheques were returned to them

If the cheques were returned to them then that presumably suggests that they didn't have your correct postal address?  If this is the case then you wouldn't have a leg to stand on as it's your responsibility to ensure that you inform them of any changes to your address, but twenty uncashed cheques suggests ten years of biannual dividends so did you just forget about them all this time, despite them amounting to 'a lot of money'?  Why didn't you choose to have them issued straight to your bank or automatically reinvested - cheques are an expensive and laborious method of handling dividends so it's unsurprising that they seek a contribution to their costs.

Anyway, ultimately it's your call as to whether the juice is worth the squeezing but I can't see any basis on which you could challenge them....

eskbanker

Deleted_User said:

On the basis that you are asking them to issue a single replacement cheque to cover all the missing dividends, so why don't they charge you once?

They refer to "the charges we have to pay to stop the original cheque(s)", i.e. there will be twenty of these charges....

dunstonh

Is this right - legally - can they charge this much,

Banks charge for stopping cheques and the figures quoted are in line with expectation. HSBC, for example, charge £10 per cheque.

Plus, the work involved in finding out if the original cheques were presented or not is time consuming.  Who is going to pay for that if you dont?

eskbanker

Deleted_User said:

eskbanker said:

Deleted_User said:

On the basis that you are asking them to issue a single replacement cheque to cover all the missing dividends, so why don't they charge you once?

They refer to "the charges we have to pay to stop the original cheque(s)", i.e. there will be twenty of these charges....

If they come back with that, perhaps try asking how much they actually pay their bank per cheque stopped.

They don't need to 'come back with' anything - they've already explained what they charge and why (in the knowledge that it's twenty cheques), and are under no obligation to disclose internal costs.  That's not to say that negotiation would be a complete waste of OP's time but it's generally a mistake to overplay your hand if under a mistaken illusion that the other party has a weak position, so IMHO OP would be better served taking a humble approach rather than going in with all guns blazing, i.e. 'is there anything that can be done?' rather than "i am appalled quite frankly"....

eskbanker

Deleted_User said:

eskbanker said:

That's not to say that negotiation would be a complete waste of OP's time but it's generally a mistake to overplay your hand if under a mistaken illusion that the other party has a weak position, so IMHO OP would be better served taking a humble approach rather than going in with all guns blazing, i.e. 'is there anything that can be done?' rather than "i am appalled quite frankly"....

That's more constructive advice. You could have started with that. :shrug:

For the avoidance of doubt, I'm not recommending that OP tries to negotiate, but simply observing that if they choose to do so then it wouldn't be prudent to wade in with the attitude that SLA are somehow at fault here!

naedanger

Or if you want to wade in then wait until you have received your money. So:

1) write with your payment while stating your dissatisfaction at being charged so much,

2) once you have received your money send them a formal complaint stating that you believe the charge is disproportionate as you doubt there is twenty times the work of dealing with one lost cheque. 

Then if you feel strongly about it follow the complaint process until the end. You probably won't get anything for your trouble but unless people express their dissatisfaction the registrars may assume those affected by their charges have no complaints.

masonic

Perhaps these charges are the result of their recent rebranding exercise, where it appears they need to buy a vowel.

Albermarle

The firm said its new name "Abrdn" would still be pronounced "Aberdeen", but that the rebrand would make it "modern" and "dynamic".

I wonder how much the consultants got paid who came up with  ABRDN ?

eskbanker

Albermarle said:

The firm said its new name "Abrdn" would still be pronounced "Aberdeen", but that the rebrand would make it "modern" and "dynamic".

I wonder how much the consultants got paid who came up with  ABRDN ?

They must have been at their most creative when dropping three Es....