Fidelity Platform Fee Question

Amoux

Hi, I apologise if this is a daft question. 

I understand that Fidelity have a service fee £45 cap on ETFs within an ISA or SIPP. My question is how does this apply if you have more than one account, say an ISA and a SIPP? Is the £45 cap on both accounts or would you be charged £45 per individual account? I have read the charges document, many times, but I'm still not sure. 

If it's the former then it essentially gives me an ISA for free minus any trading costs (I already have a SIPP with Fidelity paying £45 per year). It sounds all a bit too good to be true which is why I ask. 

Alexland

My understanding from others on the forum who have checked their statements is Fidelity pro-rata the £45 charge between the ISA and SIPP accounts and apply a proportion to each. We are similarly already paying the £45 cap on our SIPPs but still don't use them for ISAs as for us iWeb works out even cheaper on trade fees than Fidelity with similar no ongoing charges.

granta

I called them recently with this exact question and was told that the £45 cap is per wrapper, so if you have an ISA and SIPP, it would be £90. I haven't yet moved my ISA over (they only allow full transfers in which is a pain for me) so not tested out the fees in practice.
So would be good to hear confirmation from someone who does hold both products with the ETF cap.

Alexland

granta said:

So would be good to hear confirmation from someone who does hold both products with the ETF cap.

It was discussed a few months ago.

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/78765757/#Comment_78765757

Albermarle said:

Anyway I just had a look at my latest quarterly Wealth statement to check.
I have a mixture of funds and ETF's/IT's in both a SIPP and an ISA.
They take the fees separately for each .  I was able to confirm that the £45 for the ETF/IT part is a cap across both SIPP and ISA and it is charged in proportion to what is held in the SIPP and ISA.

granta

Good to know thanks! I've learnt to take anything customer services tell me with a pinch of salt.

Amoux

Thank you both and for linking to a previous discussion about this. If Albermale has confirmed it in practice then I will trust he is right, but I'm surprised that granta was told differently. 

It does seem like an unbelievably good deal to spread the cap across accounts and my trading costs are already quite low as I have only one global ETF in my portfolio

granta

Amoux said:

Thank you both and for linking to a previous discussion about this. If Albermale has confirmed it in practice then I will trust he is right, but I'm surprised that granta was told differently. 

It does seem like an unbelievably good deal to spread the cap across accounts and my trading costs are already quite low as I have only one global ETF in my portfolio

It doesn't surprise me! It was the only question the person could answer (albeit incorrectly clearly); the other questions either could not be answered or were also answered incorrectly (I had to explain to him that you were allowed to transfer an ISA mid- tax year as long as you transferred all of it as he was insisting it was not allowed; also told me you couldn't transfer previous tax years' ISAs as that was 'too complicated').

I only have one global ETF but considering holding a second similar one purely for provider diversification purposes.

Albermarle

After reading these posts I checked again my own fees.
The problem is that I have a mixture of funds , ETF's and IT's in both ISA and SIPP .

With values of the funds moving around ( down ), quite a lot recently it is quite difficult to be absolutely sure how the tiny amount of money involved with the capped fee is split, as the funds platform charge is calculated on an average values over the preceding month .
I still think it looks like the £45 is split between ISA and SIPP, but I wouldn't swear my mother's life on it .

On the other hand on a relatively substantial amount on the platform , the difference in monthly fees either way is miniscule .
The investments probably move by that amount each second of the day .

From the document 'Doing business with Fidelity' I found this statement which would indicate the £45 is over your whole Fidelity accounts .
In instances where a Customer holds Brokerage Assets in their Investment Account, along with other accounts such as ISA and / or SIPP and the Service Fee accrued on the ISA and / or SIPP reaches our Charging Limit of £3.75 per month for these assets across your accounts (£45 a year), we will pro-rata the amount due across all the customer accounts, including the Investment Account. This means that even though there is no Service Fee accrued on the Brokerage Assets in an Investment Account, the £3.75 is spread at a Customer level across the accounts held. So, a small portion of this £3.75 charge may be deducted from the Investment Account.