interactive investor vs iweb + share LISA options

Mistermeaner

hi

Looking to transfer an old workplace pension (£450K) currently with scottish widows and my missus pension (£110K ) currently with HL to either Interactive investor or iweb

I also have a share ISA with charles stanley (£35K) i would look to transfer as well

Cost wise very little between the 2, website I think i prefer II but would welcome views and comments from folk who use them


Slightly separate question: Me and the missus both have share LISA's with HL - the charges upset me but there seems to be so little choice in folk offering LISA's - any options to look at here with reduced charges

?

Thanks

Alexland

Mistermeaner said:

Looking to transfer an old workplace pension (£450K) currently with scottish widows and my missus pension (£110K ) currently with HL to either Interactive investor or iweb

Rather than going for a fixed price SIPP have you considered a capped price SIPP for example Fidelity cap their percentage fees at £45 pa if holding ETFs, ITs or individual company shares? Might be cheaper than both iWeb and II if you don't trade much and are happy with those types of investment. Obviously SIPPs are limited to £85k FSCS protection and those underlying investment types have no FSCS protection. Your workplace pension probably has full FSCS protection.

Mistermeaner said:

I also have a share ISA with charles stanley (£35K) i would look to transfer as well

Depends on how often you trade and what investments you hold but iWeb or Lloyds could be cheaper for a medium sized S&S ISA. Still if you put the SIPP with II then you are paying for the other account types anyway. I don't like how II's pricing causes their customers to put so many eggs in one basket.

Mistermeaner said:

Slightly separate question: Me and the missus both have share LISA's with HL - the charges upset me but there seems to be so little choice in folk offering LISA's - any options to look at here with reduced charges

As the LISA gets bigger AJ Bell will be cheaper than HL as the 0.20% difference in platform charge (0.45% versus 0.25%) will be more significant than the occasional AJ Bell £1.50 fund trading charges. AJ Bell can be particularly good value if you want to hold ETFs, ITs or individual company share as they cap their charges at £3.50 pm although live trades cost £9.95 there is a workaround of doing a 'one-off scheduled trade' (setup then cancel) at £1.50 that some of us use. If you are already over 40 you might not have any transfer options.

Mistermeaner

If you are already over 40 you might not have any transfer options.

i am indeed over 40 - is it not possible to transfer a LISA past 40? (i get you can't open a new one but would have thought transfers are allowed)?

Thanks

Alexland

Mistermeaner said:

i am indeed over 40 - is it not possible to transfer a LISA past 40? (i get you can't open a new one but would have thought transfers are allowed)?

I guessed it was likely by the value of the workplace pension. The LISA rules allow transfers and the old provider must support the process but the problem is finding a new LISA provider who is happy to start the process for you. As far as I am aware there are no S&S LISA providers that will currently accept new transfer requests from over 40s. The last in the market offering this were EQi and Onefamily but not anymore. Still that might have recently changed so you might want to check a few providers for yourself.

If the LISAs are big enough you might want to look at the capped charges with HL for holding ETFs, ITs and individual company shares. The capped price is £45 pa but their live trades are £11.95 and the scheduled £1.50 trades can only be used for DD contributions not existing account balance money including bonus. They also have a limited choice of investments that you can do regular trades against but it does include some good ones. The lack of choice and flexibility on doing LISA regular trades is why we moved from HL to AJ Bell before I turned 40.

Mistermeaner

there seems to have been very little take up of S&S LISA's judging by the lack of provision out there - v strange!

Alexland

Also if you choose to go with iWeb (or sibling brands Halifax or Lloyds Share Dealing) you might want to read about the current extended transfer times people have been complaining about on the Savings & Investments forum. We have our ISAs with iWeb and consider them perfectly adequate but then we are not trying to do a transfer at the moment. A few years ago we were seeing regular complaints about II service quality but that seems to have stopped now and they even get the occasional compliment.

pip895

The other option is to look at changing over to ETF’s in your HL Lisa charges are then caped at £45 I believe - only worth while if you don’t trade much though..  You also need to look at the fund versions available - HL do have access to some lower charging fund classes so you could claw back some of that 0.45%.

Albermarle

Looking to transfer an old workplace pension (£450K) currently with scottish widows and my missus pension (£110K ) currently with HL to either Interactive investor or iweb

What is wrong with the SW pension ? Cost? lack of investment choice?

Some workplace pensions can be very competitive . I have a SW one with a lowish  platform charge and some funds only costing 0.1 %.

Mistermeaner

Albermarle said:

Looking to transfer an old workplace pension (£450K) currently with scottish widows and my missus pension (£110K ) currently with HL to either Interactive investor or iweb

What is wrong with the SW pension ? Cost? lack of investment choice?

Some workplace pensions can be very competitive . I have a SW one with a lowish  platform charge and some funds only costing 0.1 %.

primarily limited fund choice 

the platform itself charges 0.17% and then fund range from 1% (small caps) to 0.08% for a global tracker - based on my portfolio it is averaging at about 0.37% (platform + funds) so is more or less equivalent to II in terms of charges but will only get more expensive as funds grow.

I would also be able to move my ISA to II as well at no extra charge thus avoiding the current 0.35% i pay charles stanley (albeit on only 35K at the moment but i want to grow this pot as well)